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MALE-FEMALE RELATIONSHIPS ACROSS CULTURES... a principal component of the self is its relationships to others), which entails the importance of family and group achievement," the lack of fixed boundaries between the selfand the other"? and the ultimate goal of maintaining harmony and appropriateness in relationships,'* where the approval ofthe others comes across as a highly influential factor, and the Western positive image of the self is interpreted as bragging." Cognitive consistency versus context contingency Second, and in accordance with the above, I would like to mention cognitive consistency and context contingency as a feature of independent and interdependent self-construal, respectively. In this context, cognitive consistency refers to the individual saying what he/she feels straight from the heart and his/her behavior resulting from internal attributes and processes with the aim of self-expression. Regarding interdependent self-construal, context contingency implies that being responsive to others is the preferred and therefore most highly valued form of behavior, even at the expense of consistency: "Eastern cultures may tolerate cognitive dissonance as normal/ natural as the interdependent self has a flexible/variable structure. [...] This happens in order to attend to the needs and desires of the significant others with whom [people] are interacting.”'® Dispositionism vs. situationism The next difference between the two construal types lies in their tendencies of dispositionism (context independence) versus situationism (context dependence).’” The independent construal is characterized by consistency and stability in communication behavior across situations and over time, which means the same behavior will be exhibited by the same person in all situations: “Western people have a unique and articulated set of internal attributes that remain stable across situations”? At the same time, in the case of the interdependent self-construal, behavior ofthe same person will vary from situation to situation, and from one time to another: “interdependent selves do not prescribe 4 Tbid., 138. 15 Tbid., 73. This principle is based on Buddhist tradition: to submerge the self and gain freedom from the self. Kim, Non-Western Perspectives on Human Communication, 121-129. 18 Ibid., 73. In predicting behavior, Westerners focus on the individual (dispositionism) whereas Eastern people focus on the social situation (situationism/contextualism), situational, external and relational causes (Kim 83-87). Kim, Non-Western Perspectives on Human Communication, 73. * 161 +
