The reading talks about different dimensions of culture that put them into different categories, individualist vs. collectivist, Nonverbal communication, Monochronic vs. polychronic, Internal vs. external, and direct vs. indirect communication to explain the cultural differences in the world.
First, the reading talks about individualists and collectivists. As we compare this two, individualist can be characterized as people who like to stay by themselves or they do not change themselves for other people in the group or have less emotional connection between people; collectivism is the opposite from individualist as people tend to stay in group, work together, and take care of each other. Collectivists’ identities changes with the group and they are more emotionally attached to the group members. Second, the reading talks about Nonverbal communication and there are three main categories, behavior exists in your culture and target culture with the same meaning, behavior exists in both cultures with different meanings, and behavior has meaning in one culture but is meaningless in the other one. The third dimension is monochronic and polychronic, how different cultures value time differently. Monochronic sees time as a commodity and is quantifiable, people like to make a plan and do not like interruptions. However, polychronic see time is limitless and not quantifiable, people see life is too unpredictable and there is no need to have plans. Fourth, people’s life is controlled by an internal factor vs. controlled by an external factor. The people who believe that life is controlled by internal factor believe they can change their lives based on how hard they work; the people who believe that life is controlled by external factor believes success is the combination of effort and other many predetermined things. The final one is direct and indirect communication. In the indirect communication culture, conversations can have different layers of meanings and people have to find the hidden message by themselves. In the direct communication culture, communication is much simpler, people just say what they want to say and there is no hidden message.
This is very interesting reading and I strongly agree with the author’s point on the different dimensions of culture. I can relate myself and find where I stand from those dimensions. I have lived in China and the U.S for a very long period of time and I see a lot of differences between culture and how these differences affect people’s communication. For example, I think the way Chinese people communicate is a lot more indirect compared to the U.S. In China when people ask me to do something I don’t want to do, I will never just say no to them, instead, I will tell them I have some other thing to do or tell them that we can discuss it later. By doing this, people can easily get my point that I do not want to be part of their plan. But in the U.S, if I do the same thing, people will not realize as quickly as people in China. I also found some similarities between the dimensions of culture and the sixteen personalities. For example, the Monochronic vs Polychronic can be Judging vs. Perceiving. I wonder how much influences does culture have in people’s personality.
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