Paulette Byrd, CTP #1

While reading the introduction to communication studies, I found that intrapersonal stood out to me more than any of the other five forms of communication, including interpersonal communication, group communication, public communication, and mass communication. Intrapersonal communication takes place within oneself.

It stands out because here at Alverno College, we are taught to do reflective thinking and writing often after every major assignment. Over the course of our time here, we complete many self-assessments and that is a form of intrapersonal communication. In the reading, it stated that it helps build and maintain our self-concept. It also helps how we interact with others. Without it, people would not have filters.

The reason I am drawn to intrapersonal communication is because it is the least researched of all the communications. I like challenges and this may be the most challenging to research. The other forms of communication have been written about and researched for many years over and over. To research it may seem difficult because you can never be sure that research subjects are telling the truth about what is going on in their heads. In the reading it stated that it is rare to find course an entire course devoted to intrapersonal communication. Even though it has no discipline devoted entirely to it, you can find it in every form of communication.

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              When it comes to what I want to do professionally, I am still trying to figure it out. Although I have not come to that conclusion, I do know that I find mass communication in relations to the media, very interesting.

                Media controls pretty much all aspects of our lives. We are constantly being told what to purchase and where to purchase it from. We are told how, where, and what to learn. It also has a huge impact on how we perceive other people and places, negatively and positively. We are force fed ads, commercials and songs that tell us what to wear, drink and how to have a good time. They even decide what news is worthy for the public to know and what is not.

                I would like to learn how mass media communication has evolved and how it has become so controlling over our daily lives. I want to know how it is able to get people to emulate stereotypes they see and here in the media. I want to be able to stop that and help people arrive at conclusions and make their own decisions with very little help from mass media communication.