What Is The Importance Of Communication Skills In Health And Social Care

Communication skills are used within care settings to engage within a better conversation. They consist of physical attributes which make conversation and discussion more effective by conveying interest in what the carer/professional is saying.
My first example of a communication skill is body language. Body language is the conscious and unconscious use of physical bodily positioning in order to convey attitude and emotion. Open body language would consist of sitting with a straight back with hands/arms being positioned in a manner which doesn’t ‘block’ the person who you are talking to. This is important as it conveys respect and encourages the service user to speak within the conversation. This would then mean that the service user is more
For example; some cultures consider eye contact with certain people to be aggressive, rude or disrespectful, where as other cultures consider it to be threatening or flirtatious when men and women use eye contact. Also, in many Asian cultures, avoiding eye contact with the opposite sex or someone elder than them would be seen as a sign of respect.
So, if within a counselling session, the service user was looking at the floor instead of at the person, it may be because their culture suggests that it would be flirtatious – and therefore inappropriate to hold eye contact. Consequently, the counsellor would also have to respect the culture of the service user and not attempt to make eye contact with them in order to achieve the care values of promoting equality and diversity, and promoting individual rights and beliefs.
Equality would be achieved because by not trying to make eye contact with the service user, they would be showing respect to the service user, as they would also be showing respect to other cultures by holding eye contact. This would then make the service user feel valued and appreciated by the carer for respecting their