Sociocultural Data to Accomplish Department of Defense Missions: Toward a Unified Social Framework by National Research Council of the National Academies

Author:National Research Council of the National Academies
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Conflict and Security Issues : Military and Defense Studies
Publisher: NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS
Published: 2011-02-07T00:00:00+00:00

FIGURE 5-2 Attunement to how a message is conveyed via emotional tone of voice.

NOTE: Data drawn from U.S. participants raised as Protestants.

SOURCE: Adapted from Sanchez-Burks (2002, p. 923). Copyright ©2002 by the American Psychological Association. Adapted with permission. The use of APA information does not imply endorsement by APA.

What this means, he said, is that while there may be very little cultural difference in communication outside the work environment, there are quite large differences between Americans and people in other cultures in the way that they communicate at work. “And when I say work, it’s not just in an office building. It’s any sort of situation in which there’s a task at hand. You get this in the lab, and you get this with senior managers in large organizations.”

This “American exceptionalism,” Sanchez-Burks suggested, probably has its roots in the same Protestant work ethic that the sociologist Max Weber credited for the capitalistic spirit in the United States. A lesser known part of that work ethic, he said, was Calvin’s belief that people should not display emotions or relational information while performing their calling.1 “So you have this crazy cocktail in which not only do you feel like you’re supposed to work, but you’re supposed to be very task-focused while doing it.” And so Americans, unlike most other people in the world, pay little attention to the emotional or relational signals of others while they are at work.

1 The presenter refers to John Calvin, the French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation and father of the theological system of Calvinism.

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