Minimal responses

Minimal responses are defined by Pamela Fishman as Monosyllabic utterances such as huh, yeah, mm. These types of words are used during the conversation by men and women to convey their agreement and acceptance. These responses are used to differentiate the two people by listening that how they used these words in conversation. Minimal responses have different forms and that is why; they have different functions. There are various forms of minimal responses that are frequently used in the conversation. “Oh” is the most frequent minimal response that is used by users in the conversations. The forms of minimal responses are also used in TV series to represent their thoughts with their expressions (Geldard, Geldard, and Foo, 2017).

As per my opinion, minimal responses are used by the good listener to encourage the current speaker by showing the interest. However, people used these norms to ask the current speaker to stop the conversation with the mutual understanding. According to my opinion, the forms are used to represent the thoughts in the form of expression such as “Oh for surprising, yeah for acceptance and the others more that express their emotions with expressions. It is necessary for the leader to use these forms in an effective manner so that the opponent will understand the person. The people give the minimal responses in taking the pause for a second to use the form in effective way. Taking a pause helps to understand the conversation due to which they can easily use the forms of minimal responses effectively (Simon, 2018).

References

Geldard, D., Geldard, K. and Foo, R.Y. (2017) Basic personal counselling: A training manual for counsellors. Cengage AU.

Simon, C. (2018) The functions of active listening responses. Behavioural processes, 157, pp.47-53.