Cross-Cultural Differences in Compliment Behavior between Koreans and Americans

Speech act behavior has been a central concern for researchers in the field of cross-cultural pragmatics. It is generally agreed that languages differ a great deal from one another in their patterns and norms of interaction. It is useful to examine the speech act of complimenting, as an example of the sort of sociolinguistic information needed to reveal some aspects of cultural differences in the speech acts of compliments. This study will demonstrate that the speech acts in compliments greatly differ from culture to culture. The norms of compliment usage including functions, frequency, and appropriate conditions vary depending on cultures. Thus we see that complimenting behavior varies cross-culturally along a number of dimensions. Americans high frequency of compliments and high acceptance in responses reflect American people s characteristics of solidarity among close friends while Koreans low frequency of compliments and low acceptance in responses mirror their cultural characteristics of humbleness, or modest attitude.