Publications

Publication details [#16278]

Li, Han Z. 2001. Cooperative and intrusive interruptions in inter- and intracultural dyadic discourse. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 20 (3) : 259–284.
Publication type
Article in journal
Publication language
English
Place, Publisher
SAGE Publications
ISBN
0261-927X

Annotation

This study examined whether culture plays a role in the use of interruption in simulated doctor-patient conversations. Participants were 40 Canadians and 40 Chinese who formed 40 dyads in four experimental conditions: Canadian speaker-Canadian listener, Chinese speaker-Chinese listener, Chinese speaker-Canadian listener, and Canadian speaker-Chinese listener. All conversations were videotaped and microanalyzed. The data generated four findings: (a) In the Chinese speaker-Chinese listener interactions, cooperative interruptions occurred more frequently than intrusive interruptions; (b) when Canadians served as doctors, the doctors performed significantly more intrusive interruptions than cooperative ones; (c) the two intercultural groups engaged in more unsuccessful interruptions than the two intracultural groups; and (d) in the intercultural conditions, the occurrences of intrusive interruptions were greater than cooperative interruptions. This phenomenon provides unequivocal support for communication accommodation theory. The findings point to a hypothesis that conversational interruption may be a pan-cultural phenomenon, whereas interruption styles may be culture specific.