Evaluation of politeness: Do the Japanese evaluate attentiveness more positively than the British?

Saeko Fukushima

Abstract

This study investigates evaluation of attentiveness by British and Japanese university students. Attentiveness (kikubari) (defined as a demonstrator’s preemptive response to a beneficiary’s verbal/non-verbal cues or situations) is demonstrated without being requested and it is one of the important politeness strategies. A questionnaire including six attentiveness situations was distributed to 74 British and 138 Japanese participants, who were asked to evaluate the attentiveness situations on a five-point Likert scale and to state the reasons for their evaluation. The Likert-scale evaluations were analyzed using a three-way ANOVA and subsequently, the reasons for evaluations were analyzed qualitatively. It was anticipated that the Japanese would evaluate attentiveness more positively than the British, as attentiveness has been important in Japanese culture. The results, however, did not necessarily confirm this. That is, there were significant differences between British and Japanese participants in four situations, the British participants having evaluated attentiveness more positively than the Japanese participants in two situations and the reverse being the case in two other situations.

Keywords:
Quick links
A browser-friendly version of this article is not yet available. View PDF
Brown, Penelope, and Stephen C. Levinson
(1987) Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cocroft, Beth-Ann K., and Stella Ting-Toomey
(1994) Facework in Japan and the United States. International journal of intercultural relations 18.4: 469-506. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Eelen, Gino
(2001) A critique of politeness theories. Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing.Google Scholar
Fukushima, Saeko
(2000) Requests and culture: Politeness in British English and Japanese. Bern: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
(2004) Evaluation of politeness: The case of attentiveness. Multilingua 23.4: 364-387. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
forthcoming) Hearer’s aspect in politeness: The case of requests. In D. Shu & K. Turner (eds.) Contrasting meaning Bern Peter Lang
Hatch, Evelyn, and Anne Lazaraton
(1991) The research manual: Design and statistics for applied linguistics. Boston: Heinle and Heinle Publishers.Google Scholar
Haugh, Michael
(2003) Anticipated versus inferred politeness. Multilingua 22.4: 399-413. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2005) A review of requests and culture: Politeness in British English and Japanese by Saeko Fukushima. Journal of politeness research 1.1: 160-165.Google Scholar
(2007) The co-constitution of politeness implicature in conversation. Journal of pragmatics 39: 84-110. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hikey, Leo, and Miranda Stewart
(2005) Introduction. In L. Hickey & M. Stewart (eds.), Politeness in Europe. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, pp. 1-12. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hofstede, Geert
(1991) Culture and organizations: Software of the mind. London: McGraw-Hill Book Company.Google Scholar
Holliday, Adrian
(1999) Small cultures. Applied linguistics 20.2: 237-264. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lebra, Takie
(1976) Japanese patterns of behavior. Honolulu: The University of Hawaii Press.Google Scholar
Ohashi, Jun
(2003) Japanese culture specific face and politeness orientation: A pragmatic investigation of yoroshiku onegaishimasu. Multilingua 22.3: 257-274. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2008) Linguistic rituals for thanking in Japanese: Balancing obligations. Journal of pragmatics 40: 2150-2174. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sifianou, Maria
(1992) Politeness phenomena in England and Greece: A cross-cultural perspective. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
(1997) Silence and politeness. In A. Jaworski (ed.), Silence: Interdisciplinary perspectives. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 63-84.Google Scholar
Spencer-Oatey, Helen
(2000) Culturally speaking: Managing rapport through talk across cultures. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
(2005) Rapport management theory and culture. Intercultural pragmatics 2.3: 335-346. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stewart, Miranda
(2005) Politeness in Britain: “It’s only a suggestion…” In L. Hickey & M. Stewart (eds.), Politeness in Europe. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, pp. 116-129. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ting-Toomey, Stella
(2009) Facework collision in intercultural communication. In F. Bargiela-Chiappin & M. Haugh (eds.), Face, communication and social interaction. London: Equinox, pp. 227-249.Google Scholar
Yoshida, Tomoko
(1994) Interpersonal versus non-interpersonal realities: An effective tool individualists can use to better understand collectivists. In R.W. Brislin & T. Yoshida (eds.), Improving intercultural interactions: Modules for cross-cultural training programs. Thousand Oaks: Sage, pp. 243-267. DOI logoGoogle Scholar