A communicative situation is given by the different elements involved in an act of communication.
The set of elements that intervene in an act of communication is called a communicative situation : the sender; the receiver; the message; the place and time where the act takes place, etc.
The theory of communication indicates that, in the communicative act , a sender is responsible for sending a message to one or more receivers . Said message propagates through a channel and can be understood when the sender and receiver share a code . It is also important that the receiver has knowledge about the referent of the message to understand what it is about.
What is a communicative situation
The communicative situation, therefore, is linked to the specific place and specific time in which all these elements act and interrelate. It is important to highlight that, in fluid communication, roles are constantly exchanged: the person who sends the first message becomes the receiver when he receives the other subject's response, then returns to occupy the role of sender and so on.
In the same way, we cannot ignore the fact that in every communicative situation the circumstances surrounding both the sender and the receiver play a fundamental role. Because? Because they come to positively or negatively influence, depending on each case, this communication process.
Of course, it goes without saying that in any situation like the one at hand, what is called noise can also make an appearance. We can say that this is all the interference that can seriously damage communication between sender and receiver and even make it impossible.
The place and time of the interaction are key in the communicative situation.
Purpose of communication
In the communicative situation, on the other hand, there is always a purpose . This means that communication is established for some purpose, such as making information known or requesting an action from the interlocutor.
For example: on May 8 at 10:30 a.m. , the commercial manager of a company sends an email to the owner of the company to notify him that he has just closed a commercial agreement with another firm. Five minutes later, the owner responds in the same way, congratulating him and inviting him to come to his office for more information. In this communicative situation , thus, the roles of sender/receiver are exchanged once.
In addition to everything stated above, we cannot ignore other relevant aspects that have to do with the aforementioned communicative situation, such as the following:
-The purpose or purpose of the issuer can be very varied and different. Thus, for example, we can determine that it may intend to inform, persuade, excuse, tell...
-In order to know if this communicative moment between both parties is going well and is to their liking, it will be necessary to look at aspects such as the physical proximity or distance between them. However, they will also give a lot of information about the tone with which they are speaking, the postures they adopt, the looks they exchange, the gestures and even the silences that may be generated.
-Currently the message can be transmitted in a wide variety of ways and methods: oral language, written language, email, telephone, WhatsApp, videoconference, letter, fax, telegram...