Intercultural communication.

Culture affects the language we use, the choice of words and sentences, and our thoughts, feelings and behavior. As we have seen culture also affects our nonverbal behavior with the same gestures having different meanings in different cultural groups. Culture shapes our nonverbal behavior automatically at a cognitive level not requiring reflection. Intercultural messages are understood subjectively from the perspective of the listener. The interpretation of communication is a perceptual process influenced by ingroup values, by the emotions signaled by the nonverbal context, and by cultural stereotypes. These cultural filters are largely unconscious, but that does not minimize the impact of the cultural canalization on effective communication. Intercultural communication is especially difficult since both the encoding as well as decoding of messages is understood using different cultural filters, and evaluating the intent of the communicator is a judgment process influenced by our attributions rather than the content of the message (Gudykunst & Shapiro, 1996).

5.6.1 Obstacles and uncertainty reduction in intercultural communication.

Obstacles that prevent clear and effective communication are present in the contact between people of different cultures. Barna (1996) has discussed several issues that distort meaningful communication. We see the world through our own eyes and therefore often think that people are like us, even when they grew up with very different ideas and values. Again because language is mediated through our own experiences, we naively assume that words have only one meaning when it may have several in the language of the other speaker. We need also to attend to nonverbal signals and understand what they mean in the culture of the communicator since misunderstandings can easily derive from differences in nonverbal meanings. All cultural groups have stereotypes of their own society and other cultures and these generalizations may prevent accurate interpretations or distort the intent of the message. There is also a tendency in all cultures to evaluate the ingroup positively and outgroups negatively and such ethnocentric attitudes are conveyed nonverbally. Finally, Barna noted that intercultural communication often produce anxiety and stress. Dysfunctional thought processes follow stress encouraging people to hang on to stereotypes even when they have proven inaccurate. Effective intercultural communication requires an awareness of these potential stumbling blocks and tolerance in seeking the common ground.

The obstacles discussed above produce uncertainty about the meaning of messages compounded by nonverbal signals that vary between cultures. Different interpretations of such nonverbal signals add another obstacle to intercultural communication producing uncertainty and potential conflict. Gudykunst and Shapiro (1996) showed that intercultural interactions were rated higher in anxiety and uncertainty. Research shows that the primary concern in the initial intercultural encounter is to reduce the uncertainty and increase the predictability of interaction outcomes (Berger & Calabrese, 1975). Gudykunst and Nishida (1984) in a study of American and Japanese respondents showed that participants tried to reduce uncertainty by indicating intent to interrogate and self-disclose, and by expressing affiliation nonverbally.

Intercultural conflict is often the result of misinterpretations of communication based on culturally laden attributions of intent to other cultural groups. As a result of miscommunication we attribute false and inaccurate motives to other cultural groups. Communicators from other cultures often conflict with our expectations and fail to conform to cultural norms. Conflict is also a natural outcome of cultural differences in the meaning of vocabularies as well as in nonverbal language. Cultural values may contribute to miscommunication as in one study Anglo-European participants communicated more individualistically, whereas East Asian students communicated in more collectivistic ways (Pekerti & Thomas, 2003).

There are both attitudinal and skill components to consider if the goal is to reduce uncertainty in intercultural communication (Gudykunst, 1993). When interacting in the cross-cultural context we need to interpret the pragmatics thoughtfully and appropriately, and in the process try to control subjective cultural factors affecting the message. To improve intercultural communication requires desire and motivation, knowledge about the target culture and skills in communication. When uncertainty is reduced it is possible to concentrate on the message and make accurate interpretations. In particular it is essential to regulate emotions and moderate ethnocentric thinking about other peoples. Conflict in intercultural communication is perhaps inevitable given different views of reality, but by moderating emotional reactions it is possible to engage in constructive communication. When emotions are regulated self-insight is possible with the collateral benefit of self-critical thinking controlling ethnocentric attributions (Matsumoto & LeRoux, 2003; Matsumoto, LeRoux, Bernhard, & Gray, 2004).

Date: 2015-01-11; view: 775