Here are two sample questions that might appear on a typical exam. Guessing probably won’t help with these.

In the communication process model, what happens immediately after the receiver receives the encoded message?

The key to question one is not getting confused between the receiver and the sender, and taking the process step by step. Knowing the parts of the communication process model helps too. If you have to, draw two boxes (or stick figures) to represent the sender and the receiver. What step are we at? What step has just been completed? We know the message has been sent (by the sender) and it has been received (by the receiver). Now what? Well, it has to be deciphered for meaning by the receiver. Deciphering is another word for decoding. The answer for this question is 'C'.

Which of the following is potentially "noise" in the communication process?

The second question is tricky in its own way too. Can you recall what the term is for receiving more information than one can process? In this question, one of the responses 'C' uses a definition of one of the barriers, but not the actual label. The statement in 'C' means the same as information overload, which is one of the four barriers. The other three barriers are perceptions, filtering, and language. Remember that barriers constitute 'noise'. The correct answer for question two is 'D'.