MEASURING CULTURE

 Can the culture be measured??

the answer is yes, it can, thanks to our discussion in class i could realize that the culture can be measured by a certain specific topics that better describes how people belonged to a culture act and why the reason of their behavior … have you ever heard about the Hofstede Dimensions ?? if not let me explain you how him classify his theory to let us understand how culture can be measured and analyzed  

HOFSTEDE DIMENSIONS  

this guy is the inventor of the next 5 dimensions that helped everybody to measure the culture they live in, and even better the foreign ones. 

1. Power of distance (PDI):  this dimension basically explain the relationship between the employer and their employees, or the teacher and their students, any of the cases where is needed a distance to be respectful and to give orders to subordinates, knowing the existent distance, also can be defined the inequality that exist: (physical and mental characteristics, social status and prestige, wealth, power privileges)  

2. Individualism Vs Collectivism ( IDV): this one, stands in the way the people belonging to a culture prefer to work or to study, how they feel more comfortable to do their job if working alone or doing it  with more people, stands for a society in which people from birth onwards are integrated into cohesive groups or if their where born in a culture where you respond for your own job 

3. Uncertanty Avoidance (UAI): the extent to which a society, organization, or group relies on social norms, rules, and procedures to alleviate the unpredictability of future events"

4. Masculinity and Femininity (MAS): in this dimension he tried to explain how the roles between genders are different: Men are supposed to be assertive, strong, and hard worker,women are supposed to be modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life

in the other hand, Femininity stands with a society in which social gender roles are treated in the same way, men are women are supposed to be equal.  

5. Long Term Vs Short Term Orientation:explains how people worry about the time orientation , some are more likely to worry about future, and others about past. the extent to which the members of a culture feel treated by uncertain or unknown situations 

In this chart clearly represents the comparison between the Colombian culture, and the one from United States in every of the Hofstdes dimensions.

But Wait…. no just Hofstede created dimensions to measure the culture, well those are the most known ones but now lets see  others authors who also created some theories to measure culture.

Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck: (Value Orientation Theory) 

these values are basically

-Description of Five Common Human Concerns and Three Possible Responses (based on Kohls, 1981)

Halls Dimensions of culture in communication:

-Space: ways of using personal space 

-Time: monochromic or polychronic 

-Context: high or low

-Info flow: structure and space of messages 

What is a POLICHRONIC Culture? 

According to (Hahn, 2008). Polychronic cultures are involved with many things at once, usually with varying levels of attention paid to each. For polychrons, time is continuous, moving from an infinite past through the present and into an infinite future; it has no particular structure. Polychrons prefer not to have detailed plans imposed on them but want to make their own plans and meet deadlines in their own way. Switching from one activity to another is both stimulating and productive and the most desirable way to work.

I would say that we as Colombias are clearly a Polichronic culture, we are used to do or to think in  many things at the same time, sometimes we can be distinguished as disorganized culture, but not as much as the others imagine, because pitifully colombian culture has been stereotyped during long time with a very bad image. 

SOURCES:

http://www.tlu.ee/~sirvir/IKM/Leadership%20Dimensions/uncertainty_avoidance.html

http://www.joe.org/joe/2001december/tt1.php

http://www.emergingleader.com/article41.shtml

BARRIERS TO INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Have you ever feel stuck trying to explain something to a foreigner ? don't worry that is what its called barriers in communication, it is normal to experiment some uncomfortable feelings while you are talking to a foreign person, these refer to the main causes of frustration and misunderstanding in intercultural encounters.

People from different cultures may be not able and not willing to communicate with others due to various reasons such as:

1. Assumption of similarities: most commonly seen when people traveling abroad try to act in the same way or manner as if they were in their home country which can cause a lot of troubles, in order to avoid it, its important to study and analyze before traveling, the culture you will be, such as attitudes, manners, laws, religion among others that would be cause of discomfort  dealing with others, as we know, people might have different assumptions and views of the same topic, and we need to be prepared to deal with it, if not we have to be aware of the difficulties in communicating with people from other cultures.

2. Preconceptions and Stereotypes: in order to make it easier to understand, this is basically how we stereotype preconceptions of a person from a unknown culture and how we interpret his/her behavior according to this preconception, whether or not the reason of the reaction or action( behavior) its what we think it is 

3. Tendency to Evaluate: the human being have the tendency to approve or disapprove the statement or actions of any person or group rather than correct or comprehend the thoughts and feelings expressed  from other´s perspectives 

Ethnocentrism: Ethnocentric people tend to value their own culture above everything else and judge the others using one’s own cultural criteria. To some extent, all the cultures are ethnocentric. This is natural, since people have been brought up thinking that their way is “the natural” way to do things. However, ethnocentrism can also lead to cultural misunderstandings if it is not recognized because it provides us with only limited choice of human thinking and behaving.

4. Anxiety or tension: this sensation if commonly seeing when facing a conversation in a foreign language, or between people who doesn't spoke the same language, and its just because of the willing they have to be understood. it is also known as stress 

5. Language Differences: differ in the use of different languages to communicate with others, no just about idioms, communication its more than words, it is how express the ideas. Communication "differ not so much in what they can express as what they must express." that is what cause huge of misunderstandings at the moment of try to say something being told in a way and being interpreted by other 

6. non-verbal communication: this is the type of communication where words are not needed to understood the message, are the actions who have socially shared meanings, and are characterized for being intentionally sent or interpreted, are consciously sent and received 

STEREOTYPE AND PREJUDICE 

stereotype: are judgments made about individuals based in group membership and those can be positive or negative but are usually an exaggerated idea of what a group is like, are cognitive representations of how those members are similar to one another and different from members of other groups, stereotyping a group is describing or defined their specific beliefs, how they behave or their abilities

Prejudice: refers to the attitudes and feelings, it is the irrational suspicion of a particular group, race, religion or sexual orientation is a feeling towards a person based on their affiliation with a group.

Prejudice and stereotyping are generally considered to be the product of adaptive processes that simplify an otherwise complex world so that people can devote more cognitive resources to other tasks, are biases that work together to create and maintain social inequality. 

  

What is Implicit stereotyping? 

according to Greenwald, A. G., & Banaji, M. R. (1995). An implicit stereotype is the unconscious attribution of particular qualities to a member of a certain social group.Implicit stereotypes are influenced by experience, and are based on learned associations between various qualities and social categories, including race or gender. Individuals' perceptions and behaviors can be affected by implicit stereotypes, even without the individuals' intention or awareness. in the other hand Explicit stereotypes are the result of intentional, conscious, and controllable thoughts and beliefs. Explicit stereotypes usually are directed toward a group of people based on what is being perceived.

SOURCES:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/johnson/2011/12/differences-among-languages

http://study.com/academy/lesson/prejudice-discrimination-stereotypes-definitions-examples.html

http://www.immi.se/intercultural/nr34/dumessa.html