BODY GESTURES IN COMMUNICATION
Body language and communication are important topics when it comes to intercultural communications. People have serious issues understanding body movements and gestures from people that belong to other cultures. This might be the reason why there are a lot of controversies regarding awareness in intercultural situations. Some of the most common gestures and body movements involve pointing, listening, smiling, hands, head and feet movements -- they all play a major role in intercultural communications. Non-verbal communication reflects individuals’ emotions, or in other words, supports the verbal message. The first impression of a person is received by eye contact, which is 60% of the message, the ear receives the next 30%, and the 10% left of that message is verbal (qtd. in Özüorcun). Body movements have different meanings and effects, and people perceive them differently depending on their cultures.
Gestures are primarily actions that are performed to convey meaning which is the reason why people need to learn about them. This perhaps becomes the main reason why misunderstandings occur in intercultural communication. It is essential to not only know but also understand the differences of diverse cultures and their body actions because if people are not aware of how to encode and decode the messages there can be serious consequences.
Below are some common body movements and examples that reveal how differently the same body movements or gestures can be interpreted by people from different cultures.
Smiling:
Smiles have different meanings and people smile for different reasons in different cultures.Communication barriers are present when body language is interpreted incorrectly due to cross-cultural diversity. In USA people show gratitude through smiles, and when greeting people. Whereas, in Japan people smile for different reasons; when they are embarrassed, ashamed and even when they feel uncomfortable. In all the examples the body language is the same but the meaning can represents something completely different in each culture (as cited in Cangil, 2004).
Hands:
When people with the same sex (adults or older people) hold hands and walk about. In the Turkish culture this reflects that they are homosexuals. But in other cultures like China it is not like that at all, it just means that they are very close friends (Dresser, 1996).
OK gesture:
Non-verbal communication varies depending on the cultures. In some cases a particular gesture means nothing to a representative of another culture, but in other cases--for example the “OK sign"--have vulgar meanings in Iran and Afghanistan respectively. Whereas, in other countries the “OK" sign means just “zero", which is not offensive at all.
Pointing:
Pointing can results often in misunderstandings in cross cultural communications. An example of the Japanese family that got really angry when asked where the restroom was and a girl pointed and said “it is over there”. She had no idea that pointing was very rude in the Japanese culture (Dresser, 1996).
Fingers:
In a lot of places around the world holding your thumbs up means well done. This is not the case in some countries like Iran or Nigeria where it is perceived and interpreted as an insulting language (MEGEP, 2008). An American will try to convey the message that a person is crazy by holding the index finger next to the right ear without touching the ear and twirling and twisting the index finger in a rotary motion. This non verbal message will probably mean nothing to somebody from a different culture (Molinsky et al., 2005).
Staring:
Staring at somebody in the eye means is an invitation to violence to Americans, it reflects that you are daring them. This gesture is called “maddogging”. In some places (like Universal Studio’ Universal City Walk) they warn people with signs saying “no undue staring”. This expression will make people understand that just by staring at somebody you might be in trouble (Dresser, 1996).
Listening:
According to Dresser (1996) and many other English speaking countries, you look down when you speak and you look up when you listen. You reflect that you are listening to the person who is speaking when you look up to the person. It is not always the same in other cultures. Africans and African-Americans show that they are listening to you by looking down and they look up when they are talking to a person. This simple gesture might lead to misunderstandings between the two sides.
Handshake:
Handshakes are common all over the world. When in some cultures like the Islamic culture, men should be careful when tending to shake a woman’s hand because as in many cultures it is a serious disapproved action to touch a woman, even for a handshake. Shaking hands is not common in countries like Japan, people should not misunderstand when they do not do it, instead they bow to greet people (Coshkun, 2010).
Head movements:
The same body gestures may show entirely opposite meanings in cross-cultural communications. For example, in many countries a person would nod their head up and down to say yes. Whereas, in Turkey, North Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Syria, and Sicily people nod their head up to express “no”. Shaking their heads back and forth means “yes” in these countries (MEGEP, 2008). Cangil (2004) also indicates that Turkish people nod their head up and down when approving a verbal message but they also use the same gesture to represent disapproval sometimes. This can be confusing to a person from Greece.
Blowing your nose:
In Japan it is extremely rude to blow your nose in public (Coshkun, 2010). An English person will feel free to blow their noses anywhere they feel like it. They can get into serious trouble in such a case without understanding why such a problem occurred as they do not have it in their own culture.
Feet or shoes:
It is stated in MEGEP (2008) that a person can understand the real intention of another person by looking at their feet. For instance, American businessmen put their feet on the table especially when speaking on the phone but a Japanese person would perceive this action as very bad manners because it is not accepted to show the soles of your feet to anybody.
Victory or Peace sign: The victory sign or peace sign is perceived OK when the palm is facing outward in America, whereas when the palm is facing towards the performer it is accepted as very offensive to the society’s moral in England. Finally all the examples above reveal that, in order to communicate well it is a must to understand that every culture is unique and has its own values, customs, and characteristics other than treating them as inappropriate behavior.
References
Özüorcun, Fatma. “THE IMPORTANCE OF BODY LANGUAGE IN INTERCULTURAL
COMMUNICATIONS” (2013): n. web.
For example, in Greece punctuality is not so important but in a business meeting they expect the foreign person to be on time even though they might be late (ediplomat.com).
ETIQUETTE AND MANNERS