Cross-Cultural Training to Improve Intercultural Understanding and Communication - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

1 / 42
About This Presentation
Title:

Cross-Cultural Training to Improve Intercultural Understanding and Communication

Description:

Cross-Cultural Training to Improve Intercultural Understanding and Communication Kenneth Cushner, Ed. D. Kent State University U. S. A. Whether people like it or not ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

Number of Views:2775
Avg rating:5.0/5.0
Slides: 43
Provided by: dolegyDo
Category:

less

Transcript and Presenter's Notes

Title: Cross-Cultural Training to Improve Intercultural Understanding and Communication


1
Cross-Cultural Trainingto Improve Intercultural
Understanding and Communication
  • Kenneth Cushner, Ed. D.
  • Kent State University
  • U. S. A.

2
  • Whether people like it or not, they are
    increasingly being expected to engage in
    interpersonal interactions with people from
    cultures different from their own

3
Increased Intercultural Interaction is Evident in
  • the global business marketplace
  • international tourism
  • changes in immigration policies and domestic
    diversity
  • movement of international students
  • changes in school curricula in response to above.

4
  • In addition, we share the limited resources of a
    relatively small planet
  • The complex problems of today will only be solved
    by the contributions of many different people
    or they will not be solved!

5
Goals of Intercultural Training
  • Interculturally effective people are
  • -able to deal with psychological
  • stress
  • -able to communicate effectively
  • -able to develop and maintain
    interpersonal relationships
  • -able to complete task

6
Goals of Intercultural Training
  • Teach people to distinguish between two aspects
    of culture
  • Objective culture or Big C
  • Tangible, visible aspects of people
  • Subjective culture or little c
  • Invisible, intangible elements

7
Objective - Subjective Culture
  • Culture, like an iceberg, tends to show only a
    small portion on the surface

8
Objective - Subjective Culture
  • Objective culture
  • Subjective culture
  • It is at the level of subjective culture where
    most intercultural misunderstandings occur.

9
Goals of Intercultural Training
  • Transcend ethnocentrism, thus help people become
    more ethnorelative
  • Understand processes of perception and
    categorization.

10
Goals of Intercultural Training
  • In general, reduce culture shock and ease
    adjustment to new cultural patterns
  • U-Curve Hypothesis
  • U

11
Goals of Intercultural Training
  • Teach people to suspend judgment about others
    until more information is available by making
    isomorphic attributions
  • the judgments people make about others
  • Explain anothers behavior in the same way they
    would

12
Approaches to Intercultural Training
  • Most Common Training Strategies
  • -Cognitive/University Approach
  • -Experiential Approach
  • -Interaction Approach
  • -Attribution Training

13
  • Most researched of all the cross-cultural
    training approaches, and the one proven to have
    the most impact, is attribution training through
    the intercultural sensitizer or cultural
    assimilator

14
  • Presents a collection of critical incidents or
    stories that reflect a cross-cultural
    misunderstanding
  • Readers learn of subjective reasons behind
    anothers behavior

15
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2000)
  • Identified 18 culture-general themes found to be
    common in peoples intercultural interactions,
    regardless of where they are from, their
    particular role in society, and with whom they
    will interact
  • 3 general categories

16
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2000)
  • Experiences Which Engage Peoples Emotions
  • Knowledge Areas
  • Bases of Cultural Differences

17
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2006)
  • EMOTIONAL EXPERIENCES
  • anxiety
  • belonging
  • ambiguity
  • confronting prejudice of self and others
  • disconfirmed expectations

18
Anxiety
  • People tend to feel uncertain and anxious when in
    interaction with people of other cultures
  • People with high anxiety may have a tendency to
    avoid the situation

19
Belonging
  • All people have a need to belong and feel as if
    their contributions are welcome
  • When people do not feel as if they belong they
    may feel rejected and alienated, and may stop
    contributing

20
Ambiguity
  • When interacting with other cultures, all the
    necessary information may not be apparent
  • People may then act from their own knowledge
    base, which may not be accurate
  • People who work well across cultures have a high
    tolerance for ambiguity - and ask may questions.

21
Prejudice
  • Prejudice refers to the application of
    stereotypes to all members of a group,
  • Also, when in an intercultural situation, people
    may confront knowledge and beliefs about others
    that they previously held that they may no longer
    support.

22
Disconfirmed Expectations
  • Most people expect others to think and act as
    they do
  • They also have a tendency to expect certain
    outcomes
  • If what they expect does not come to pass, they
    may become quite upset

23
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2006)
  • KNOWLEDGE AREAS
  • work
  • time/space orientation
  • language and communication
  • roles
  • group versus individual orientation
  • ritual and superstition
  • class and status
  • values

24
Work
  • Peoples orientation toward work-related behavior
    can be significantly different. This is evident
    in such areas as
  • problem solving
  • time-on-task versus emphasis on social relations
  • decision-making practices

25
Time and Space
  • Various attitudes exist on the importance of
    adhering to clock time, relational time,
    flexible time, and so forth
  • Peoples orientation toward others in terms of
    spatial distance, placement of furniture, etc.

26
Communication and Language Use
  • One of the more obvious difference between people
  • Refers to verbal as well as nonverbal
    communication differences
  • Nonverbal differences account for most
    communication problems at the subjective level

27
Roles
  • A generally accepted set of behaviors people
    perform in relation to a position
  • Respect across cultures may differ in different
    roles
  • Cultural differences in roles may be evident with
    regard to age, position, gender, family, and so
    forth.

28
Group versus Individualism
  • The degree to which people act according to their
    individual needs or group needs
  • Differences across groups are most significant in
    this regard

29
Rituals and Superstition
  • One groups rituals are often seen as
    superstitions by another
  • What one group views as intelligent behavior may
    be seen by another as superstitious

30
Social Class
  • People tend to divide themselves according to
    some hierarchy
  • They may make distinctions based on various
    markers of high versus low status
  • Status differences may be quite different from
    culture to culture

31
Values
  • Refer to internalized views of broad areas as
    religion, economics, education
  • Accepted as proper and right
  • Can be defended in extreme ways

32
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2006)
  • BASES OF CULTURAL DIFFERENCES
  • categorization
  • differentiation
  • ingroup-outgroup distinctions
  • learning styles
  • attribution process

33
Categorization
  • Refers to the act of grouping similar information
    together
  • Culture determines how people form categories
  • For example, in some cultures a dog is an animal
    to avoid, in others it is an important member of
    the family, in others it is food.

34
Differentiation
  • Fine distinctions people make in large categories
    of information that is important in their culture
  • For example, not all breeds of cattle do well in
    Turkey
  • People who do not differentiate categories in the
    same manner as locals may be viewed as ignorant.

35
Ingroups versus Outgroups
  • Refers to major distinctions all people make
    regarding others
  • Ingroup members are those one is close to, shares
    critical information, will marry, etc.
  • Outgroup members are those often kept at a
    respectable distance
  • Different groups form ingroups in different ways

36
Learning Styles
  • Culture teaches people how to learn
  • Those serving as trainers should match their
    instructional style with peoples preferred
    method of learning.

37
Attribution Process
  • Attributions refer to the judgments people make
    about others
  • People judge others by such things as their
    behavior, speech, and other mannerisms
  • The goal is to judge people the same way they
    would judge themselves.

38
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2000)
  • The themes are introduced through Critical
    Incidents, or short stories that bring people
    from different cultures together to solve a
    problem
  • Individuals read many critical incidents and
    begin to understand that subjective cultural
    elements at play

39
18-Theme Culture General Framework(Cushner and
Brislin, 1996 Cushner, McClelland and Safford,
2000)
  • The critical incidents are used to introduce
    readers to the important 18 culture general
    themes
  • You may use critical incidents in a variety of
    ways

40
Impact of Intercultural Training
  • Has positive impact on cognitive, affective and
    behavioral domains
  • People learn a significant amount of useful
    information
  • Both parties in interaction feel more positive
  • People are more effective in their work

41
Incident Review
  • Read one incident
  • Discuss the incident in your group.
  • For incidents 1 and 2, identify which
    explanations best explain the situation.
  • For incident 3, what do you think is the problem?
  • Identify which of the 18-themes are evident
  • How are these themes evident in your work or
    experience?

42
(No Transcript)
Write a Comment
User Comments (0)
About PowerShow.com