A cross‐cultural comparison of the implications of self‐disclosure on conversational logics∗

The authors express their appreciation to JoAnne Jablonski for her help in collecting data for this study.

Theorists dealing with the relationship between communication and culture confront the dilemma of trying to describe communication as culture‐laden without making statements which are themselves not so culture‐laden as to be mere ethnocentric expressions. One way of coping with the dilemma is to use “transcultural concepts”; as defined by Kang and Pearce. “Logical force,”; a concept derived from the theory of “the coordinated management of meaning,”; is proposed as a useful transcultural concept and tested in a cross‐cultural comparison. High and low levels of self‐disclosure were manipulated in a simulated conversation in which North American and Chinese subjects were asked to role‐play and subsequently describe. Obtained differences between conditions and between cultures in the logical force described as impinging on their response to the self‐disclosing messages were understood as descriptions of the differences between the cultures. The configuration of linkages within the logical force measures are interpretable in terms of the differences between Eastern and Western concepts of “sincerity.”; These data, plus other experiences with the subjects, suggest that the concept of “logical force”; is sufficiently transcultural to provide a vocabulary in which the relation between culture and communication can be expressed without merely expressing the biases of a particular culture.

Notes

The authors express their appreciation to JoAnne Jablonski for her help in collecting data for this study.