(MCR) Communication Skills for LPSCS Lesson
Communication Skills for LPSCS Lesson
Verbal self-defense is defined as using one's words to prevent, de-escalate, or end an attempted assault.
It is a way of using words as a way to maintain mental and emotional safety. This kind of "conflict management" involves using posture and body language, tone of voice, and choice of words as a means for calming a potentially volatile situation before it can manifest into physical violence. This often involves techniques such as taking a time-out, deflecting the conversation to less argumentative topics, and/or redirecting the conversation to other individuals in the group who are less passionately involved.
Verbal-self-defense experts have widely varying definitions of what it is and how it is applied. These include everything from simply saying no to someone or repeatedly refusing a request to telling someone who has violated a personal boundary what you want. It could even entail a more complicated scenario in which you are called on to refuse to engage verbally with someone manipulative, to set limits, and to end the conversation.
In any definition it is always agreed that verbal self-defense is necessary as a means of enforcing personal boundaries and limits. Part of learning these skills includes learning how to identify communication triggers which cause you negative feelings and, in some cases, what those triggers represent with regards to what personal values the other person is violating.
The abusive types of communication that verbal self-defense is designed to acknowledge and deal with also vary greatly. This includes indirect forms of abuse such as backhanded comments and backstabbing or two-faced behaviors. As well, verbal self-defense is meant to address more commonly recognized forms of abuse such as yelling, belittling, and name calling. Going beyond verbal attacks, abusive behaviors also recognized in the field of verbal self-defense are aggressive posturing (taking a threatening posture or making a threatening gesture), physically interfering with personal belongings, and inappropriately intruding on one's personal space.
Learn more about the police Aikido communication method in the presentation below:
The following presentation focuses on communication skills role playing:
Now, let's see what you've learned. Complete the following activity: