CIICPD 2023

immanent knowledge of the spectrum of differences. While Thomas’s method sets out to make visible regular phenomena of a (national) culture, the ECIA also includes situational and procedural factors (Hiller, 2009). In other words, the individuals are not only seen as representatives of a certain culture or cultural standards. Rather, they are perceived as producers of culture in a specific context and as such they are seen as cultural experts of the given environment. Before elaborating on the concept of ‘Cultural Critical Incidents’, it is vital to gain an understanding of how intercultural communication is defined. As Ting-Toomey and Chung (2012, p. 24) put it, intercultural communication is “the symbolic exchange process whereby individuals from two (or more) different cultural communities attempt to negotiate shared meanings in an interactive situation within an embedded societal system”. In this vein, it can be stated that intercultural communication is more challenging than intracultural communication (God and Zhang, 2019). Unsurprisingly, individuals operating in a familiar and shared cultural setting are much more likely to be understood by other group members of the collective with the same cultural background without further clarification (Thomas, 2010). Therefore, it appears evident that discussion partners that share the same cultural and linguistic background and thus interpret sent messages mainly as intended are more clearly on the same page. When it comes to intercultural communication, however, the situation may vary widely. Interlocutors from different cultural backgrounds might not share the same cultural knowledge to accurately exchange information and meanings (God and Zhang, 2019). When interacting with people from other cultures and different orientation systems, it becomes clear that other norms, values and behavioural patterns may lead to critical incidents (CI) with unexpected reactions. This may have the potential to create confusing situations and settings, in which the meaning is both unclear and ambiguous to the interacting individuals, and deciphering of the intended meaning is hardly possible based on their familiar cultural orientation system (Thomas, 2010). This lack of common ground for interpretation can lead to CIs like language barriers, misunderstandings and conflicts (God and Zhang, 2019). On this note, it may be interesting to look at Flanagan’s definition of a CI, which he defines as “observable human activity that is sufficiently complete in itself to permit inferences and predictions to be made about the person performing the act” (1954, p. 32). Brookfield (1995) defines CIs along similar lines, stating that they are concise descriptions of illustrative experiences that people remember because they are meaningful to them. Butterfield et al. (2009, p. 268) describe the Critical Incident Technique as a technique that “[…] explores what helps or hinders in a particular experience or activity”. Even though CIs’ original application was to evaluate interviewees’ competencies during the interview process (Flanagan, 1954), the field was further broadened and redefined by examining cultural settings. The applicability of Flanagan’s model, however, was found to be limited, especially in view of current dynamic societal changes and the requirements of modern work. Although he is considered the father of CIs, not all researchers cite Flanagan or subscribe to his assumptions in their application of his technique (Rosenthal, 1995).

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