A Real Life Example of Message
Distortion
G. Huber cites the following example from the U.S. Army First Air Cavalry
Division in
DIVISION H.Q. TO
BRIGADE
(WRITTEN ORDER)
"On
no occasion must hamlets be burned down."
BRIGADE TO
BATTALION
(RADIOED ORDER)
"Do
not burn down any hamlets unless you are
absolutely
convinced that the Viet Cong are in
them."
BATTALION TO INFANTRY
organization (RADIOED ORDER)
"If
you think there are any Viet Cong in the hamlet,
burn it
down."
organization COMMANDER TO
TROOPS (SPOKEN
ORDER)
"Burn
down that hamlet."
As we have seen, when information passes through a
message/communication channel, there is a good chance that the original meaning will be
transformed between the place it was initiated and its final destination. Sometimes
a change in meaning is relatively harmless or even humorous as in the Halley’s Comet
example. Unfortunately, changes in meaning can have drastic consequences, as
illustrated in the example of the U.S. Army First Air Cavalry Division message in
As discussed earlier, when a message moves from one person to the next, it inevitably gets altered or changed in some ways. Sometimes those changes are minor (e.g., word choice or order). Other times they are more serious (e.g., tone of the message, details lost or misconstrued, or it can be misinterpreted entirely and passed on). Occasionally, the message is so altered as to not be recognizable or to be completely misunderstood.