Which of the following likely indicates a low-context culture?

Communicating at Work Principles and Practices for Business 11th Edition Adler Test Bank

Published on Apr 5, 2019

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Rodriguez

# Example 1
Employer: Hey, bring it over.
Employee: It?
Employer: Yeah, the thing we always use!
Employee: ???
Employer: So frustrating! You have spent enough time with me to understand what I say. I will just bring it myself.

# Example 2
Wife: Please wash the rice and put it in the rice cooker.
Husband: Okay!
The husband washes the rice and puts it in the rice cooker. Later, the wife checks the cooker, gets angry, and yells at her husband.
Wife: Honey, why didn’t you switch the rice cooker on???
Husband: Uhm, you just asked me to put the rice in the cooker.
Wife: Oh my god, are you serious? You clearly knew that we were going to have dinner soon. Couldn’t you have figured out what I really meant?

If you are from the US or Germany, the communication styles from the examples above might seem a little odd. However, these types of conversations are not unusual in Korea, where I am from. Koreans often say that you have to be able to figure out what others are saying even when they don’t do a good job communicating what they really want to say. Not only that, people who are not good at the figuring-out job are sometimes criticized for having a bad 말귀 ([Mal-Gwi], ear for words), which means being slow at understanding words.

In anthropology, this cultural difference in communication style is

explained by the concept of context, introduced first by anthropologist Edward T. Hall in his 1976 book Beyond Culture. According to Hall, cultures can be defined on a continuum of high and low context, which is based on whether explicit verbal expressions or contextual cues are emphasized in communication. In a low-context culture, communication occurs through explicitly spelled out and defined words, and listeners just have to interpret spoken or written words as they are. Germany, Sweden, and the United States are generally classified as low-context cultures. Meanwhile, in a high-context culture, nonverbal cues and unspoken background information should be considered together with explicit verbal expressions for successful communication. Therefore, listeners are often expected to interpret spoken or written words based not only on the meaning of the words but also on voice tone, gesture and context. China, Japan, and Korea are generally classified as high-context cultures.

One reason why I attend to this cultural difference is that it gives an insight into whom, the speaker or the listener, miscommunication is attributed to within each culture. Apparently, when miscommunication occurs, listeners are more likely to be blamed in high-context cultures than in low-context cultures. This is because the interpretation of a message depends on the listener’s subjective judgment in high-context cultures. Considering that miscommunication is often a cause of conflict, it is important to understand, if any, the cultural differences in attribution of miscommunication. Psychologists Singelis and Brown tested whether collectivistic cultural values are associated with the tendency of blaming listeners for miscommunication, and found no evidence for the hypothesis. However, I think this topic needs to be explored in the context of the high-low context cultural spectrum. In that much of understanding among people can be acquired by communication, this research question may be one that our Geography of Philosophy Project, a quest to advance the current academic understanding of knowledge, understanding, and wisdom, needs to explore in the future.

Bibliography:

Hall, E. T. (1989). Beyond culture. Anchor.
Kittler, M. G., Rygl, D., & Mackinnon, A. (2011). Special Review Article: Beyond culture or beyond control? Reviewing the use of Hall’s high-/low-context concept. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management, 11(1), 63-82.
Singelis, T. M., & Brown, W. J. (1995). Culture, self, and collectivist communication: Linking culture to individual behavior. Human communication research, 21(3), 354-389.

What is low context in culture?

What is a low context culture quizlet?

Which of the following cultures is classified as a low context culture?

Which of the following is true about low context culture?