Cause Of Miscommunication Research Articles

Intercultural Miscommunications of a Malaysian university students and Strategies to Overcome Them

The phenomenon of intercultural communication is increasing day by day due to the new trend of global economy which brings people from various ethnicities and nationalities to work together in the same places. There is a need to look into this type of communication and have a closer look at the possible causes of miscommunication. This paper looks into intercultural miscommunication between international and local students in one of the major multicultural universities in Malaysia. It examines the quality of intercultural communication through investigating the various challenges students face in this regard as well as the different strategies they use to avoid and fix miscommunication. Interviews were conducted on 20 students. It was found that the participants of the study face various challenges which were classified into linguistic and cultural ones. The present paper invites researchers to further examine the various challenges that face both groups of students in this regard.

Modifying phrases in surgical pathology reports: introduction of Standardized Scheme of Reporting Certainty in Pathology Reports (SSRC-Path).

Pathologists often incorporate modifying phrases in their diagnosis to imply varying levels of diagnostic certainty; however, what is implied by the pathologists is not equivalent with what is perceived by the referring physicians and patients. This discordance can have significant implications in management, safety, and cost. We intend to identify lack of consistency in interpretation of modifying phrases by comparing perceived level of certainty by pathologists and non-pathologists, and introduce a standard scheme for reporting uncertainty in pathology reports using the experience with imaging reporting and data systems. In this study, a list of 18 most commonly used modifying phrases in pathology reports was distributed among separate cohorts of pathologists (N = 17) and non-pathology clinicians (N = 225) as a questionnaire survey, and the participants were asked to assign a certainty level to each phrase. All the participants had practice privileges in Brown University-affiliated teaching hospitals. The survey was completed by 207 participants (17 pathologists, 190 non-pathologists). It reveals a significant discordance between the interpretations of the modifying phrases between the two cohorts, with significant variations in subgroups of non-pathology clinicians. Also there is disagreement between pathologists and other clinicians regarding the causes of miscommunication triggered by pathology reports. Pathologists and non-pathology clinicians should be mindful of the potential sources of misunderstanding of pathology reports and take necessary actions to prevent and clarify the uncertainties. Using a standard scheme for reporting uncertainty in pathology reports is recommended.

Communication Breakdowns – Uninformative Doctors Or Ignorant Patients?

Objective: Communication issues within clinical encounters are increasing within Turkey. To raise awareness of the problem and identify solutions, it was decided to undertake the current research. Methods: Separate questionnaires, one for doctors, the other for patients, were prepared and distributed between May and July 2018 to 100 doctors plus 100 adult patients at either Adana Numune Hospital or Eskisehir Osmangazi University Hospital. Results: Patients’ views: 60% responded that doctors give insufficient information in terms of quality and quantity. 80% stated that the doctor failed to convey a clear message. 40% described doctors as lacking enthusiasm in explaining the issue and curtailing the conversation. 40% felt that the inadequate length of the consultation contributed to a sense that the patient was undervalued by the doctor. 40% felt consultation times needed to be lengthened. 20% stated that the doctors listened inadequately. 30% felt that communication would be improved by better use of Turkish equivalents for latinate medical terms. 10% felt that the key element in communication was for doctors first to value patients.Doctors’ views: 100% felt they had the ability to explain, but that time constraints and patients’ inability to understand key elements hinder communication. 95% felt the issue rested with patients and their inability to comprehend. 60% considered the patients insufficiently educated or lacking adequate intellectual resources to understand. 90% proposed lengthening consultation times to improve communication. Conclusion: Blaming either party is not the solution. Short consultation times are the root cause of miscommunication and need to increase if communication is to improve. Improvements in patients’ education may in the future lead to more fruitful clinical encounters. Clinicians must develop an effective communication style to create healthier relationships with their patients.

Speakers adapt speech based on percieved miscommunication

Recent work suggests that speakers can exaggerate their speech based on perceived communicative success (Buz et al., 2016). However, the flexibility and sophistication of this speech adaptation is relatively under-explored. We thus investigate whether this adaptation can be responsive to context-specific demands (e.g., exaggerating speech in contexts with increased potential for miscommunication), whether adaptation can target specific phonetic/acoustic properties (e.g., specifically exaggerating aspects of speech that may reduce miscommunication), and whether this adaptation involves inference about the potential causes of miscommunication. We investigate these questions in a web-based spoken communication game where we manipulate speakers' perceived communicative success. We find that speakers “smartly” adapt to miscommunication so as to increase speakers' likelihood of subsequent communicative success. The results argue for a speech production system that incorporates past experience and can adapt fine-grained properties of speech to better achieve communicative goals.

Pragmatic transfer, relevance and procedural meaning in L2

Abstract Pragmatic transfer traces back to Thomas’ (1983, 1984) definition of “pragmatic failure” as a violation of sociolinguistic rules which result in misinterpretation (for a historical overview, see Bou Franch, 2012). As a result, negative transfer has received a great deal of attention for being a cause of miscommunication in L2 and a domain where corrective strategies towards native-like performance were much in need (see Kasper, 1992). In this study, positive transfer is triggered by a cognitive procedure rather than a sociolinguistic skill and is examined in terms of learners’ acquired ability to infer pragmatic meanings in L1 and L2. Using the relevance-theoretic distinction of conceptual-procedural meaning (Wilson, 2011), the study seeks to unveil facilitating effects of L1, L2 and interventions on participants’ ability to interpret newspaper editorials while using procedural expressions as evidence for pragmatic inferences drawn.

A speaker-oriented multidimensional approach to risks and causes of miscommunication

Combining ideas from different research directions and fields, the paper presents a multidimensional model of communication which enables to explain the risks of communication more comprehensively than before. The process of producing and interpreting speech is described through a message transfer circle. The model also includes the mental worlds of the speaker and the recipient, which substantially influence interaction. In addition, special attention is paid to recipient design, which plays a crucial role in interaction. One may even argue that such frequently mentioned factors as misreference or ambiguity are not causes of miscommunication but only risks for it; the real cause of miscommunication is incomplete recipient design. The common denominator is the egocentrism of the speaker: avoidance of cognitive effort, common ground fallacy, emotional overdrive, obstacles caused by physiological state or physical defects, and attaching greater importance to other things at the expense of recipient design.

Negotiation strategies in written communication between adult teacher–student dyads: a cross-cultural perspective

This paper presents the results of an analysis of written communication strategies between adults engaged in a teacher–student relationship, with a strong cross-cultural component. In presenting data available from actual written communication between students and teachers of diverse cultural backgrounds and age, this work aims to highlight significant strategies for negotiation in dyadic (i.e., non-mediated) conflict resolution between adults in higher education, by means of an analysis of the linguistic, pragmatic, and cultural traits within each text. The texts are taken from written communications between teacher–student dyads that are distributed as follows: a) European dyads of same nationality; b) European dyads of different nationality; and c) Chinese–European dyads. By providing a contrastive analysis of the different strategies recorded for dyadic conflict resolution and negotiation, and by elucidating the major causes of miscommunication – such as misunderstanding and wrong-footing, either between European–European and European–Chinese dyads or between dyads of the same nationality but different age – this research aims primarily to provide a key for the linguistic analysis of effective interpersonal and intercultural written communication in unequal relationships, such as that between teacher and student. The present study is also aimed at establishing a baseline for future linguistic research in this field.

Interns Overestimate the Effectiveness of Their Hand-off Communication

Theories from the psychology of communication may be applicable in understanding why hand-off communication is inherently problematic. The purpose of this study was to assess whether postcall pediatric interns can correctly estimate the patient care information and rationale received by on-call interns during hand-off communication. Pediatric interns at the University of Chicago were interviewed about the hand-off. Postcall interns were asked to predict what on-call interns would report as the important pieces of information communicated during the hand-off about each patient, with accompanying rationale. Postcall interns also guessed on-call interns' rating of how well the hand-offs went. Then, on-call interns were asked to list the most important pieces of information for each patient that postcall interns communicated during the hand-off, with accompanying rationale. On-call interns also rated how well the hand-offs went. Interns had access to written hand-offs during the interviews. We conducted 52 interviews, which constituted 59% of eligible interviews. Seventy-two patients were discussed. The most important piece of information about a patient was not successfully communicated 60% of the time, despite the postcall intern's believing that it was communicated. Postcall and on-call interns did not agree on the rationales provided for 60% of items. In addition, an item was more likely to be effectively communicated when it was a to-do item (65%) or an item related to anticipatory guidance (69%) compared with a knowledge item (38%). Despite the lack of agreement on content and rationale of information communicated during hand-offs, peer ratings of hand-off quality were high. Pediatric interns overestimated the effectiveness of their hand-off communication. Theories from communication psychology suggest that miscommunication is caused by egocentric thought processes and a tendency for the speaker to overestimate the receiver's understanding. This study demonstrates that systematic causes of miscommunication may play a role in hand-off quality.

建築設計組織内における設計作業上のコミュニケーションギャップについて

This study examines the cause of miscommunication which wakes up in the drawing works in small design firms. The method was that architect and draftsman were interviewed, when the discrepancy of the interpretation for the indication was generated in the design work, and it was carried out in the form which caught the process for the thought. The architect tends to consider the detailed and individual contents from the whole of object regarding as architecture. In the meantime, the draftsman tended to compose the whole of the small concrete decision.

Yes, I don't understand: Yes, no and European-Polynesian miscommunication in New Zealand

Discussions by non-linguists of causes of miscommunication between New Zealanders of European and Polynesian origin have highlighted a number of apparent linguistic causes. The most frequently reiterated claims are that miscommunication arises from differences in the use of yes and no in response to questions of various kinds, especially questions containing negatives. These claims are evaluated with reference to conversational and courtroom data. The specific claims are not confirmed, although related phenomena are found to occur. Yes and no can be ambiguous following questions containing negatives, but the problematic question forms are negative declaratives and mixed-polarity complex forms. Such ambiguous yes's and no's are used by European native English speakers as well as Polynesian second-language speakers of English, and the problem is usually easily repaired. The main problem for Polynesian second-language speakers appearing in court was found to be a general one of difficulty comprehending the lawyer's questions. The main problem with yes and no is that they disguise misinterpretations and failures of comprehension. Whether or not the ‘negative question problem’ is a major cause of miscommunication, it is widely accepted as such in New Zealand, and can be considered to be a stereotype about European-Polynesian communication. Possible reasons for the development of this stereotype are put forward. Consideration is given to the more general question of how instances of European-Polynesian miscommunication can be explained, and it is argued that explanations need to go beyond a focus on systematic differences between first languages or between varieties of English. It is necessary to take into account the social and cultural context of communication, second language acquisition phenomena, performance factors, and psycholinguistic processes, particularly comprehension.