INTRA-CULTURAL COMMUNICATION

The type of communication that takes place between members of the same dominant culture, but with slightly different values

Communication within the boundaries of the same culture

Sharing the same ground rules(Matsumoto & Juang, 2004)

EXAMPLE

An example of intra-cultural communication triggering a stereotype would be if a person in the dominant culture, for instance of the United States, spoke Ebonics. If a non-Ebonics speaking person hears Ebonics,(a nonstandard form of American English characteristically spoken by African Americans in the United), they may assume the person is of low intelligence, and is a criminal or violent in nature

People can focus on the content of the messages that are being exchanged

Encode and decode messages using the same cultural codes

People can make an implicit judgment that the other person is the member of their culture or is engaging in ‘socially appropriate behavior’

However communicating with people whose behaviors do not match our expectations often leads to negative attributions(Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Refers to exchanging information between two cultures

People do not necessarily share the same ground rules(Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

People encode and decode messages using different cultural codes

they tend to make implicit judgments that the other person does not know how to act appropriately or is not a god person

The message that is being sent to the other person may be unclear, distorted or ambiguous (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

EXAMPLE

A Brazilian (female) student, who, while travelling on a French airline, tries to draw the attention of the (male) flight attendant by whistling, which is a common practice in Brazil. The flight attendant did not respond, but later came to explain to the student that whistling is used in France to call animals, not persons. The student apologized, explaining that in Brazil it is acceptable to whistle to call a person, while animals are called by their names

Focus is on the content of message

between members of the same dominant culture

Share the same ground values

Encode and decode messages using the same cultural codes

People can make an implicit judgment that the other person is the member of their culture or is engaging in ‘socially appropriate behavior

Difficult to focus on content of message

exchanging information between two cultures

do not necessarily share the same ground rules

Encode and decode messages using different cultural codes

They tend to make implicit judgments that the other person does not know how to act appropriately or is not a god person

Intracultural communication

Intercultural communication

SOME PSYCHOLOGICAL ISSUES REGARDING INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Uncertainty and Ambiguity Conflict

1. UNCERTAINTY AND AMBIGUITY

There is uncertainty in verbal and non-verbal behaviors in both coding and decoding modes

There is inherent uncertainty in the meaning of words as people engage in with each other that is not a native language for at least one of them (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

HOW DO INTERACTANTS WORK TO REDUCE UNCERTAINTY IN INTERCULTURAL INTERACTIONS?

GUDYKUNST AND NISHIDA (1984)

Tested 100 Americans and 100 Japanese participants and assigned them to one of four experimental conditions:

1) Cultural similarity and attitude similarity2) Cultural dissimilarity and attitude similarity3) Cultural similarity and attitude dissimilarity4) Cultural dissimilarity and attitude

dissimilarity (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

Cultural similarity or dissimilarity was manipulated by having participants interact with a stranger from either their own culture or the other culture

Attitude similarity or dissimilarity was manipulated through a description of similar or dissimilar attitudes when introducing the stranger (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

FOR EACH PARTICIPANT THE RESEARCHER ASSESSED: Intent to self-disclose Intent to interrogate Nonverbal affiliative expressions Attributional confidence Interpersonal attraction (Matsumoto & Juang,

2004).

Higher in Cultural dissimilarity

intent to self-

disclose

Intent to interrogat

e

nonverbal affiliative

expressions

GUDYKUNST AND SHAPIRO (1996)

Asked the students in a large university to record their perceptions of communication episodes with other students (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

RESULTS:

Students rated intracutural episodes higher than intercultural episodes in quality of commuication and positive expectations

Students rated intraethnic encounters as higher in quality and satisfaction

Rated intercultural episodes higher in anxiety, uncertainity and social identity

Interethnic encounters as higher in anxiety and uncertainty

(Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

INTRACULTURAL INTERCULTURAL

2. CONFLICT:

People’s behaviors do not conform to our expectations

We interpret these behaviors as transgressions against our value systems

As a result they produce negative emotions which lead to conflicts and misunderstandings (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

People may become impatient with or intolerant of the ambiguity leading to anger, frustration, or resentment

The result is often differences in the interpretation of underlying intent among interactants (Matsumoto & Juang, 2004).

REFERENCES

Matsumoto, D., and Juang, L.(2004). Culture and Psychology. United States: Thomson Wadsworth