Difference Between Active Listening & Passive Listening
Effective listening skills are absolutely essential to good communication. There are essentially two kinds of listeners, passive and active. While both types of listening are better than nothing, active listening tends to promote better relational outcomes. The primary difference between the two is that the goal of active listening is to understand what is being said, while the goal of passive listening is to merely hear what is being said.
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Active Listening: Engaged Non-Verbal Cues
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When someone is actively listening, they use non-verbal cues to demonstrate their interest in what is being said. They may nod, lean forward, make eye contact or exhibit facial expressions in response to the conversation. This encourages the speaker to continue talking and helps them to feel as though the listener is interested.
Passive Listening: No Non-Verbal Cues
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A passive listener provides little to no non-verbal feedback to demonstrate that they are engaged in what is being said. Although a passive listener will usually remain still while the speaker talks, they will not make eye contact, nod or use empathetic facial expressions. The message that the speaker receives is that the listener is hearing them, but is not truly interested.
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Active Listening: Being Focused
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An active listener is totally focused on what the speaker is saying. In addition to ceasing all distracting physical activities, they have suspended irrelevant mental activity and are truly engaged in what the person is saying. As the conversation progresses, the active listener will carefully analyze and digest what they are hearing.
Passive Listening: Acting Focused
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When someone is listening passively, they may appear to be superficially focused on what the speaker is saying, but their mind is elsewhere. Instead of trying to comprehend what is being said, they simply hear it without giving it any additional thought. They may be thinking instead of their own feelings, schedules, problems or ideas
Active Listening: Providing Feedback
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During active listening, feedback and encouragement are provided to the speaker. An active listener may say something like, "That must have been awful," or "Would you mind telling me more about that?" They validate the speaker, summarize what has been said, prompt the conversation to continue.
Passive Listening: Providing No Feedback
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A passive listener provides no feedback to the speaker. After the speaker finishes talking, they may respond with a perfunctory, "OK," or "I understand." They do not validate the speaker, restate what has been said or encourage the speaker to continue talking.
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