Question

Write a essay with a references page about Cultural Differences in Communication 1500 words.

Answer 1

Introduction

Cultural differences can create communication issues.Because people who are coming from a different cultures are completely different.Their languages, thinking, sign and symbols are also very much different.But basically culture can only identified by ideas, behavior, arts, the way of thinking, some socail norms, dressing sence and others like language and symbols.Culture totally changed from one to another generation. It is the way of interpreting someone's life.A single culture is divided by many sub cultures.

Cultural differences can create an issue in communication. It is also called communication Error.The main identified cultural differences are language and symbols.Cultural difference can also create prejudice and stereotype, which also can create an issue while we are talking about cultural differences.Our communication is highly affected by the culture we were bron and brought up.

example

In America people can communicate friendly and freely because this is an affect of their culture. In opposite Some countries like Pakistan, India , people have some communicate issues with strangers. This is also the affect of cultural issues.

There are some causes which highly affecting the communication skills of the people

Languages

The language is the biggest problem while communicating. Because people are coming from different countries and cultural differences has a big impact in their communicational process.

Example- if a people does not know how to talk in english. Then it will be very difficult to communicate in such countries who uses english language in their communicate process.

This example describes that, different cultures have some different languages also. People develops their own and cultural language and this beacmes a part of the Heritage.

As example classic chinies is a heritage language for the chinies and they have used this language more than two thousands years.

So we can say that cultural differences creates a language problem in communicating with others.

Semantic Differences

Semantics like signs and symbols also can be different in different cultures. As we know sign and symbols can helps to understand what others trying to tell.Not only that sometimes non-verbal communication can developed by the using of signs and symbols. But when cultural difference occurs between two group of people, then symbols and signs can also be different according to the different background and cultures of them.(Horst and Miller,2013)

As example, a sign of thumbs up can be treated as appreciation in American and this particular sign of thumbs up can be insulting for the people of other countries.

So we can say that , sign also create a communicate issue for the cultural affect in two different group.

Thinking and Beliefs

Cultural differences have a strong influence in someone's personality, behavior and the way of thinking. Not only that a decided socail norm can also influenced by different cultural values.A strong ethics and emotions about cultural values can create a communication problem. Every person behaves according to their cultures, not only that the way he or she behaves with other person has can create a communication issue. (Cheng and Seeger, 2012)

As example

If a person used to behave well and good from the childhood, then he or she will behaves well and good in future also. But if a person used to behave like an introvert person since the childhood, then he or she will face a communication issue in future.

So it can be stated that, our cultural background has a strong influence in our behavior,thinking and beliefs.

Religion

Religion can also create cultural differences.We used to belief that people who have a different religion completely different from us.Not only that, people also thinks that they must be holding some absolutely different moral values.So they dont like to communicate with people who are holding a different religion.(Eades, 1996)

As example-

Muslims in Pakistans have a strong communication issue with Christians people.These kind of barries can be developed by the over-estimation of religion. People in many countries, always gives priority to the religion rather than the ethics and moral values. This kind of religion preference can create a big problem in while communication.

Stereotype-

Stereotype is kind of a biased thinking or behavior. Some people have the tendency to overestimate their cultures and their community.Not only that this kind of biased thinking can leads to the categorizing. These kind of catagorizing about some particular group can brings a judgmental thinking or behaviors. This kind of biased behavior can hamper the communication process between two different groups.(Schouten and Meeuwesen, 2006.)

Not only that, stereotype can positive also. This kind of positive stereotype can create a healthy communication. But in other hand a negative stereotype can leads to prejudice. Prejudice is kind of a negative biased thinking towards the people who belongs to a different culture.

So we can say biased attitude such as stereotype and prejudice can create more issues in communicating process.

As example- White Americans have a strong prejudice towards Black Africans. This kind of negative attitude can brings communication error in the time of communicating.

Other Preferences

There are other more factors which have some strong influences in communication process. Such as preferences in political parties, genders, age and community can brings a cultural difference.(Moran,et.al ,2014)

People who have some personal choices in something always like to interact with someone who is holding same kind of choices. Thes kind of personal preference have some strong communicational error. Because when people have founds the same kind of person according to their choice, they mostly ignores to communicating with other people.

As example

Small groups in the school or college can create with personal choices and these particular formed group lose interests to communicate with other groups for having different kinds of choices.

Interpretation

After discussing all the factors we can say that, Different cultures have some different moral values and ethics.Communication process is also influenced by these different cultural backgrounds.As some people are holding different cultures like different religion,language, beliefs and thinking they alway ignores to communicate with different cultural people. These kind of differentiate mostly leads to communication error.(Triandis 1994).

This kind of communication problem only can be solved if interacted people are enough open minded and ready to accept the real factors.

References

Triandis, H.C., 1994. Culture and social behavior.

Schouten, B.C. and Meeuwesen, L., 2006. Cultural differences in medical communication: a review of the literature. Patient education and counseling, 64(1), pp.21-34.

Eades, D., 1996. Legal Recognition of Cultural Differences in Communication: The Case of Robyn Kina. Language & Communication, 16(3), pp.215-27.

Cheng, S.S. and Seeger, M.W., 2012. Cultural differences and communication issues in international mergers and acquisitions: A case study of BenQ debacle. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(3).

Moran, R.T., Abramson, N.R. and Moran, S.V., 2014. Managing cultural differences. Routledge.

Martin, J.N. and Nakayama, T.K., 2013. Intercultural communication in contexts. New York: NY: McGraw-Hill.

Horst, H.A. and Miller, D. eds., 2013. Digital anthropology. A&C Black.

Yang, D., Olesova, L. and Richardson, J.C., 2010. Impact of cultural differences on students' participation, communication, and learning in an online environment. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 43(2), pp.165-182.

Vasalou, A., Joinson, A.N. and Courvoisier, D., 2010. Cultural differences, experience with social networks and the nature of “true commitment” in Facebook. International journal of human-computer studies, 68(10), pp.719-728.

Sam, D.L. and Berry, J.W., 2010. Acculturation: When individuals and groups of different cultural backgrounds meet. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 5(4), pp.472-481.

Moran, R.T., Harris, P.R. and Moran, S.V., 2011. Managing cultural differences: global leadership strategies for cross-cultural business success. Routledge.

Stahl, G.K., Maznevski, M.L., Voigt, A. and Jonsen, K., 2010. Unraveling the effects of cultural diversity in teams: A meta-analysis of research on multicultural work groups. Journal of international business studies, 41(4), pp.690-709.

Loi, C.K. and Evans, M.S., 2010. Cultural differences in the organization of research article introductions from the field of educational psychology: English and Chinese. Journal of Pragmatics, 42(10), pp.2814-2825.

Fuhrman, O. and Boroditsky, L., 2010. Cross?cultural differences in mental representations of time: Evidence from an implicit nonlinguistic task. Cognitive Science, 34(8), pp.1430-1451.