The Influence of Cultural Individualism-Collectivism,Self Construals,and Individual Values on Communication Styles Across Cultures

Individualism-collectivism has a direct effect on communication styles and an indirect effect that is mediated through self construals and values. It was hypothesized that cultural individualism-collectivism, self construals, and values would have separate effects on individuals’use of low- and high-context communication styles. As predicted, the results of this study suggest that independent self construals and individualistic values mediate the influence of cultural individualism-collectivism on the use of low-context communication, and interdependent self construals and collectivistic values mediate the influence of cultural individualism-collectivism on the use of high-context communication. The patterns for cultural individualism-collectivism were not as clear-cut. The findings suggest that individual level factors (i.e., self construals and values) are better predictors of low- and high-context communication styles across cultures than cultural individualism-collectivism.     

Beyond Mental Competence

Justification for psychiatric paternalism is most easily established where mental illness renders the person mentally incompetent, depriving him of the capacity for rational agency and for autonomy, hence undermining the basis for liberal rights against paternalism. But some philosophers, and no doubt some doctors, have been deeply concerned by the inadequacy of the concept of mental incompetence to encapsulate some apparently appealing cases for psychiatric paternalism. We ought to view mental incompetence as just one subset of a broader justification for psychiatric paternalism. The very basis of liberal limitations on psychiatric paternalism, whether described in terms of rights to autonomy or as respect for differences in values and lifestyles, presupposes a sense of moral persistence, and hence some sufficiently persistent self. Paternalistic intervention is warranted when we are unable to govern our lives in a manner consistent with the goals and values that comprise that ‘self’. One way that can occur is when we lack the mental capacities required for autonomy, such that we are unable to interpret and interact with our environment in order to meaningfully pursue our goals, i.e. mental incompetence. But it can also occur when we are subject to impositions that alter our goals without altering our capacity to pursue them — i.e. when it is our ‘self’ that is impaired rather than our competence.     

Using Systems Theory to Organize Confusion

This paper represents an initial step in applying to complex clinical situations the symbolic logic developed by G. Spencer Brown and elaborated by Francisco Varela. This way of modeling turns out to yield an interesting mixture of rigidity, ambiguity, and paradox, perhaps inevitable at our present level of understanding of systems containing feedback. Applying the Brown-Varela concepts seems a useful transitional step toward the future use of more sophisticated quantitative models such as those of Powers and Forrester.