Introduction
Culture refers to the traditions and values of a society. Every society has got its own unique culture that characterizes them. The various aspects of culture include communication, beliefs, norms, and behavior. Societies pass their culture from one generation to another. Culture is an essential component in today's world. Communities are easily identified by their culture. Different communities in the world, for instance, dress, act, and eat in unique ways depending on their culture. Culture defines a community better. Cultural diversity facilitates interactions as people shares values and traditions. In the modern world, however, some societies have copied other people's cultures due to increased interactions globally. The purpose of this paper is to discuss how culture impacts the interactions among people in various parts of the world.
Culture plays an essential role in shaping both verbal and non-verbal communication. Culture influence how people communicate and the behaviors they exhibit when making communications and also during conversations. Culture shapes our mental structure and the meaning we assign to information. In the most ambiguous scenarios, culture influence the way people think. The difference in culture determines how people communicate. The differences are observed in both verbal and non-verbal communication. Of the cultural aspects are facial expressions (Willem, 2020). Some cultures, for instance, in the United States, have a culture of smiling during conversations to demonstrate approachability and friendliness. Different cultures such as Japan do not allow them to smile at strangers since their culture view that as appropriate more specifically for women. The communication context is also shaped by culture.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Some people explain to others as if they are aware of what they are talking about; they end up giving a narrow explanation. Some community's culture eye contact, for instance, displays honesty, while at the contrary, shying off or lack of eye contact indicates dishonesty. Some other societies believe that eye contact reflects a sign of aggressiveness and insults. People who have these beliefs occasionally keep eye contact to show concentration. Formality is another concept of culture. Some cultures make communications formal, while others informally make communication. In some cultures, people touch each other during communication. In such cultures, people stand close to each other and keep on touching each other during conversations (Willem, 2020). Some cultures perceive touching as aggressive, inappropriate, and pushy. People stand far from each other and rarely keep on touching each other.
In other cultures, people believe in communicating in high tones. During communications, they use high tones regardless of the distance between the two people engaging in communication. Other cultures might not embrace such. People who have a culture that believes in low tones in communication could consider communicating in high tones as aggressiveness or prevalence of conflict.
Low-context and the high-context cultures
Many cultures incorporate both verbal and non-verbal aspects of their communications. However, some cultures tend to rely more on the use of body language to pass information, while others rely more on the communication itself. There are clear differences between the low-context culture and the high context- culture. The messages meanings in the low-context culture, the messages are direct and clear. An example is the United States. There is a greater emphasis on spoken words. In a high context culture, messages have indirect meanings (Willem, 2020). As a result, the focus is more on the use of non-verbal elements. People who use the high context culture tend to raise eyebrows, for instance, to mean yes while in other countries it could mean a no. in high context culture, the spoken words are not as much important as the way they are communicated. In this communication, an individual is required to read in between the lines to understand the message less; they fail to get the message. People with high context cultures people engaging in communication choose to avoid conflicts or give up in conflicts while people who embrace low context cultures tend to be more dominant during conversations.
Perceptual filters
Culture is a perceptual filter. Different people have a mental structure that gives diverse meaning to information. Culture influence the way of thinking in people. However, it is possible to change the perceptual filters within cultures and amongst individuals. For instance, the communities which had embraced fishing activities and the turtles hunting, their culture were influenced by the reduction in the number of turtles forcing the population to adjust their cultural norms (Willem, 2020). As the generation's pas on their culture to the generations at a certain point, the turtles are perceived as tourist's attraction eliminating the norm of use of turtles for food. Their cultural norms filter messages received by people.
Paying attention to people's cultures is essential in enhancing the improvement of communicators. Different cultures have different meanings for relatively similar non-verbal communications. Some cultural norms use certain nonverbal communication means that demonstrate courtesy. Paying attention to these will enhance clarity in communication. Learning other people's cultures will facilitate the development of information completeness. Some cultures make shallow explanations during communication with the belief that other people know what they mean. Paying attention to such cultures will be effective in ensuring information completeness. Communication can only be perceived to be effective when information recipients get the message as the sender intended it to mean. Lack of attention to cultural norms will result in ineffective communication where the receiver receives the information communicated by the sender in a distorted manner.
Conclusion
Culture explains why people behave, think, or tend to act in a particular manner. Various people from different societies have cultures that make them unique. Similar acts can be perceived to have different interpretations. An aspect of culture that is perceived to demonstrate peace in one culture can be interpreted by a different culture to mean insults. There is a need for people to learn to appreciate and understand other people's cultures to increase efficiency in communications.
References
Willem Dijkstra (2020). Interpersonal Communication Begins with the Self: An Introduction to Intrapersonal Communication.
Willem Dijkstra (2020). The Influence of Culture on Interpersonal Communication.
