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NLP Representational Systems

Have you ever wondered why some people get along so well and hit it off right away and other people when introduced have an awkward silence, or maybe more particularly why are some people be able to get along with anyone they meet.  You might start, if you haven't already, by reading Building Rapport Part 1.  Our Building Rapport Part 2 post (coming soon) will include part of the answer to this question.  For now we want to introduce the idea of Representational Systems that will become a part of the foundation for how to connect deeply with others.

A brief word on NLP models.  Everything we present on the topic of NLP is just a model.  Very often there is good science to go with it, but these models were primarily built based on observing and experimenting with what worked in real situations with real people.  Then models were build to allow others to assimilate the skills and produce the same results.  It's very important to understand and not get too caught up in whether something is literally true, but rather whether its useful (or not) in achieving the desired result.  The way to determine that is to test it.  Nothing you will read in the next 100 or probably 1000 postings on this blog is of any use at all if it isn't used and tested out there in the real world - away from your computer.

 

The model we are talking about right now is called Representational Systems (or lets say "rep systems" for short).  

It basically says that people organize their mental processing in terms of the 5 sensory systems:

• visual
• auditory
• kinesthetic
• olfactory
• gustatory

It means that when someone remembers something the memory is represented using at least one of these rep. systems.  When you think about a house you used to live in you remember the way it looked from the street, or you remember the smell when you walked inside, or perhaps you remember the sound it made as you lay in bed at night, or you remember sitting in a room feeling the warm sun in come in on you.  I'm not sure what tastes you might associate with a house, but there may be some.  The same is true of thoughts that you are constructing or inventing - the thought is rooted in one or more representational systems.

Some representations are more appropriate in some contexts than others.  It makes sense that when learning a tactile skill or sport, kinesthetics are often more important.  When practicing a piece of music, auditory representations might be more useful, and in planning how to re-decorate a room, a visual set of representations may be most important.  It is almost always true that its most useful to make representations that include as many representational systems as possible.

Some people will tend to have a dominant or primary representational system although everyone almost everyone uses all representational systems at various times.  Being able to recognize and match the representational systems that another person is using is extremely useful in building rapport and communicating effectively.

So what does any of this have to do with anything?

Well as it turns out people who use the same representational systems at the same time tend to communicate more effectively.  If someone is primarily visual and you want to explain an idea to them and you tend to operate more kinesthetically and you aren't aware of that, how successful do you think you'll be?  By recognizing your own preferences and how other people use rep systems to represent the world, you can rapidly multiple your results in communicating with others.

So how do you identify the representational systems used by someone?  Well you can observe 3 basic things: physiology, eye movements, and language. 

 

Physiology of Representational Systems

 

Sometimes you can get a general idea of the representation system that another person is using by observing their physiology.  Please not that these are only generalities, it's possible to hold the physiology described while accessing a different representational system, but when you test this I think you'll find it pretty accurate. 

Visual: Often times, a person using visual representations will tend to talk more quickly, their voice may have a higher pitch and they may breath higher in their chest.  They will tend to gesture more as if to paint a picture, and their general orientation with gestures and glances tend upward.

Auditory: May talk medium to fast; breathing will tend to be from the middle of their chest, gestures will tend to be at chest level.  Their voice may tend to be more resonant.  

Kinesthetic: May talk quite slowly; breathing will tend to be lower in the chest and their voice may be deeper; gestures will be slower and lower.

Olfactory/Gustatory: These systems are not usually primary systems and there are not identifiable physiological markers that readily identify them.

 

Language of Representational Systems

 

The words that people use are an excellent indication of how they are representing the world internally.  You might know someone that says, "I see what you mean."  At the very least it's an interesting phrase, but it certainly suggests that the person is literally seeing or visualizing something in their mind, probably some representation of what you said.  If someone says, "I hear what you are saying", chances are they are literally hearing in their mind what you are saying.  You can probably think of a number of words that indicate a particular sense (our next article will contain a detailed list of words and phrases and the rep. system they indicate).

 

Eye Accessing Cues

Next week we will have a series of articles on this.  So stay tuned.

Exercises

For now we recommend a few exercises to get better at noticing:

Exercises #1: Ask a friend to tell you a story of something interesting that they have done.  Listen for different parts of their description that would indicate visual, auditory, or kinesthetic information.  Ask them to re-tell the story, describing the things that they were seeing.  Ask them to re-tell the story, describing primarily the sounds.  Ask them to re-tell the story, describing primarily the feelings (tactile or internal).  With each story, pay attention to each of sensory system.  This will help you practice paying attention to sensory information.  As you watch each story, notice for any changes in physiology, gestures, voice tone, etc.

Exercise #2: Tell a story to a friend or into a tape recorder of an interesting experience that you have had.  Follow the same format above.  Just tell the story.  After the story, notice if there is one sensory system or another that you seemed to prefer.  Re-tell the story with a focus on each of the representational systems.

Exercise #3: Learn ImageStreaming.  This technique, when practiced regularly will help you strengthen your ability to access each rep. system completely.

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