Email: easy to write and easy to misread

The New York Times wrote a helpful article explaining how email dialog has often led to many a misunderstanding.  I think we’ve all experienced this at some point when sharing a personal viewpoint and our email doesn’t convey the true pathos of our remarks. Here’s why:

Face-to-face interaction, by contrast, is information-rich. We interpret what people say to us not only from their tone and facial expressions, but also from their body language and pacing, as well as their synchronization with what we do and say.

Most crucially, the brain’s social circuitry mimics in our neurons what’s happening in the other person’s brain, keeping us on the same wavelength emotionally. This neural dance creates an instant rapport that arises from an enormous number of parallel information processors, all working instantaneously and out of our awareness.

While I’m not sure on the neuron dance mumbo-jumbo but isn’t it so true how email interpretation can be so skewed from the lack of visible or audible expressions from a person.  He goes on to say:

In contrast to a phone call or talking in person, e-mail can be emotionally impoverished when it comes to nonverbal messages that add nuance and valence to our words. The typed words are denuded of the rich emotional context we convey in person or over the phone.

Next time you are confused or heated in an email stop: call or walk to the person on the other end.