Nonverbal dialects: Culture and person perception

In our everyday interactions, we are frequently called upon to make judgments and categorizations of other individuals. When meeting someone for the first time, for example, we form an impression of that person almost instantly. These immediate judgements about other individuals are sometimes surprisingly accurate. At other times, however, our first impressions turn out to be inaccurate and can lead to misunderstandings. Research on person perception has suggested that the information we glean from others can be affected by factors such as appearance, stereotypes, and culture. Although the role of culture in person perception has become increasingly important, given the rapid increase in globalization and cross-cultural exposure, it has been relatively underexamined. In this chapter, we review some of our experimental findings on culture and person perception in the area of nonverbal behavior, including affect and gestures. We then shift our focus to discuss trait inferences and seek to examine the effects of culture on making trait inferences based on external cues. Full text published in R.S. Wyer, C. Y. Chiu, Y.Y. Hong, & S. Shavitt, (Eds), Understanding Culture: Theory, Research and Application (pp. 289-298). NY: Psychology Press.