Is it just me or do is there a propensity for people from China to always answer “Yes” when asked a yes/no question?
Do you have your seafood buffet today? “Yes”
only to get there and …no they don’t
Do you sell boiled Crawdads? “Yes”
No, they don’t.
Did the instructor explain how to freeze your cell culture? “Yes”
uhmm, excuse me, no she didn’t yet.
So, has anyone else noticed this? and is there a cultural reasoning for it?
Yes.
I read the linked article about “Face”. That prompts another question.
What happens in these cultures when the accuracy of a “yes/no” response is of paramount importance … in life-or-death situations, say?
Are there strategies employed in “face” cultures that people use when they absolutely MUST know something? A hypothetical example might be to ask someone who has less face to lose than the person who’d probably know best but risks much face.
Another instance – how do cops get past “face” during routine, but important, interrogations?
I found this out the hard way when I hired a couple of Chinese immigrants to help in my accounting and tax business. They would make the most God-awful mistakes rather than ask a question or refer an issue to someone with the proper experience. I had meetings with them both where I emphasized that I would never fire them for not knowing something, only for not asking questions. I had to fire them. Very nice girls and very talented, but they would rather plug a random number into a tax return than admit they didn’t know how to do something. (Even when their job description said “Here are things we don’t expect you to know and don’t want you to do.”)
Bwah…?
Maybe, but seems unlikely. “Saving face” can be roughly equated to “avoiding embarrassment”, and I don’t see how that would apply here. My guess is that the folks in the OP just didn’t understand the questions.
Sigene, was this some random Chinese restaurant in a foreign country? Oftentimes (at least here in the US) the staff won’t understand much more than the answers to “How many people?” and “What drink?”. Could that’ve been the case?
Many times I’ve asked waiters in Chinese restaurants, in English, for something and they’d just smile and nod and say “Yes, yes” like they were retarded (usually the questions weren’t even the yes-no type). My guess is that they think I’m just making smalltalk and so try to play along. Then I’d try again in Chinese and they’d have an “Ohhhhh!” moment and answer the question properly.
Dracoi, what was their response when you tried to make it clear to them what you expected?
I don’t know if this relates to ‘face’, but I’ve read that in some cultures it is very important to show that you understand the question. The answer may not have been, “Yes, we have Crawdads.”, but “Yes. (I understand your question)” Even if he/she didn’t undeterstand.
Presumably they said, “yes.”
:dubious:
AFAIK – I’m not a sociologist, just somebody who grew up in that culture – it’s not that different. “Face” is something akin to tact/subtlety/politeness, not a get-out-of-jail-free card for hard questions.
In general everyday conversation, there might be an initial period of “I hate to ask you this, but…” or “A person of your stature should surely understand the circumstances involved; reluctantly, I’m forced to inquire…” answered by “Well, you know…” (involuntary shift in posture, fake smile, uncomfortable chuckle) and then they get to the heart of the matter, perhaps scattering in a few abrupt, hastily-contrived excuses along the way, but the heart of the matter nonetheless.
In something like a medical emergency, there’s no time for pretense. They just ask. The answer may not always be a direct “Yes” or “No”, but meaning can usually be derived from the undertone and body language. If it still isn’t clear, you simply demand: “Look, I know this is difficult, but I need an answer. Just tell me.”
As for cops, I haven’t actually been interrogated there, but I suspect that the difference in stature/authority/power would render face mostly moot. A parent does not have to save face when demanding something of a child, a boss of an employee, cops of their prisoners, etc. If the situation isn’t mission-critical and/or time-sensitive, sure, the more powerful party may try to allow the other to save some face, but that’s more just a strategic nicety – if the other party is an asshole in return or not sufficiently forthcoming, patience will soon wear thin.
But, again, all that is just (somewhat limited) personal experience talking. I may be wrong.
One of the links on jjimm’s link, more explicitly references Eastern culture (polite lies).
I’ll defer to the experts on that one (I don’t know either way), but this is related:
“Yes” is also sometimes used as a form of active listening, the same way an English speaker might interject the occasional “Uh-huh”, “Yeah?”, or “Right, right…” to show they’re awake and participating.
Typically, you would differentiate between yes-as-an-answer and yes-I-hear-you by waiting a few seconds and reading the situation and the other party’s facial and body language (do they look like they’re about to say something or are they staring at you like you’re slow?).
In the study of communications, I think they call this the difference between “high-context” and “low-context” cultures.
I’ll quote another random website:
Another consideration is that they would have said ‘yes’ to any question just to get you into the restaurant.
Hmm. I didn’t realize polite lies went quite that far, even in Chinese culture (is Japan different in that regard?). I can understand “No means no. Maybe means no.” but “Yes means no”? I know implicit language can be used to downplay or emphasize the explicit, but to outright contradict it?
Even the Wikipedia paragraph about how airlines will lie and say a flight was delayed when it was actually canceled strikes me as extreme. Can anyone with more knowledge or experience chime in?
I wonder if this is not a case of lost in translation. In Urdu, we often say accha meaning “good”, in a manner where it would mean "I understand. It would be obvious by the tone and the context to the other person what the sayer intended. Nobody would construe a person who on being told “you child has died” replied accha as meaning I understand.
Malaysians and Indonesians will also answer “yes” to almost everything, from my experience.
Hamsters. See below.
I’m feeling a lot less liberal guilt over those A-bombs now. It truly is as my Japanese Cultural History professor told me a case of east being east and west being west and never the twain meeting.
That’s interesting. I took a trip to Bali recently. One driver I hired had been to the US as a college student. While discussing diferences between the two cultures, he explained that Balinese will say no because it’s more important in their culture to keep their word than to appear polite by saying yes and not following through.
Now, if your’e talking about massage girls and the “plus plus” experience, that might be different.
The Balinese, who are predominantly Hindu, are a different kettle of fish. Everything seems different on Bali. I was thinking of the more traditional Indonesians, like say on Java.