3.4 Communication Barriers & How to Work Around Them
Key Takeaways
- A communication barrier is anything that stops your message arriving as intended — physical, language, sensory, cognitive, emotional, cultural, or organisational.
- Volume is never the fix: repeating the same words louder is the single most common barrier-handling error tested on the BST exam.
- Signs that look like non-compliance — no eye contact, delayed answers, repeated questions — are frequently sensory, cognitive, or crisis-related rather than defiance.
- Use short single-step instructions, plain words, one speaker at a time, and confirm understanding by asking the person to say the plan back.
- Every barrier you worked around belongs in the report: what the barrier was, what you did about it, and how you confirmed the person understood.
3.4 Communication Barriers & How to Work Around Them
Why this matters for the BST exam: One of the four published learning outcomes in the Communication Skills unit is to "identify strategies for effective verbal and non-verbal communication in situations where there are communication barriers." Exam items on this outcome are scenario-based: a person is not responding the way you expect, and you must choose the response that removes the barrier rather than the one that escalates.
What Counts as a Barrier
A communication barrier is anything between your intended message and the other person's understanding of it. Barriers are rarely the other person's fault, and almost never deliberate.
| Barrier type | Examples on a BC security post | Signal you are hitting it |
|---|---|---|
| Physical / environmental | Loading-bay noise, nightclub music, wind, glass partition, distance | Person leans in, cups an ear, answers a different question |
| Language | Newcomers, visitors, contractors; BC's public speaks Cantonese, Mandarin, Punjabi, Tagalog, Spanish, French and many Indigenous languages | Short answers, nodding without acting, "yes" to everything |
| Sensory | Deaf or hard of hearing, blind or low vision | Watching your mouth, not reacting to a call from behind |
| Cognitive / neurological | Dementia, brain injury, intellectual disability, autism | Repeated questions, literal answers, distress at touch or noise |
| Mental health / crisis | Panic, psychosis, acute distress | Rapid speech, fixed focus, apparent non-sequiturs |
| Impairment | Alcohol, drugs, medication, hypoglycaemia | Slurring, delayed processing, poor balance |
| Emotional | Anger, grief, fear, humiliation | Interrupting, raised volume, personalising |
| Cultural | Norms around eye contact, personal space, gender-matched interaction, authority | Averted gaze read wrongly as evasion |
| Organisational | Site jargon, radio codes, acronyms | Blank look at "proceed to the FCC" |
| Physical barrier you created | Sunglasses, mask, hood up, hands behind back, standing too close | Person mirrors your tension |
The Universal Moves
Before reaching for anything specialised, these work on nearly every barrier:
- Close the distance problem, not the personal space. Move to a quieter spot, step out of the wind, get to the same side of the glass. Do not step into arm's reach to be heard.
- Face the person and take the sunglasses off. Roughly half of what you communicate is face, posture and hands.
- Say less. One instruction at a time. "Come with me to the front desk" beats a three-clause sentence with a reason attached.
- Use plain, literal words. Drop idiom ("you're out of luck," "hold your horses"), drop jargon, drop acronyms. Idiom is the first thing to fail across a language barrier and the first thing misread by a literal thinker.
- Slow down; do not turn up. Louder is the classic wrong answer. Slower, clearer, and shorter is the right one.
- Give processing time. Silence of five seconds feels enormous to you and is barely enough for someone under stress or with a cognitive condition.
- Confirm by teach-back. "So where are you going to wait?" A nod proves nothing; a correct answer proves understanding.
Barrier-Specific Strategies
Language. Offer an interpreter — a colleague, the person's companion, a phone translation app, or the client's language line. Use gestures and pointing for direction. Write it down; many people read a second language better than they hear it. Do not use a child as interpreter for anything sensitive.
Deaf or hard of hearing. Get attention first with a wave or a light touch on the shoulder or upper arm if the person is facing away. Face them in good light, keep your mouth visible, do not cover it. Speak normally — exaggerated mouthing destroys lip-reading. Write, or type on a phone screen. Never speak to the interpreter instead of the person.
Blind or low vision. Identify yourself and your role by voice on approach. Describe what you are about to do before you do it. Offer your arm rather than taking theirs. Say when you are leaving — walking away silently strands the person.
Cognitive, neurological or autistic. Reduce the input: fewer people talking, less light and noise if you can control it, no crowding. Ask closed, concrete questions. Avoid unnecessary touch. Allow a support person to stay.
Mental-health crisis. Lower your voice below theirs. Do not argue with, or agree with, delusional content — respond to the emotion ("that sounds frightening") rather than the claim. Create distance and time, and call for police or health resources early rather than late.
Impairment. Short sentences, one idea at a time, repeat calmly, and screen for a medical cause before you assume alcohol. Confirm arrangements for getting the person home safely.
Cultural. Averted eye contact often signals respect, not deception. Personal-space expectations differ. Where a person requests a gender-matched interaction for a search or an escort and you can arrange it, arrange it.
Your own PPE and posture. High-visibility gear, a mask, mirrored glasses and a bladed stance all read as distance. Remove what you safely can and keep your hands open and visible.
Worked Scenario
A contractor at a Burnaby industrial site walks past your check-in point in ear defenders while a compactor runs. You call twice; he keeps walking. You catch up and take his arm.
The barrier was environmental plus sensory: he never heard you. Taking the arm of someone who does not know you are there is how a compliance problem becomes an assault allegation. The correct sequence is to move into his field of vision, wave, wait for eye contact, gesture toward the quieter side of the yard, and only then speak — face to face, one instruction, in plain words.
Document the Barrier
If a barrier shaped the encounter, it belongs in the notebook and the report: what the barrier was, what you did about it, and how you confirmed understanding. "Subject spoke limited English; site interpreter (J. Lam, tenant services) attended at 21:14; subject confirmed he would wait at the lobby bench" is a defensible record. "Subject was uncooperative" is not — it records your conclusion and hides the barrier you failed to address.
Key Takeaway
Barrier handling is a decision tree, not a personality trait: identify the barrier, change the channel or the environment, shorten the message, give processing time, confirm understanding, and write down what you did. On the exam, the answer that raises volume, adds words, or reads a barrier as defiance is always the wrong one.
A visitor with limited English is nodding at everything you say but has not moved toward the visitor desk. What is the most effective next step?
Which approach is correct when communicating with a person who is deaf or hard of hearing?
A guard writes: "Subject was uncooperative throughout." The subject was in fact in acute distress and had asked twice for the guard to slow down. What is wrong with the entry?