Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT)

Do we speak differently to different people? (Mirzaiyan, Parvaresh, Hashemian, & Saeedi, 2010). When one speak to a kid, one may change their voice and talk in a kid’s tone; or say Indian man who works in Brunei, they may have to speak in local language and accent in order to communicate with the local citizen. Communication Accommodation Theory suggest that “communicators are motivated to adjust their speech styles with respect to one another as a means of expressing values, attitudes, and intentions” (Streets and Giles, 1982, p. 205; see also Giles et al., 1987). In order to adjust to other party’s speech styles, the person may converge – making one’s speech styles similar to the other party – or diverge – the opposite of convergence (Buller & Aune, 1992).

CAT help “explains some of the reasons for change in conversation as individuals seek to emphasize or minimize the social differences between themselves and their interlocutors” (Mirzaiyan, Parvaresh, Hashemian, & Saeedi, 2010). Say a French man speaks in English, one sometimes can guess that this guy is a French guy perhaps through his accent or dialect. Hence, CAT states that people adjust to the other party language through the speech style, accent, or dialect of the interlocutors to gain social approval (Mirzaiyan et al, 2010).

“Converging toward the speech of another person can be regarded as a polite speech strategy while choosing a language not used by the other interlocutor can be considered as the clearest example of speech divergence” (Mirzaiyan et al, 2010). It is where the listener is trying to adapt to the conversation with intention to reduce nonverbal differences among themselves (Griffin, 2012). For example, a teacher talk to one of his student in English language, the student may also need to reply in English to. However, the student may not be fluent in speaking English, say he stutters on his words. The teacher in return may speak to him in a language that the student can speak fluently say Malay language.

Divergence is a term used to refer to the way in which the speakers accentuate and nonverbal differences between themselves and others (Giles, H., Coupland, N., & Coupland, J., 1991).  There are three types of divergence: (1) Counter-accommodation – direct ways of maximizing the differences between two speakers, (2) Under-accommodation (maintenance) – is the strategy of persisting in one original communication styles regardless of the communication behaviour of the other, and (3) Over-accommodation – demeaning or patronizing talk; excessive concern paid to vocal clarity or amplification, message simplification, or repetition (Griffin, 2012).


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rl9Cxc7uZA


In the Rush Hour (1998) Movie, there is a scene where Detective Carter (Los Angeles cop) picks up Inspector Lee (a Hong Kong Detective) from the airport. One can see that there will be some culture clash scene that is about to happen. Detective Carter assumes that Detective Lee could not speak in English. Therefore, Carter speaks to Lee by emphasizing every word he is saying, as if Lee is having hearing problem. Carter may mean well – he may want to make sure Inspector Lee can catch up the words he was saying - but somehow his method may offend the partner, Lee. This is an example of divergence, specifically, over-accommodation.

There must be some reasons for why people acting – convergence or divergence – to the others. According to Griffin (2012), desire for social approval is the main motivation for convergence. However, it does not explain for why people converse in divergent way. Therefore, CAT theorists use Social Identity Theory to answer the question.

According to Tajfel and Turner, a person does not converse with others as an individual person, but as a representative of social group that define him, this is called Social Identity Theory. Tajfel and Turner further add that people used this social identity as a motivation to reinforce and defend ties to reference group and also the need to emphasize the distinctiveness. Even so, there is question of whether a person is care for his social identity or personal identity when both of identities are salient.

CAT theorist, Giles, explained that there is no strictly enforced rule but then, Initial Orientation of a person may be reliable predictor. According to Griffin (2012), initial orientation is a communicators’ predisposition to focus on either their individual identity or group identity during a conversation. Thus, there are five factors that will influence the communicator perception of a conversation as intergroup encounter: collective cultural context, distressing history of interaction, stereotypes, norms or expectations for treatment, and high group of solidarity and high group of dependence. However, Griffin (2012) stated that “No single factor determines a person’s initial orientation, but if all five factors line up in the direction of public identity, it’s almost certain that a communicator will approach a conversation with an intergroup mindset”. Put simply, people may converse in divergent way.


References

Buller, D.B. & Aune, R.K. (1992). The Effects of Speech Rate Similarity on Compliance: Application of Communication Accommodation Theory. Western Journal of Communication, 56 (Winter 1992), 37-53.

Griffin, E. (2012). A First Look At Communication Theory 8th Edition. New York: McGraw Hill.

Mirzaiyan, A., Parvaresh, V., Hashemian, M., & Saeedi, M. (2010). Convergence and Divergence in Telephone Conversations: A Case of Persian. International Journal of Human and Social Sciences 5:3.