Communications and Media

With the rise of globalization and a lot of integration going around us people have come in contact with people from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds. In order to communicate with people belonging to different backgrounds a common set of procedure is required which is interpreted by people who are even from different backgrounds. Today what a lot of people are facing is the language barrier as they come in contact with people who are from different countries and thus speak different languages. (Allwood., 2009) The procedure could be the non verbal or even verbal. Thus, the communication which is meant to form meaning across culture is referred to as intercultural communication. (Griffin, 2001)

There are numerous theories that can be incorporated in the intercultural communication. Practically speaking the most common type of communication is the nonverbal communication. It refers to the facial expressions, gestures, postures and eye contact etc. It is the silent conversation between people. Not only these but any sort of action that sends a message to people without using any words is the nonverbal communication. Even standing too close is a nonverbal communication which is interpreted differently in different cultures. (Gunawan, 2001)

In order to explore the modes of communication between people from different backgrounds, the paper will focus on the nonverbal communication for research. The paper would further look for the fact that whether the nonverbal communication is the best form of intercultural communication or not. Though the nonverbal communication accounts for the 70 of the communication that is taking place but what here needs to be pointed out is that whether it would be understood cross culturally. The difference in culture and norms also makes the signs and gestures interpreted differently in different cultures. To further elaborate the point the example could be that the ok sign or the ring sign in America means that everything is OK while in Japan is referred to money and in France it means zero or nothing. Similar to this example there are numerous signs which in one culture is considered in a good manner while in the other culture is considered offensive (Gunawan, 2001)

Various researches have been done suggesting different methods for intercultural communication and along with the effectiveness of the method. This research will aim to focus only on the effectiveness of the nonverbal communication. It would explore the fact that whether the non verbal communication is effective within different cultures or not.  A lot of researches have been done which will be discussed in the literature according to which nonverbal methods provides an effective method to overcome the language barrier while on the other hand there are even content that establishes that nonverbal communication is not very effective within different cultures due to the different interpretations of the signs. This research aims to find that to what extent is this method effective and does it actually makes communication possible or further confuses the communication process.

This research would aim to improve the previous researches by identifying to what extent is the nonverbal communication effective within different cultures and would also identify what are the pitfalls related to it. Since two different approaches are found regarding the nonverbal communications within cultures so the research would aim to find out the effectiveness of both the notions and a conclusion based on the secondary and the primary research would provide how effective nonverbal communication is.

Literature Review
Intercultural communication means the communication which is taking place between the people who belong to different cultures. This is the most difficult form of communication as there is a barrier of language and the people involved are not able to understand each others language. In such cases nonverbal communication is what is look up to when one does not understand the language. (Allwood, 1985)  There are two different notions for nonverbal communication as one school of thought considers it to be more effective than the verbal communication while the other feels that it cannot be used during intercultural communication as the nonverbal cues differ culturally. The cultural variation can be in the form like low context cultures like that of America and Canada, the nonverbal communication is not that important while in countries which are of high context like Japan this communication is relatively more important. Having said that, a lot of content is still found which says that nonverbal cues are still a very good method when communicating within different cultures. (LeBaron, 2003)

There is a dispute in the ideas as some people believe that nonverbal communications can be used while communicating intercultural as research ahs shown that generally the important gestures of anger, happiness, surprise, disgust and sadness are the same across the cultures so nonverbal communication can be done in order to explain someone what one wants to say as the basic gestures are the same in all the cultures. (LeBaron, 2003)

Thomlison in his research mentioned that nonverbal communication plays a very significant role when communicating within different cultures because of the fact that they are used unconsciously and thus adds significance to the message. A message alone can have dual meanings but when a message is communicated by using the nonverbal impressions it adds to the interpretation and thus the message is received in the right manner by the receiver (Ostermeier, 1995) This notion is also supported by Potoker and Elaine who have come up with a case study in which they have discussed the training of the employees via using the nonverbal communications. This has been discussed in the case study as a very successful method for training the employees who belong to different cultures. The case study mentions that while training people from various different linguistic backgrounds the nonverbal cues such as signs and expressions were very successfully used and they were able to communicate the message in the right manner. The cues were interpreted in the correct manner by the trainees. (Management and Training across Cultures Importance of Non-Verbal Communication Strategies--A Case Study., n.d.)

Henry Calero in his study has described that nonverbal communication is the best understood mode and is very powerful. He is of the opinion that this mode is not taught to anyone but is there with a person since he is born. Despite of people being from different backgrounds and cultures, facial expressions and the other cues along with it communicates the message in the right manner. A person might not exactly understand the message but a rough idea can be done as to what the message is about and would does it say. On the other hand he in his book has mentioned that at times the nonverbal is much better in terms of understanding as compared to the verbal form because certain sentences have dual meanings due to which they can be interpreted in a wrong manner. (Calero, 2005)

This is completely negated by a few researches who have by giving examples have clarified that a lot of gestures are different in different cultures and at times even opposite of what one culture claims. For example shaking hands is considered as a good and welcoming gesture in America and other western cultures while it is considered very offensive in the subcontinent and the Arab countries. Other than that sign like signaling people to come with palm up is considered common in USA while in Korea and Latin America it is considered rude. A lot of cultural blunders have been done by various multinationals as their nonverbal communications have been interpreted differently in different cultures.  (Jones  Quach, n.d)

Culture is responsible for shaping up the beliefs and attitudes. A person is shaped from the culture he lives in and whatever a person does is a representation of his culture. Thus the nonverbal communication that an individual does is strictly derived from the culture the person belongs to. Wide cultural gaps are found around the world. What is considered right in one culture is a wrong sign for the other culture and vice versa. In such a condition one cannot rely on the nonverbal communication only without knowing different cultures thoroughly or at least the basics if the culture. In order to communicate using the nonverbal cues one is bound to understand or have a slight insight of the culture of the person he is referring to otherwise a huge misunderstanding may be created as the message would be transmitted incorrectly.  Otherwise a huge misinterpretation and confusion can be created by using these nonverbal communication techniques. (Yammiyavar, Clemmensen i,  Kumar, 2008)

Methodology
In order to authenticate the data findings a comprehensive method would be used for collecting the data. The tools that would be used for the primary data collection would include questionnaires, focus group and in depth interviews. The sample size would be around 250 and the sample frame would include people who are working or living in the environment where there are people from different cultures. This sample would be reached on the basis of the researchers convenience and thus the sampling method that would be used would be convenience sampling. Around 200 questionnaires would be used while the rest 50 would be interviewed. A focus group will consist of around 8-10 respondents.

Since the primary data would be gathered by three different types thus first the analysis would be done separately for the three methods but at the end a comprehensive result would be given which would be a consolidation of the result obtained from three methods. The questionnaires would be analyzed by using the hypothesis method where the Z-test would be used to test the hypothesis. Other than that certain simpler statistical tools like mean, graphs and frequency would also be used to clarify the results.

The result obtained by focus group would be presented separately where all the content would be recorded first during the focus group and the results from the focus group would then be documented.
The data from the third method that is in depth interview would also be recorded separately first and then consolidated. At the beginning a summary of each interviewee would be provided after which the trend from the interview would be given which will be the analysis of all the interviews.

A consolidated result will be provided at the end which would be obtained by combining the three results. Recommendations and conclusion would be based on the findings from the study. At the end a guide will also be provided for the future researchers who would help them in the further researches regarding the topic. It would tell them about the areas which have not been tapped in this research and doing research on those areas would help this field substantially. A set of limitations would also be provided that the researcher will face during the course of the study.

Conclusion
The research would aim to find the effectiveness of nonverbal communication while doing intercultural communication. A lot of researches have been done on the field of intercultural communications and various methods have been suggested. The nonverbal communication method is also one of the topics already discussed but the problem that exists is that of different notion regarding this method. One school of thought considered it as a very good medium as it tends to communicate better than the verbal communication while the other school of thought feels that due to cultural differences even the nonverbal communication differs. The people belonging to the later school believes that the nonverbal cues are also shaped by the culture and thus what is good in one culture may sound offensive in the other.

Thus this study would find out the effectiveness of the nonverbal communication and would also find if this method communicates the message or misinterprets it.