Essay Example: Analyzing Cultural Dimensions and Their Impact on Intercultural Communication

Introduction

The United States is primarily of Western Origin, but it is influenced greatly by the multicultural ethos of Africans, Native Americans, Asians, Hispanics, and many other cultures. As a Caucasian male in the country, I have little experience with other cultures. However, upon carrying out two interviews, I acquired a lot of insights into the African-American and Hispanic cultures. As such, the paper focuses on the interview insights I acquired from the two cultures.

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The first interviewee was Tony, a middle-aged African-American man who worked as a counselor. Tony migrated with his family from Ghana five years ago. Despite migrating from Africa, his family upholds the African way of life, which makes him an African American. The second interviewee was Amanda, who is in her late 20’s. She originated from Spain to further her studies, but after completing her education, she chose to stay in the United States. She also does not like most of the ideals in her mother country. Currently, she works as a cashier, and she describes herself as a Hispanic. Therefore, based on the cultural dimensions by Engleberg and Wynn, I will analyze the dimensions and their impacts on intercultural communication.

Culture is generally described as a societal way of creating connectivity among a group of people based on their origin, beliefs, religion, music, and art, as well as institutions. In business, culture is the sharing of behaviors, interactions, and experiences within the workplace. More so, culture can be described in terms of dimensions since people have different ways of life. Engleberg and Wynn identified the various dimensions of culture, which include individualism and collectivism, masculinity and femininity, power distance, time orientation, and high-low contexts. Each of these dimensions will be discussed in detail, along with its impacts on intercultural communication.

Power Distance

Power distance is the psychological and physical distance between people with power and those without power. It is the extent to which less powerful people or members expect and accept that power is distributed unequally. My culture is a low-distance power culture since supervisors and heads work with subordinates. At the same time, students work perfectly with their supervisors and instructors such that they can object or ask questions. During the interview, I asked both interviewees whether they used to interact with their bosses at work or on any occasion in their cultures. I received similar answers that they rarely interacted with their bosses, and they claimed that the work of the boss is giving orders, and no one would object or oppose any of their commands. Based on their responses, I can conclude that interviewees culture values high power distance. Thus, these two cultures greatly impact intercultural communication if one moves from a low-power distance culture to a high-distance culture.

Individualism-Collectivism

Individualism and collectivism refer to relationships that a person has with others. These concepts can also be described as the degree to which a culture relies on the self or a group. My culture mainly focuses on the importance of oneself, whereby everyone is urged to do what benefits him in the long run. The question I asked for both respondents is whether they have ever lived with their extended family. Amanda claimed that she does not get along with her extended family, and she only visits her extended family once in a while. Tony, on the other hand, claims he lives together with most members of his extended family. Through these insights, it is clear that one culture values individualism while the other culture values collectivism. Cultures focused mainly on individualism do not value the need for relationships with others in comparison to cultures that value collectivism. Besides, in terms of intercultural communication, individualistic people will show interest when receiving information, while collectivists focus on building relationships while conveying or receiving information (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015).

Gender Expectations

Gender expectations are interrelated with femininity and masculinity. Masculinity focuses on the degree at which society reinforces traditional masculine work for achievement, control and power, while femininity refers to the distribution of roles between genders (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). My culture falls under the egalitarian society where males and females can carry out both masculine and feminine roles.

The question asked to examine this cultural dimension was as follows, “Do women and men play similar roles within families in your culture?” I received different responses to this question since Tony claimed that males in their culture could not play similar roles, but females could play both roles. Amanda, on her part, claimed that everyone within their culture could play both masculine and feminine roles. This trend in different cultures will impact intercultural communication by forming presumption barriers and confusion such that if a female from the masculine society encounters a female who plays a male role, she will be shocked. More so, a conflict may arise if a masculine female encounters a masculine male.

Time Orientation

Time orientation is presumed to be the past, present, and future. This dimension can either be long-term or short-term. Long-term orientation refers to the degree to which society embraces long-term devotion to forward-thinking values. In contrast, short-term orientation refers to the trend of wanting things to get done quickly. My culture aims at a short-term orientation to seek instant gratification (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015).

To seek a response on time orientation, I asked each respondent what they could do if given a large sum of cash after the interview. Tony claimed that he would save up his cash, while Amanda claimed that she would clear her bills and use the remaining cash to purchase items she had planned to buy. Based on these responses, I can conclude that Tony holds a long-term time orientation because of having a tendency to want to save money. Amanda, on her part, portrays a short-term orientation of wanting things to get done. These forms of orientation can impact intercultural communication when people are interacting. If one values short-time orientation conflicts could arise due to punctuality or wanting things to be done immediately.

High Low Context

High-low context is the level at which a message is described verbally and non-verbally. Low context refers to the expression of a message mainly through language, while high context is the expression of information through gestures or body language. For this dimension, I did not ask any questions; I observed the interviewees all along during the interview. Based on my observation, I could easily tell that both individuals come from a high-context culture. This dimension can impact intercultural communication due to the high risk of miscommunication if an individual from a low-context culture speaks to a person from a high-context culture.

Reflection

While conducting interviews and analysis, I discovered a lot of insights into other cultures other than my Caucasian culture. More so, for effective communication, several competencies have to be followed strictly. These competencies include connecting with others, knowing oneself, adapting to the context, and selecting, and expressing a message. Another important fact that I noted is that every culture has its unique dimensions, but with effective communication, one can interact with anybody from any culture.

Reference

Engleberg, I. N., & Wynn, D. R. (2015). Five Dimensions of Culture by Engleberg and Wynn. https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Five+Dimensions+of+Culture+by+Engleberg+and+Wynn+%282015%29+&btnG=