Culture learning involves acquiring social knowledge and skills to function in a new society. Elements like non-verbal communication, social interactions, and relational communication vary between cultures and can lead to failed interactions if not understood. People traveling to new cultures may experience communication apprehension if not familiar with cultural differences in areas like etiquette, conflict resolution styles, and non-verbal cues like gaze, touch, and gestures. Understanding such hidden rules and conventions is important for smooth intercultural interactions.

1. Culture Learning
Behavioral Aspects of Culture
Contact

2. Culture learning is a process whereby
sojourners acquire culturally relevant
social knowledge and skills in order to
survive and thrive in their new society.
• Elements that regulate interpersonal behavior
that vary between cultural and ethnic groups
-non-verbal communication such as proxemics,
touch and gestures

3. These elements are ‘hidden’ in that
people are not fully aware of them
• Failed social interactions
• Misperceptions
• Negative stereotypes
• Intergroup friction
• More likely to happen again when there is
more cultural distance separating the
participants

4. Social Interaction
• The social behavior of persons interacting with
each other constitutes a mutually
organized, skilled performance.
• Elements that regulate social encounters include
expressing attitudes, feelings and
emotions, adopting the appropriate proxemic
posture; understanding the gaze patterns of
others; carrying out ritual routines such as
greetings/leave-taking, self-
disclosure, making/refusing requests; asserting
oneself.

5. Relational Communication
• Implicit messages that vary across cultures and
define the tenor of the relationship by indirectly
conveying feelings of
liking, friendliness, dominance and trust.
• Evidence suggests that many travelers do not
easily learn the conventions of another society.
• Recent research falls under the heading of
communication style or competence, which
includes a specific problem of intercultural
communication apprehension or anxiety aroused
by interacting with culturally dissimilar people.

6. The Social Inadequate Individual
• The social inadequate individual may not have
mastered the conventions of their society,
ether because they are unaware of the rules
of social behavior that regulate interpersonal
conduct in their culture or, if aware of the
rules, are unable or unwilling to abide by
them.
• Performance may also be affected by anxiety
about how performance it is being evaluated

7. Socially Unskilled Persons
• Behave like strangers in their own land, a similar
position to socially inadequate indigenous
individuals
• Many individuals in this predicament (students,
business travelers, diplomats) tend to be highly
skilled in the customs of their own society and
find their sudden inadequacy in the new culture
frustrating
• Deficit formula falls within general literature on
communication theory

8. Cross-Cultural differences in
Communication
• Differences in ways people send and receive
information, commands, wishes, and affect
• High context vs. Low context cultures
-low context: direct; rely on verbal
communication
-high context: indirect, ambiguous; convey
limited information in coded messages, more
influenced by situational cues

9. Differences in Cultural Communication
(cont.)
• Variability in self-disclosure, face negotiation
and proxemics
• Oftentimes variables are related to broader
cultural values such the I-C dimension
• More difficulty with differing ‘codes’ (may be
unaware, particularly when share the same
linguistic form) “Would you like to…?” US/Aus

10. Etiquette
• Direct/indirect
• How requests are made or denied
- Chinese place greater emphasis on face-saving and
polite usage than Western societies
- US Peace Corps volunteers in Philippines were too
direct and regarded as brutal and tactless
• Turn distribution (Japanese take shorter turns,
distributed evenly/word ‘no’ rarely used)
• Voice volume (Arabs loudest/Americans more than
English)
• Linguistic forms such as ‘Thank you’

11. Resolving Conflict
• Expatriate managers may reprimand too directly,
which can lead to absenteeism, poor morale and
higher turnover (Mexican assembly line
workers—being publicly criticized is regarded as
shameful and insulting in Mexican culture)
• American work settings require managers to
provide frank feedback on performance
• Affected by power-distance (status inequality)
and the I-C dimension

12. Resolving Conflict (cont.)
• Managers in low power distance and
individualist cultures rely heavily on their own
training and experience and involve
subordinates and co-workers.
• In high power and collectivist countries formal
rules and procedures are given precedence
(unwillingness for first officers to challenge
airline captains contributed to accidents)

13. Resolving Conflict (cont.)
• Negotiating styles: consider the interest of the
other party or more inclined to use strategies
to maximize own interests at the expense of
the other party (Brazilian/U.S.; Mexicans
prefer strategies of accommodation and
collaboration, avoid conflict and competition)

14. Non-Verbal Communication
• Important in communicating attitudes and
expressing emotions, supporting speech,
provide feedback and synchronize turn-taking
- Meaning of some signals universal but many
vary across cultures
• Elements studied include face, eyes, spatial
behavior, bodily contact and gestures
(Japanese discourage negative facial
expressions/Filipinos may smile when angry)

15. Mutual Gaze
• Levels vary across cultures with Arabs and
Latin Americans displaying a high frequency of
mutual gaze, Europeans comparatively lower
• Low gaze participant may be seen as impolite
• High gaze participant may be seen as
disrespectful, threatening or insulting
• Spatial behavior also varies with some groups
standing much closer to each other than
others

16. Bodily Contact
• Contact cultures include Arab, Latin American,
and Southern European groups
• In non-contact cultures touching is allowed under
very restricted conditions (within the family,
specialized roles or brief handshakes)
• Low-touch culture seen as aloof, cold and
unfriendly to high-contact cultures
• Italians most tactile Europeans
• Arabs high-contact, but among same-sex
• East Asian low-contact cultures
• Psychological closeness/immediacy

17. Gestures
• Vary widely across cultures
• Thumbs up in Greece is taken as an insult
• In Europe, Italians most intense users of
expressive hand movements in conversation
- French, Spanish, Portuguese, East European
Jews—very expressive
- Nordic people make little use of gesticulation
- British, Germans, Russians, Dutch—moderate
gestures
• Congruent non-verbal cues higher predictor of
attraction than ethnicity

18. Rules and Conventions
• American/Brazilian approach to
lateness/success
• Differences in attitudes towards pace of life
(clocks most accurate in Japan, least in
Indonesia, Japanese fastest
strollers/Indonesians slowest)
• Social rules operate beneath the level of
consciousness, become aware of rule only
after it’s been broken

19. Forms of Address
• Titles (always used in Germany and Italy in
introductions to convey status/occupation)
• First names reserved for friends and family
members (British professor offended by
Australian students who used his first name)
• Tied to variations in power-distance across
cultures (high power distance cultures more likely
to recognize status differences)
• Rules for exchanging business cards, addressing
by surname/given name combinations

20. Social Relations in Multicultural
Societies
• Sizable groups of permanent settlers within a
nation’s boarders (minority groups)
-Despite policies based on integration, in practice
minority groups are expected to assimilate to the
dominant ethos, which can lead to a weakening
or total abandoning of ties with culture of
origin/resistance can lead to marginalization
- Most belong to two distinct groups (‘code
switching’ linguistic styles such as Arabic
speakers)

21. Social Situations Questionnaire
The Culture Learning approach suggests skills
deficits be included in the study of
intercultural contact
- The results of a study of international students
in the U.K. (Furnham and Bochner, 1982)
clearly indicated that social difficulty was a
function of cultural distance.