To listen, empathize and do nothing would be considered a weak response. Facilitative listening is a learned skill for most men and must be studied and practiced. She suggests men use their critical thinking function on objects, plans, strategies and reports and their feeling function on people. Interruptions You are in the middle of making an important point in the meeting at work when your male associate interrupts and changes the focus of the discussion. Studies have shown that 97 percent of interruptions in the workplace are by men interrupting women.
Interruptions can be a communication of higher status, dominance or even aggression.
As a general rule, women do not interrupt men. If the interruption is a genuine attempt at intellectual discourse, the woman should feel free to argue her point or even to interrupt the interrupter. In fact, my husband had very little interest in exploring the dynamics of the communication and took most of the messages at face value. According to Murray, women tend to analyze communication for the metamessage, or underlying message, as well as the obvious message. Women are sensitive to the process of communication as well as the end result of the communication experience.