when I understand what a friend (or other relationships) is saying to me,” and “Communication is effective
when I understand how my friend (or other relationships) feels and my friend (or other relationships)
understands how I feel.” It is important that the items written for a derived etic measure of effective
communication tap the outcome versus process bases of perceptions of effective communication, as well
as the individual versus the relationship foci and the emotional versus the cognitive emphases in effective
communication.
In addition to developing items from the common themes, items based on the themes that were
found only in Japan (e.g., appropriateness and relations between communicators) should be included as
well to investigate if these themes are recognized as aspects of communication effectiveness in the
United States. To illustrate, an item for perceived appropriateness could be “Communication is effective
when I talk about a topic about which my friend (or other relationships) is interested.” An example of an
item for relations between communicators could be “Communication is effective when I do not hurt my
friend’s (or other relationships) feelings.”
To conclude, the present study suggests that there are systematic differences and similarities in
the perceptions of effective communication in the United States and Japan. The culture-specific findings
can be used to develop quantitative measures of perceptions of effective communication in the two
cultures. The common findings from the two cultures can be used to develop a derived etic measure of
perceptions of communication effectiveness. The differences that exist need to be taken into
consideration in future cross-cultural and intercultural research on U.S. American-Japanese
communication.
Convention