Lecture The Study of Intercultural Communication Key Terms

3.9 Cultural Factors in Nonverbal Communication. Types of Nonverbal Communication
Participants in a communication process adapt to each other’s speaking style – for example, by leaning forward, matching the other’s speech rate, assuming a similar posture, using similar gestures, or pronouncing words with the same accent. If a communicator rejects the style of the other as culturally inappropriate – for example, by leaning away, intentionally slowing the speech rate, or assuming an uninviting posture – the flow of communication is interrupted. Edward Hall stated:” People in interactions move together in a kind of dance, but they are not aware of their synchronous movement”. He found that each culture has its own characteristic manner of sitting, standing, reclining and gesturing. Most people are unaware when these are happening. When they become aware, they are unable to pay attention to anything else. When someone from a low-context culture interacts with someone from a high-context culture, the rhythms are likely to be very different and may create such discomfort that communication is jeopardized.
Culture establishes standards for nonverbal behavior. We often have an involuntary reaction to someone violating our expectations about personal space. Our culture specifies behaviors that invite or discourage interaction. We learn nonverbal signals that indicate another person is receptive to being approached – for example, smiling, and eye contact. If we use those same cues in interaction with someone from another culture, we could be quite startled by the response. If our expectations are not met, we will probably evaluate the other person negatively based on behavior that conforms to a culture different from our own.
There are seven types of nonverbal communication: kinesics and other body movements, space, time, touch, voice, artifacts, and physical appearance.


3.10 Body movements
Kinesics is a type of nonverbal communication that involves body movement and activities (also called body language). The four main types of kinesic communication are: emblems, illustrators, regulators, affect displays.
Emblems are body movements that can be translated into words and that are used intentionally to transmit a message. One type of emblem that is particularly important, perhaps ranking second only to facial expressions, is hand gestures. People talk with their hands. Hand gestures like the thumbs up or the thumb and forefinger circle (okay) sign, the palm outward gesture (silence, or stop), and circling a forefinger near one’s head (crazy) all have a widely understood meaning in the United States. But the meanings of these emblems may be quite different in another nation. For example, the thumb and forefinger circle is a sign for the sex act in some Latin American nations. So hand gestures can be very confusing interculturally. As with verbal language, nonverbal codes are not universal. There are gender differences as well as cultural differences in hand gestures. An emblem unique to Japanese women is the hand held in front of the mouth when smiling or laughing. People from the United States perceive this gesture as girlish, polite, and cute. Only women in Japan cover their mouth when smiling. Men never do.
In addition to hand gestures, head movements can also communicate nonverbally. Like hand movements, head movements differ from one culture to another. In India the head gesture for a positive response to a question is a sideways movement which is perceived by most non-Indians as a head shake meaning no. But after visiting India for a period of time, the typical foreigner is likely to have picked up the sideways head nod. When the person returns to the home country and uses shaking the head sideways to mean yes, further confusion occurs. In Turkey, an up-and-down movement of the head conveys a negative rather than a positive expression.