Profession Comm. 8

Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in

Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication

Maja BRATANIĆ 1

Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences, University of Zagreb

Abstract. Nonverbal behavior is to a great extent universal but in many ways also marked by culture-specific patterns. Being less obvious than misunderstandings in verbal communication, nonverbally induced miscom-munications are more difficult to detect. The problem is relevant for a wide range of disciplines – from lexicology and lexicography to foreign language teaching. Main categories of nonverbal behavior are briefly discussed with the focus on proxemics elaborated in examples from American cultural patterns. Further examples of culturally- conditioned miscommunication draw on an aviation-related context.

Keywords. Nonverbal communication, cultural miscommunication, lexicography, proxemics, Aviation English

Introduction

People convey meanings not only through language but also through various aspects of

nonverbal communication. A great deal of human communication – verbal as well as

nonverbal - is culturally molded and conditioned. Both the above assumptions have

been widely recognized in modern communication studies and hardly need to be

defended.

Linguistic disciplines by definition do not take into account the nonverbal

component of human communication to any considerable extent. Instances of

miscommunication, however, arise from both of these components. Being less obvious

than misunderstandings in verbal communication, nonverbally induced miscom-

munication is far more difficult to detect. Furthermore, the line between verbal and

nonverbal components of communication is often almost impossible to delineate

precisely. Neglecting the nonverbal component of human exchanges, or rather the

extralinguistic elements pertaining to the meaning of linguistic phenomena, can thus

result in less than adequate transfer of the meaning of language entities – ranging from

larger units of discourse to single-sound utterances like exclamations and the like.

It is my intention to show, albeit in a limited context, that even those disciplines

considered to be eminently “verbal” cannot afford to bypass nonverbal constituents of

meaning, here used in the widest pragmatic sense.

1 Corresponding Author: Maja Bratanić, Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences, University of Zagreb,

e-mail: [email protected]. [email protected].

Fundamentals of Verbal and Nonverbal Communication and the Biometric Issue A. Esposito et al. (Eds.)

IOS Press, 2007 © 2007 IOS Press. All rights reserved.

82

1. Lexicographic Context

The fundamental hypothesis of traditional lexicography assumes that the meaning of

lexical units can be explained or otherwise rendered by means of definition – in case of

monolingual lexicography – or by lexical equivalents in another language – as

presented in conventional bilingual or multilingual dictionaries. The concept of

definition has itself been defined in a variety of ways, but a standard lexicographical

definition – as opposed to an encyclopedic one – is generally assumed to be confined to

strictly linguistic devices. This, in other words, implies that such a lexicographic

representation of word meaning will often fall short of encompassing the full range of

lexical meaning (as used by cognitive linguists) i.e. its full referential dimension.

The problem is more obvious in bilingual lexicography, since concepts called by

the “same” name (translational equivalents) in two languages do not necessarily have

all their features in common. Lexical meaning is very often culture-bound, and

‘cultural meanings’ are to a great extent embedded in linguistic meanings. As

Witttgenstein implies in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, just because something

has the same name in two or more cultures it does not mean that it refers to the same

thing in those cultures [1]. This has been reiterated on many occasions to support the

strong interconnection of language and culture [2].

Different cultures may conceptually define a particular construct differently. These

constructs may be highly abstract, such as intelligence, self-image, personality or

emotion [3] but can relate to more mundane behavior or down-to-earth concepts. The

consequences are, clearly, that if a concept means different things to speakers of

different languages and participants in different cultures, then there is a lack of

equivalence, and representations of culture-bound concepts will be somewhat

misleading. The immediate consequence of a situation in which the specific culture-

bound meaning is not made explicit is that a dictionary user will tacitly assume

equivalence with a more familiar concept [4].

2. Form vs. Meaning

2.1. Lexical discrepancies are not always language related. Lado has proposed the

following categorization of cultural phenomena overlap [5]:

1. The same form has a different meaning (or different classification) in different

cultures.

2. The same meaning has a different form.

3. The same form has the same meaning, but the distribution of cultural patterns

may vary considerably.

In addition to the above, the most obvious type of incongruence occurs when a

particular cultural concept has no corresponding equivalent in a different culture.

On the linguistic level these cases roughly correspond to the following situations:

• Only partial or false lexical equivalence is established via lexical “equivalents” which carry different semantic and/or cultural connotations.

A lexeme like God, for example, refers to a wide variety of concepts depending on

the type of culture it is used by (monotheistic, polytheistic etc.). On a more profane

level, the concept of social “dating”, viewed crossculturally, is associated with a whole

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication 83

array of different cultural behavior patterns.

• Lexical gaps result from a situation in which corresponding concepts exist in different cultures but are not lexicalized.

An example of such a case can be borrowed from Hall who claims that the Arabic

language does not have a lexical equivalent for the concept of sexual violence [6].

• Referential gaps ensue from the nonexistence of corresponding cultural concepts and pose a serious barrier in translation.

An instance of such a cultural discrepancy is described by Milan Kundera in The

Book of Laughter and Forgetting elaborating the concept of litost. Kundera claims that

litost is an untranslatable Czech word expressing a uniquely Czech feeling that can be

roughly defined as a state of torment created by the sudden insight into one’s own

misery.

2.2. Culture-specific lexis is traditionally associated with some forms of social

behavior (food, clothing, tools, flora, fauna, customs, religion, social institutions …)

manifesting themselves on the denotational level as opposed to those, often implicit

differences in social and cultural behavior with either no lexical expression at all or of a

primarily connotative nature. In my view, however, it is the entirety of these

components that make up the lexical meaning. Modern lexicography (especially the

monolingual type) has recently started addressing this issue more systematically. The

problem remains, nevertheless, that monolingual lexicography by definition generally

tends to be less biculturally or multiculturally oriented than the bilingual type, or it at

best, rather vaguely addresses an imaginary participant of a different culture.

3. The Nonverbal Component of Lexical Meaning

Segments of meaning that cannot be conveyed by purely lexical means are often of

nonverbal nature. The nonverbal component of communication thus easily becomes a

factor in linguistic and cultural miscommunication. The boundaries between verbal and

nonverbal, linguistic and extralinguistic, are delineated by very hazy lines, and

separating them into two distinct categories often proves to be virtually impossible.

Following this line of reasoning, any definition of communication (as well as any

definition of culture, which I do not intend to elaborate further) must include nonverbal

behavior in its broadest sense.

Understanding communication events fully requires the interpretation of meanings

conveyed via nonverbal channels. In the context of foreign language learning it has

become common to talk about nonverbal fluency as an integral part of communicative

competence. Cultural fluency can, according to Poyatos, be defined as verbal-

nonverbal fluency [7].

3.1. How Much Communication is Nonverbal?

There is less accord in establishing how much of human communication is indeed

nonverbal in nature. Estimates vary, and, although we know that nonverbal clues can

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication84

be more important than utterances alone, some opinions tend to be farfetched and

untenable.

An early study conducted by Birdwhistell [8] indicated that up to 65% of a

message’s meaning is communicated through non-verbal clues, while Mehrabian [9]

argued that in face-to-face communication non-verbal cues convey about 93% of the

meaning. His statistics (attributing 7% of meaning to the words spoken, 38% of

meaning to paralinguistic features, and 55% of meaning to facial expression) have

become widely popular. These findings have been quoted excessively, and rather

indiscriminately and oversimplistically (mis)interpreted. Similar statistics have ever

since been rather mechanically reproduced:

Westbrook Eakins and Eakins also claim that in most two-person conversations the

words communicate only about 35% of the social meaning of the situation while the

nonverbal elements convey more than 65% of the meaning. They also mention another

estimate according to which the nonverbal message carries 4.4 times the weight of the

verbal message [10].

Fromkin and Rodman [11] similarly state that up to 90% of the meaning of a

message is transmitted non-verbally. In her studies on gender differences in language

use, Deborah Tannen also estimates that as much as 90% of all human communication

is nonverbal [12].

Other scholars argue that the percentage is much lower and tend to be more

cautious in similar estimates [13]. The overemphasis probably results from the fact that

verbal and nonverbal phenomena to a large extent co-occur. On the other hand, as

Scollon and Wong Scollon rightly observe, no means of quantification have ever been

put forward and it is hard to establish whether such quantification is possible at all [14]. These doubts, however, by no means diminish the role of the nonverbal in human

communication but simply point to the fact that it is hard to define.

3.2. Defining Nonverbal Communication

Knapp and Hall approach the task rather evasively, but effectively: “To most people,

the phrase nonverbal communication refers to communication effected by means other

than words (assuming words are the verbal element). Like most definitions, this one is

generally useful, but it does not account adequately for the complexity of this

phenomenon. As long as we understand and appreciate the points listed here, this broad

definition should serve us well.” [15].

In my limited research in the field I have adopted a practical view according to

which nonverbal behavior reflects a relation of a human being towards himself/herself,

other human beings or the environment, and can accompany verbal expression or

function in isolation.

The focus of my interest here are potential misunderstandings rooted in nonverbal

behavior. They generally stem from our implicit and unconscious assumption that

nonverbal behavior functions universally, as well as our lack of recognition of culture-

specific patterns in this area. If, however, most nonverbal phenomena (at least to a

point) tend to be culture-specific and therefore often interfere with the transfer of

meaning, not only of a particular speech act but of lexical meaning of linguistic units as

well - they should be of at least marginal concern to those involved in lexicology and

lexical semantics, even beyond the scope of anthropological linguistics or pragmatics

which by definition take greater interest in nonverbal signals in communication.

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication 85

3.3. Constitutive Elements of Nonverbal Communication

The most important types of nonverbal behavior can be categorized according to the

disciplines that study them:

Kinesics refers to body movement and posture, as well as gesture, facial expression

and eye contact and is thus most closely connected with what is popularly referred to as

body language.

Oculesics, or eye behavior, more specifically looks at the influence of visual contact on

the perceived message that is being communicated. It analyzes eye gaze, eye contact

and its avoidance etc.

Haptics, sometimes referred to as tacesics, deals with touching behavior.

Proxemics is concerned with personal space usage.

Chronemics refers to the study of how people perceive, structure, and react to time or,

in other words, how we use time to communicate. Cultures are, in this respect, usually

divided into two categories: monochronic and polychronic.

Olfactics is the study of the sense of smell and olfactory communication.

Paralinguistics deals with vocal communication parallel to language itself, such as

non-word utterances and other non-verbal vocal clues (tone of voice, loudness, pitch

etc.) rather closely related to language use.

Some of the above categories clearly overlap, proxemics and haptics in particular.

A wider frame of nonverbal behavior study additionally includes some other aspects of

human behavior, e.g. appearance, use of symbols and colors, and their influence on

non-verbal communication and gender related issues.

All forms of behavior listed above can in certain circumstances lead to cross-

cultural, as well as intra-cultural misunderstandings. The amount and length of eye

contact, for example, can be confusing even to the members of the same culture,

although cultures (in the broadest sense of the word) set implicit norms for all channels

of communication.

Gestures, in themselves, allow a lot of room for inter-cultural confusion. Speech-

related gestures (sometimes referred to as gesticulation) used mainly for emphasis,

illustration and pointing are rather universal and rarely seem to impede inter-lingual

and intercultural understanding. On the other hand, speech-independent gestures form a

system of signs in itself with a direct “verbal translation” consisting of a word or a

phrase [15].

Nonverbal behavior is learned along with verbal, and do’s and don’ts rarely need

to be negotiated among the participants sharing same culture patterns.

In the last decades nonverbal behavior has been recognized as an important topic,

particularly in communication studies. There is a substantial body of literature

exploring the influence of culture on nonverbal behavior and revealing similarities and

differences in communication processes and nonverbal behavior across cultures.

However, there has not been much research in the domain of applied nonverbal

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication86

behavior [3], and this is precisely the type of research that might be most directly

applicable to the areas I am touching upon in this presentation.

3.4. Proxemics Exemplified

The term proxemics was introduced by anthropologist Edward T. Hall to describe the

study of the human use of space within the context of culture, i.e. the cultural

patterning of the spatial separation individuals tend to maintain in face-to-face

encounters. Cultural expectations about the use of space vary widely, so proxemics

gradually came to encompass the concept of privacy, crowding, territoriality, i.e.

cultural expectations about how not only personal space but also public space should be

organized.

Hall pointed out that social distance is reliably correlated with physical distance so

that the distances people maintain from each other depend on the nature of their

relationship or involvement. According to Hall, the use of proxemic zones considered

“normal” and acceptable in American culture (more precisely middle-class Americans

of Northern European heritage) would approximately correspond to the following [16].

intimate distance (embracing, touching or whispering, 15-45 cm or 6-18 inches)

personal distance (interactions among good friends, 45-120 cm or 1.5-4 feet)

social distance (interactions among acquaintances, e.g. business transactions (1.2-

3.5 m or 4-12 ft)

public distance used for public speaking (over 3.5 m or 12 ft)

Different cultures maintain different standards of personal space. (Latin cultures

are typically contrasted with Nordic cultures.) Comfortable personal distances depend

on the social situation, gender, and individual preference but still have to be understood

against a given general cultural framework. This can be illustrated by a brief overview

of American sociocultural norms in the domain of proxemics as opposed to something

that will, for the purpose of this discussion and in a somewhat contrived manner, be

qualified as a Central European norm.

3.4.1. American Cultural Patterns

Some of the essential features of mainstream American culture can be clearly viewed

through the prism of the concept of space. They could be more productively interpreted

against the backdrop of American history, but for the present purpose I will just

mention a few that are likely to strike an outsider first.

Personal distance tends to be greater among Americans than among Central

Europeans, often accompanied by broad gestures, loud communication, and lack of

physical contact, while intimate and public distances tend to be similar.

Americans show a strong tendency against restricting space, especially around

their homes. They seem to dislike fixed barriers; instead of walls they plant hedges of

bushes or trees [17]. Freedom of movement in other people’s homes is unthinkable in most European

cultures; so is American readiness to allow and even invite guests into the most private

parts of their homes.

Individuality and independence, right to privacy, personal freedom – all manifest

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication 87

themselves in the use of space. Americans like open space, surround their houses by

big lawns whenever possible, and set the limits to their private space in ways much less

apparent to members of most other cultures.

The role of the door in American culture is, I find, exceptionally significant. The

door has much stronger symbolic meaning than Europeans are used to. An American

professor working in his/her office will at times leave the door open to signal that

unannounced visitors are welcome. This “open door attitude” often strikes a visitor by

its literal application; it symbolizes the constant availability of professors to their

students.

Knocking on a closed door, on the other hand, is far from a pro forma gesture.

Many a European visitor, including myself, has experienced embarrassment upon

discovering that entering someone’s room after merely knocking (and thus announcing

our intention to come in) is perceived as barging in, since in the American cultural

pattern, knocking symbolizes asking for permission to enter and waiting for this

permission to be granted. A student, encountering a professor’s door closed, might

even be deterred from seeking permission to enter.

Consider the scene in an old American university building that was built without

central air conditioning. Only a few offices that are used year-round have air

conditioning, so on hot days the office doors that usually would be open are kept

closed, so that cool air does not escape into the hot corridor. On such closed doors we

have seen signs: "Come in without knocking: Door closed due to air conditioning".

By the way, the type of door used in American public toilet stalls, open to about 30

cm from the floor and again above about 180 cm, allowing a high degree of outside

observability, might cause a great deal of initial discomfort in newcomers.

Such apparently informal American behavior in the realm of space, as well as

otherwise, can be easily misinterpreted since it is not about uncoded behavior but,

simply, a differently coded one. People generally make sense of nonverbal behavior by

attaching any meaning at hand to unknown or unusual forms, creating in the process a

lot of room for potential miscommunication.

4. The Language Teaching Context: the Case of Aviation English

Another area where we do not expect the nonverbal element to come into play, at least

in no way directly, is the area of highly standardized languages for special purposes.

Drawing on my experience in the field, I’d like to provide some evidence to the

contrary. Among all varieties of English for special purposes (ESP), Aviation English

is very likely the most strictly prescribed one. Still, language-related air accidents are

common, usually due to less than full adherence to the rules of communication.

The worst air accident in aviation history took place in Tenerife in 1977, due to a

tragic chain of events resulting in the collision of two Boeing 747 airliners and 583

fatalities. The crucial error was committed when, in communication with Air Traffic

Control, the KLM co-pilot used a non-standard phrase, “We are now at take-off,”

literally translating from Dutch. Apart from the language problem itself, there was

another issue involved here – that of professional ethics and authority. In spite of being

aware of the imminent danger, the third member of the crew only mildly warned the

captain, who in turn recklessly dismissed the warnings. Such dismissal of possibly very

important inputs by lower-ranked members of the crew, for what would in

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication88

anthropological theory be described as face-saving purposes, is not an uncommon

pattern of behavior [18]. Many serious accidents could probably have been avoided,

had it not been considered disrespectful to question the authority of a superior.

4.1. Crew Resource Management

As a direct result of the experience gained from the Tenerife disaster, Crew (or

Cockpit) Resource Management was introduced with the intention of modifying the

existing codes of behavior.

It had been established that among the main problems leading to human error were

failures of interpersonal communication, leadership and decision making in the cockpit.

CRM is intended to ensure that the pilot receives information and advice from not

only the other crew members, but also from external sources. Among other things, it

teaches pilots how to improve communication, prioritize tasks and delegate authority.

In other words, CRM is concerned with the cognitive and interpersonal skills needed to

function in the demanding aviation system.

4.2. Cultural Conflicts

The investigation of various accidents revealed that the factors in play extend far

beyond the cockpit and the pilots and include the issue of separation of pilots and flight

attendants. “The basic problem is that these two crews represent two distinct and

separate cultures, and that this separation serves to inhibit satisfactory teamwork”. The

problem manifests itself in the cabin crew not wanting to "bother" the pilots during a

critical portion of the flight, even when they feel that the matter is critical. In situations

like this the flight attendant must use discretion in deciding what is critical and what is

not [19].

It is interesting to note how the concept of culture, as used above, applies to a

somewhat narrower context than is normally implied. This is, however, not an isolated

example. As Matsumoto and Seung Hee Yoo claim, “Culture exists on multiple levels.

Individuals are part of small groups, and smaller groups are part of larger and even

larger groups. Each group can have its own culture and in this way culture can exist on

many levels. This is true for different ethnic and community groups that live in a large

country like the U.S., as well as among different departments, sections, and work units

of large companies.” [3]

According to Captain Steve Last, the professional culture of the pilot heavily

inclines to an individualistic attitude, which CRM training generally attempts to

minimize. In his view, a lot of CRM work “seems to be biased to a particular, idealized

Western cultural and social model, inappropriate for many airlines”. Last dubs it a

"Good Buddies" concept. Its essence is related to the American social ideal based on

strong respect for the individual, yet ”emphasizing that all individuals are equally

valuable and that teamwork needs a leader to be ‘first amongst equals’. This model,

claims Last, implies that individual satisfaction is critically important because it leads

to the best collective results. Expert piloting (as a form of control manipulation) is, at

the same time, viewed as the highest attainment [20].

This ideal is not shared by the aviation community in general. The opposite

extreme to the above model can, according to this approach, be described as an

"Oriental" model or the "Good Boss" concept. Such a sociocultural pattern, in turn,

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication 89

implies greater respect towards the most skilled and experienced team member and a

more pronounced inclination towards strong leadership, as well as group satisfaction.

With the intention of bridging the cultural and other possible gaps between these

two extremes, one of the main roles of CRM is to teach techniques for responsibly

delegating higher authority duties to lower authority units, on one hand, and to

encourage lower authority units to question and even oppose higher authority in the

interest of safety.

What makes this issue pertinent to our discussion, is the fact that authority in

general tends to be exerted via both verbal and nonverbal cues. In the highly culturally

and linguistically mixed environment of the vast aviation community, the failure to

recognize such cues can easily lead to miscommunication or lack of communication. It

would, therefore, be of no little importance for pilot and air traffic controller curricula

to include at least some basic skills required to develop nonverbal communication

awareness. Since these skills essentially belong to a wider communication competence

of an individual – part of one’s language and cultural fluency - it is reasonable to

assume that the responsibility for imparting them will primarily be placed upon

(second) language teachers.

5. How Should Culture Be Analyzed and Taught?

Without pretensions to dealing in depth with this major question in the framework of

this short paper, I would like to end my contribution with a sketchy outline of one

possible approach that seems applicable in both disciplines I have touched upon. The

interdisciplinary model of culturemes Poyatos has put forward [7] seems to offer a

workable framework in the area of foreign language teaching and, to a certain extent, in

lexicographic description as well.

The cultureme is defined as “any portion of cultural activity or nonactivity

perceived through sensible and intelligible signs with symbolic value and susceptible of

being broken down into smaller units or amalgamated into larger ones”. This model

offers a progressive transition from broader culturemes to the simplest ones. The

“largest culturemes of the two basic ecological realms in advanced cultures” are

URBAN and RURAL, subdivided into what characterizes EXTERIORS and

INTERIORS. Through these culturemes a culture can identify itself, says Poyatos, in a

rather “impressionistic fashion, and mostly sensorially”, providing a true interaction

with the general environment, and modeling the participation in a given culture.

In the next step, the model develops a further subdivision into ENVIRON-

MENTAL and BEHAVIORAL realms, and so forth. The phase of secondary

culturemes and subsequent phase of tertiary culturemes, followed by derived

culturemes, allow more detailed analyses of the phenomena in given cultural structures

and their interaction.

Poyatos’s model originally deals with nonverbal cultural systems, and what he

refers to as linguistic culturemes is limited to certain pragmatic dimensions of verbal

behavior. There is no reason, in my mind, why this model could not be adapted to

encompass wider, verbal as well as nonverbal entities. Poyatos himself defines

communication as “the emissions of signs by all the nonlexical, artifactual and

environmental sensible sign systems contained in the realm of a culture, whether

individually or in mutual construction, and whether or not those emissions constitute

behavior or generate personal interaction” [7].

M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication90

Any method broadly in accordance with the cognitive approach to communication

might prove productive as long as we keep the big picture in sight: a full interpretation

of the communicative meaning of lexical, as well as broader language phenomena, is

virtually impossible without acknowledging and accounting for its nonverbal

component or counterpart.

References

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Journal of Psychology, 24, 1989, 737-756. [3] D. Matsumoto and S. H. Yoo, Culture and Applied Nonverbal Communication. In E. Riggio and R. S

Feldman, eds., Applications of Nonverbal Communication, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, Mahwah, New Jersey, London, 2005, 255-277.

[4] M. Bratanić, Rječnik i kultura, Biblioteka SOL, knj. 1, Filozofski fakultet, Zagreb, 1991. [5] R. Lado, Linguistics across Cultures, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1957. [6] E.T. Hall, The Hidden Dimension, New York, Doubleday, 1966. [7] F. Poyatos, Nonverbal Communication across Disciplines, Vol. I, John Benjamins Publishing

Company, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 2002. [8] R.L. Birdwhistell, Kinesics and context, Essays on body motion communication, University of

Philadelphia, Philadelphia Press, Philadelphia, 1970. [9] A. Mehrabian, Nonverbal communication, Aldine-Atherton, Chicago, 1972.

[10] B. W. Eakins, R. G. Eakins. Sex Differences in Human Communication, Houghton-Mifflin, Boston, 1978.

[11] [V. Fromkin, J. Rodman, An Introduction to Language, CBS College Publishing, New York, 1983. [12] D. Tannen, That's not what I meant: How communication style makes or breaks relationship,

Ballantine, 1986. [13] J. Neulip, Intercultural Communication: a contextual approach, Houghton-Miflin, Boston, 2000. [14] R. Scollon, S. Wong Scollon, Intercultural Communication, A Discourse Approach, Blackwell

Publishing, Oxford, 2003. [15] M. L. Knapp, J. A. Hall, Nonverbal Communication in Human Interaction, Thomson Wadsworth,

Belmont, CA., 2002 [16] E.T. Hall, The Silent Language, Doubleday & Company, Inc., New York, 1959. [17] R. Carroll, Cultural Misunderstandings, The French American Experience, The University of Chicago

Press, Chicago and London, 1987. [18] C. Linde, The quantitative study of communicative success: Politeness and accidents in aviation

discourse, Language in Society 17, 1988, 375-399. [19] R. D Chute, E. L. Wiener, Cockpit/cabin communication: I. A tale of two cultures, The International

Journal of Aviation Psychology, 5 (3), 1995, 257-276. [20] S. Last, Eliminating "cockpit-caused" accidents, Error-tolerant Crew Procedures for the Year 2000, at

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M. Bratanić / Nonverbal Communication as a Factor in Linguistic and Cultural Miscommunication 91