Should you be active listening, critical listening or empathic listening? How to decide

Active Critical or Empathic Listening – Which is Right and When?

Active listening is a critical communication skill in which you fully engage with the person you are speaking with. But active listening isn’t the only type of listening, and differentiating them can be confusing. How do you know how you should be listening?

• Actively
• Critically
• Analytically
• Reflectively
• Comprehensively
• Deeply

or one of the many other ways you might read about?

The truth is that many of these describe exactly the same processes. However, we believe there are three key types of listening that everyone should be familiar with. This enables you to use them as you would any other communication skill. By gauging the situation you are in, you can deploy these skills to forge stronger business relationships and influence others.

Active Listening: The Default State

Active listening is the foundation requirement for any conversation. It ensures you get the most out of the interaction, and it is also good manners.

Active listening is about focusing on what the other person is saying, and showing it through eye contact, nods, and other verbal and non-verbal ways. This is the most important foundation for establishing a strong connection with the person you are speaking with.

Active listening also means paying equal attention to the words that are being said and the person’s body language. A great deal of communication occurs unconsciously from the way we sit, move and gesture when we speak. Observing this consciously can deliver much greater insight, particularly whether you feel someone’s body language supports what they are saying, or whether they might be thinking or feeling something else.

Most importantly, don’t fall for the common misconception that active listening is only about making the other person feel listened to. Equally important is actually understanding what they are saying. That means letting the other person finish their sentences without interrupting, and asking questions if you are unsure about any of their points.

Another key technique is to periodically summarise the speaker’s main points. This is why active listening is as much about making sure you understand someone as showing you are paying attention.

Critical Listening: Evaluating Information

Beyond active listening, you may be in a situation that demands critical listening, also known as analytical or evaluative listening. This describes being able to carefully analyse what a person is saying so you can make a valid point. Naturally, this is essential in many workplace situations, such as discussing group tasks that require the input of many people.

Unfortunately, critical listening is harder than it sounds for many reasons, most notably because of certain characteristics and cognitive biases of the human mind.

The key issue is our subjective perspective of life. We process everything that people say in the context of our own experience. Even if we consciously try to think objectively, we can still fall into the trap of thinking subjectively, simply because we do not have the same experience as the speaker.

As much as possible, critical listening demands we adopt a neutral perspective in order to fully appreciate what is being said. To achieve this, ask questions so you can consider why someone believes what they are saying before you reply.

Many other cognitive biases can impact our ability to listen and think critically. There is the mind’s tendency to reinforce things we already believe rather than question them, and the appeal of simple concepts that we understand rather than complex ones that we don’t. In almost all cases, situations are more complex than we initially appreciate, and success comes from understanding this complexity.

Another issue is our tendency to want to speed conversations up if we think we already understand a point. We might do this by finishing what the other person is saying, or interrupting them with, “I know that.” Not only does this break one of the fundamental rules of active listening, it also has the potential to slow the conversation down. The speaker may not have got to the point they wanted to make before they were interrupted, and now have to try to convey it again.

Empathic Listening: Understanding Feelings

Empathic listening is slightly different to critical listening as it places the emphasis on understanding the speaker’s emotions. This is why empathic listening is the key tool used by counsellors and therapists.

Empathic listening can be particularly important if you are a line manager who has to deal with conflict and performance management. For example, you can use it to identify the root cause of a dispute, or how a team member really feels about something. Empathic listening is also essential when dealing with complaints from staff members, particularly discrimination and harassment.

When empathic listening, pay much closer attention to body language. There are many telltale signs that a speaker might be saying one thing but thinking and feeling something else. For example, avoiding eye contact, shifting position or taking longer pauses before answering. Noticing this gives you an opportunity to ask similar questions to try and get to the bottom of an issue.

Empathic listening benefits from the same periodic summary as active listening. Again, this is as much about actually understanding how a person feels as showing them that their feelings have been acknowledged.

Putting it Together

As you engage in conversation, start by making sure you are actively listening. As the conversation develops, determine whether it is more valuable to focus on information or feelings.

Naturally, certain situations demand all three types of listening at the same time, which can be extremely difficult. Ideally, use critical thinking first to understand the information the person is conveying. Once understood, ask a question that encourages the person to deliver their points in a slightly different way so you can focus on identifying their feelings.

Active Listening, Critical Listening or Empathic Listening?

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Active Listening