Nonverbal Communication

Chapter One Introduction Human communication is usually divided into verbal and nonverbal systems. Actually, in everyday life, we spend a considerable amount of time on nonverbal communication. Furthermore, we receive much of our emotional meanings through nonverbal elements. Birdwhistell and Philpott figured out that the nonverbal communication accounts for 60 to70 percent of what we communicate to one another (Tubbs&Moss, 1991:137) . This statistic has been widely accepted and reported by most current nonverbal communication books. Since verbal communication is only 30% in daily conversation, nonverbal communication is of great significance. Culture and communication are inextricably bound. Cross-cultural communication, as one of the most important parts in culture, should not be neglected. Cultural difference is one of the greatest hinders in cross-cultural communication. People in different countries may misunderstand each other because they have different cultures. Some of these differences show up by language and translation, but many others involve subtle differences in etiquette, behavior, values, norms,rituals, expectations and other nonverbal variations. Learning about cultural differences in nonverbal behavior is useful to study cross-cultural communication for number of reasons. First, we will be able to gather clues about underlying attitudes and values by realizing critical cultural differences. Nonverbal communication often reveals basic cultural traits. Second ,the study of nonverbal behavior an help us to isolate our own ethnocentrism. Knowing what attitudes and behavior be bring to a communication event can make people understand our response to the people we meet. In the 1970, Fast's Body Language was the opening of the time of synthesized the nonverbal studies. The following linguists followed and summarized the book and attempted to make nonverbal achievements more understandable to people. Among all these books, some