Hiding bad feelings in daily conversations in American and Vietnamese

21 Chart 2: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings in communication in university used by native speakers of Vietnamese and native speakers of English.. 22 Chart 3: Different stra

College of foreign languages Postgraduate department

-**0** -

Cao ThÞ HËu

Hiding bad feelings in daily conversations in

American and vietnamese (Che giÊu nh÷ng c¶m xóc kh«ng vui trong c¸c cuéc héi tho¹i hµng ngµy ë ng-êi Mü vµ ng-êi ViÖt Nam)

PROGRAM I M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60 22 15

Hanoi, 2009

College of foreign languages Postgraduate department

-**0** -

Cao ThÞ HËu

Hiding bad feelings in daily conversations in

American and vietnamese (Che giÊu nh÷ng c¶m xóc kh«ng vui trong c¸c cuéc héi tho¹i hµng ngµy ë ng-êi Mü vµ ng-êi ViÖt Nam)

PROGRAM I M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60 22 15

Supervisor: §ç ThÞ Mai Thanh, M.A

Hanoi, 2009

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Part 1: Introduction 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 2

4 Methodology of the study 3

4.1 The survey instrument 3

4.2 The participants 3

4.3 Data collection 3

4.4 Data analysis 4

5 Design of the study 4

Part 2: Development 6

Chapter 1: Theoretical background 6

1.1 Language, communication, and culture 6

1.1.1 Language and communication 6

1.1.2 Language and culture 6

1.2 Hiding bad feelings used as a face saving act 7

1.3 Previous researches on subject matters related to hiding feelings 8

Chapter 2: Verbal communication and hiding bad feelings 10

2.1 Verbal communication 10

2.2 Ways of using verbal language to hide bad feelings 11

Chapter 3: Results and Discussions 16

3.1 Ways to express different strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese 16

3.1.1 Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in American and Vietnamese in particular social groups 17

3.1.2 Different strategies used by American and Vietnamese in hiding bad feelings 20

3.1.3 Communication in university 22

3.1.4 Communication in family 23

3.1.5 Communication in business 24

3.2 Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two

groups - as seen from gender perspective 25

3.2.1 Hiding bad feelings used by Vietnamese females vs males 25

3.2.2 Hiding bad feelings used by American females vs males 33

Part 3: Conclusion 41

1 Summary 41

2 Some suggestions for successful communication 42

3 Suggestions for further study 43

LIST OF TABLES AND GRAPHS

Table 1: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of age 17

Table 2: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of gender 18

Table 3: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of marital status 18

Table 4: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of living area 19

Table 5: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of occupation 19

Table 6: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of language acquisition 20

Chart 1: Different strategies used by American and Vietnamese in hiding bad feelings 21

Chart 2: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings in communication in university used by native speakers of Vietnamese and native speakers of English 22

Chart 3: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings in communication in family used by native speakers of Vietnamese and native speakers of English 23

Chart 4: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings in communication in business used by native speakers of Vietnamese and native speakers of English 24

Chart 5: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two groups: Vietnamese females vs males 26

Chart 6: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in university by Vietnamese females vs males 27

Chart 7: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in family by Vietnamese females vs males 28

Chart 8: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in business by Vietnamese females vs males 30

Chart 9: Different purposes of Vietnamese males and females in hiding bad feelings 31

Chart 10: Different bad feelings hidden by Vietnamese males and females 32

Chart 11: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two groups: American females vs males 34

Chart 12: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in university by American females vs males 35

Chart 13: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in family by American females vs males 36

Chart 14: Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used in communication in business by

American females vs males 37

Chart 15: Different purposes of American males and females in hiding bad feelings 39 Chart 16: Different bad feelings hidden by American males and females 40

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND CONVENTIONS

SPSS = Statistical Package for the Social Sciences

FTA = Face threatening act

FSA = Face saving act

Part 1: Introduction

1 Rationale

Language, according to Schmidt & Richard (1980, p 161), is used to ‚build bridges, to consolidate political regimes, to carry on arguments, to convey information from one person to another, to entertain – in short, to communicate.‛ When the function ‚to communicate‛ flows successfully, a social relation has been established, reinforced and maintained Thus, successful communication requires not only pure linguistic competence but also knowledge of social norms, social status, social values, and relations between individuals known as communicative competence - the ability to use the language correctly and appropriately Successful communication needs the correct interpretation by an addressee of a speaker’s/ writer’s intent in performing a linguistic act The lack of this pragmatic competence as well as linguistic competence may lead to impoliteness, misinterpretation, culture shocks, or even communication breakdown

Hiding bad feelings is chosen for investigation in this study not accidentally First, communicative functions are not only language – specific, they are culture – specific as well The difference in the ways in which languages realize the same function seems to make it problematic for language learners to say the right thing at the right time It seems to

be dangerous when the exposure of negative feelings may insult or loose face of the interlocutors Knowing how to hide the bad feelings and response appropriately is very necessary, especially for cultural outsiders Second, a number of studies concerning speech acts such as thanking, advising, requesting, apologizing, disagreeing, etc have been carried out in this college Some of the researches on hiding feelings have already done at under-graduate level, but none has been carried out at higher levels Thus, I would like to continue exploring this topic in my M.A thesis Moreover, a comparison of hiding bad feelings between American native speakers of English and native speakers of Vietnamese

is considered to be valuable to the teaching and learning of spoken English in Vietnam That is why the thesis is named ‚Hiding bad feelings in daily conversations in American and Vietnamese‛

2 Aims of the study

The very first aim of this study is to find out the ways to express different polite strategies

to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese The second purpose is to compare the different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two ethnic groups: Vietnamese females vs males, and American females vs males Thanks to these findings, some suggestions for successful communication will be given The study is, therefore, conducted with the hope of contributing to the socio-cultural aspects of spoken English communication for the avoidance or at least the reduction of communication failures in terms of sociolinguistic

The following questions guided the research:

1 What are ways to express different polite strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese?

2 Does gender difference affect the ways of hiding bad feelings of American and Vietnamese?

3 Scope of the study

Although the author is fully conscious of the role of non-verbal factors in real life communication, they are beyond the scope of this study The study is only confined to the verbal aspect of the communication of hiding bad feelings And the study focuses on some specific situations in business, university and family

The Vietnamese northern dialects and American English are chosen for contrastive analysis By American English, the author means the English spoken by those who have American nationality and speak English as their native language

Although such sociological factors such as relative power, ranking of impositions and social distance are crucial, they are kept neutral and constant The study especially focuses

on the effects of different genders on the ways of hiding bad feelings of native speakers of Vietnamese and American

4 Methodology of the study

4.1 The survey instrument

The survey instrument, a three-page questionnaire, was devised to work out hiding bad feelings in daily conversations in American and Vietnamese The questionnaire was divided into three sections The first section contained demographic questions in order to gain information about the participants’ nationality, age, gender, marital status, area where they spend most of their time, occupation, acquisition of language(s) other than their mother tongue The second section consisted of three questions Respondents were asked:

‚How often do you hide your bad feelings? What is your purpose when you hide your bad feelings? What bad feelings do you often hide?‛ This section dealt with the basic concept

of hiding bad feelings in order to review the subjects’ understanding of hiding bad feelings The third section related to seven situations, including 3 situations in university, 2 situations in family, and 2 situations in business In this section, informants were asked to

be in specific positions to produce practical strategies of hiding bad feelings They can choose one of the appropriate answers given or express their own ideas

4.2 The participants

The subjects in this study were divided into two groups: Vietnamese people and American people The Vietnamese group included 20 females and 20 males, who were native speakers of Vietnamese living in the Northern part of Vietnam The American group included 20 females and 20 males who were native speakers of English living in the USA The questionnaires were delivered to many people of two groups from different professions and social status Their ages range from 18 to 60 years

Due to research requirement seen from gender perspective, the survey was distributed almost evenly in number of female and male respondents in both of the two groups The number of females respondents accounts for 50% and male respondents 50% This balance will affirm valid findings of the study

4.3 Data collection

Two different methods were used for data collection First, while visiting some places like travel agencies, restaurants, hotels, cafeterias, libraries, classrooms, and at home in February, March and April of 2009, the researcher contacted 44 foreigners and 55

Vietnamese people and asked them to answer the questionnaire A total of 75 participants, including 35 foreigners and 40 Vietnamese people, completed the survey giving a response rate of 79.6%, 72.7% respectively Next, written questionnaires were mailed to 10 Americans and 12 Vietnamese people Out of 22, a total of 18 questionnaires from 8 Americans and 10 Vietnamese people were returned, giving a response rate of 80%, 83.3% respectively The large gap of response rates in data collection may be the result of the two different approaches for data collection, namely visiting or mailing After all the data had been collected, the answers were kept and referred to when analyzing the findings

Based on the collected information from the questionnaires, all the discussions, comments, and conclusions are inductively made The quantitative method is mainly employed in the investigation with the illustration of tables, and graphs

Together with the quantitative method, contrastive analysis is also used to achieve the objectives of the research Supporting techniques such as consultation with the supervisor, discussion with colleagues, and personal observations are also of significant contribution to the study

5 Design of the study

The study is divided into three main parts:

Part 1: Introduction:

The rationale, aims, scope of the study, methodology, comments on the survey instrument, on the participants, on the data collection and analysis method are all introduced in this part

Part 2: Development:

This part is the focus of the study which is divided into 3 chapters:

Chapter 1: Theoretical background consists of 3 parts:

1.1 Language, communication, and culture

1.2 Hiding bad feelings used as a face saving act

1.3 Previous researches on subject matters related to hiding feelings

Chapter 2: Verbal communication and hiding bad feelings includes 2 parts

entitled:

2.1 Verbal communication

2.2 Ways of using verbal language to hide bad feelings

Chapter 3: Results and Discussions is designed to find out the answers for the

research questions Therefore, it contains 2 parts:

3.1 Ways to express different polite strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese

3.2 Different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two groups - as seen from gender perspective

Part 3: Conclusion

This part briefly presents review of the major findings, conclusions remarked, some suggestions for successful communication, and suggestions for further study

Part 2: Development Chapter 1: Theoretical background 1.1 Language, communication, and culture

1.1.1 Language and communication

Language has appeared and evolved to help mankind communicate As language is used to communicate, the essential problems to be solved have something to do with ‚how to make our intentions known to others, how to communicate what we have in our conscious, what

we want done on our behalf, how we wish to relate to others, and what in this or other worlds is possible.‛ (Bruner, 1978)

When mentioning communication, normally people think of communicating with words In fact, the concept must be understood as ‚the process of sharing meaning through verbal and nonverbal behaviors.‛ (Nguyen Quang, 1994, p 6)

Saundra Hybels and Rechard L Weaver II (1992, p 5) offer a more specific definition of communication: ‚Communication is any process in which people share information, ideas, and feelings That process involves not only the spoken and written words, but also body language, personal mannerisms and style, the surroundings anything that adds meaning to a message.‛

Therefore, it is clearly seen that central to the whole communication process is language For communicating successfully and effectively, caution must be exercised in order to avoid ambiguity For example, informal language is used for every day interactions but it needs elaborating for meetings and conferences Thus a successful communicator must own a good command of language at first

1.1.2 Language and culture

It has been seen that language of a community is part of or a manifestation of its culture Culture and language are closely related and interact between themselves Culture may be described by some people as opera, fine art, and so on Culture, however, in our sense in relation to language is the way we act, the context in which we exist, think, feel and relate

to others

According to Kottak, C P (1979, p 4), culture is ‚that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, arts, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired

by man as a member of society‛ In this definition, culture is taken as socially acquired knowledge in a community and anything like habits

In Sapir’s view (1970, p 207), ‚language doesn’t exist apart from culture, that is from the socially inherited assemblage of practices and beliefs that determines the texture of our lives‛ In other words, he defines culture as ‚what society does and thinks‛ and language is

‚a particular how of thought‛

Form Kramsch (1998, p 4) reaffirms that language not only expresses but also embodies and symbolizes cultural reality And language is ‚one of the most important symbol systems in any culture‛ (Brumfit, C J et al, 1985) Thus in the foreign or second language classroom the activities and cultural influences can not be separated from what is learnt

1.2 Hiding bad feelings used as a face saving act

Face must be persistently attended to in interaction Face can be maintained, enhanced as well as threatened as each communicative interaction brings with it the possibility of losing face So face is constantly at risk The polite speaker is expected to preserve and avoid the loss of face Generally, they behave in particular ways to show their awareness of the other person’s expectations that their public self-image will be respected, i.e., their face wants Interactants’ cooperation in maintaining each other’s face also allows them to save their own face It is in the mutual interest of both partners of communication to do so If a speaker says something that might be interpreted as a threat to another individual’s face, it

is described as a face threatening act (FTA) And if the speaker can say something to lessen the potential face threat in some action or speech, it is called a face saving act (FSA)

According to speech act’s classifications by Yule G (1997, p 84) (following Austin), and Searle (1969, p 67), hiding bad feelings is obviously a speech act Hiding bad feelings act carries all the characteristics of speech acts and by no means is exempted from the influences of social context One salient feature of this speech act is that, in doing it, the addresser tries to hold his/ her real feelings for whatever reasons he/ she assigns to

Regarded as a speech act, hiding bad feelings can operate well on the basis of politeness, a general foundation of any speech acts

The purpose of hiding bad feelings is to avoid hurting a person’s feelings, minimize disagreement, and hide one’s true negative feelings In other words, hiding negative feelings is aimed at lessening the threat of loosing the other’s face It helps to maintain good relationship among interlocutors by saving their own face Therefore, hiding bad feelings can be used as a face saving act

1.3 Previous researches on subject matters related to hiding feelings

Although hiding feelings is a rather interesting and worth-studying topic, it is surprising to know that there have no M.A theses on subject matters related to hiding feelings in our college so far Also, you can find few articles as well as researches on this topic on the internet However, there are two graduation papers on this subject

The first graduation paper entitled ‚Body language used in hiding feelings‛ was written

by NguyÔn Phïng Khao Trang who graduated from university in 2003 The study focuses

on finding out the differences between Anglicist and Vietnamese people in hiding feelings non-verbally with two main aspects:

 Frequency of non-verbal hiding feelings

 Differences between Anglicist and Vietnamese people in using types

of body language in hiding feelings

In general, the paper only concentrates on the three types of body language that people usually use in hiding their feelings which are: face and eyes signals, hands and arms gestures, and legs positions After analyzing the data, the author concluded that Vietnamese people are more in favor of hiding feelings non-verbally than Anglicist people In almost all relations, hands and arms are applied with high percentage These body movements are the most popular among Anglicist people when hiding feelings with acquaintance or colleague

at the same age while Vietnamese people use them the most when talking to their parents

or boss

The second graduation paper is ‚Some Anglicist – Vietnamese cross-cultural differences

in hiding feelings‛ by TrÇn ThÞ Quúnh Lª, graduating in 2002 In this thesis, the author

focuses mainly on verbal aspects of the act of hiding feelings, (more specifically dislike and disappointment) In the light of cross-cultural pragmatics and basing on data collected,

two main issues have been given special emphasis on:

 Frequency of hiding feelings

 Realization of politeness strategies in hiding feelings

Also found in this thesis are some potential culture shock evocations and implications for teachers and learners of English It is concluded that not only the choice is affected by the speakers themselves (their age, sex, etc.) but more importantly the social relationship between hearer and speaker, which is decided by such factors as age, social status, sex, etc

of hearer In addition, the different choice of the most favorable strategy in Anglicist and Vietnamese indicates that while Anglicist people resort to silence for their safety,

Vietnamese ones find their harmony in being ambiguous and vague

In this thesis I will try to avoid repeating areas covered by those graduation papers Although my thesis also focuses on verbal aspects, I do a research in order to find out the answers for the two following questions:

 What are ways to express different polite strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese?

 Does gender difference affect the ways of hiding bad feelings of American and Vietnamese?

My emphasis is on working out the different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two groups: American and Vietnamese - as seen from gender perspective, and then withdrawing the general differences between American and Vietnamese ways of hiding bad feelings Studying different strategies of hiding bad feelings used by different gender of two groups is my new way to exploit this topic Moreover, different from Ms Quúnh Lª, I only study the ways to hide some negative feelings not all feelings that humans have by researching some certain situations (specifically at home, at work place and in university)

Chapter 2: Verbal communication and hiding bad feelings

2.1 Verbal communication

The basis of communication is the interaction between people Verbal communication is one way for people to communicate face-to-face Some of the key components of verbal

communication are sound, words, speaking, and language

Over 3,000 languages and major dialects are spoken in the world today The development

of languages reflects class, gender, profession, age group, and other social factors The huge variety of languages usually creates difficulties between different languages, but even within a single language there can be many problems in understanding

Problems with relationships happen when your verbal communication or written information is misunderstood People have their own way of interpreting They understand something using one or more of their five senses An example is, instead of telling your spouse that you need him more often, you tell him that he does not care anymore This will usually lead to an argument

Through speaking we try to eliminate this misunderstanding, but sometimes this is a very hard thing to do Just as we assume that our messages are clearly received, so we assume that because something is important to us, it is important to others As time has proven this

is not at all true Many problems can arise in speaking and the only way to solve these problems is through experience

In general, mastering linguistic skill is not reserved for the selected few It is a skill that each and every one should develop for personal growth and to improve relationships and interactions

Everyone's brain is forever having thoughts and they are primarily with words Words spoken, listened to or written affect your life as well as others They have the power to create emotions and move people to take action When verbal communication is delivered accurately and clearly, you activate the mind and encourage creativity

"The quality of your life is the quality of your communication." - Anthony Robbins (cited onhttp://www.about-personal-growth.com/communication.html)

Your ability to communicate effectively is one of the skills that you require for your personal growth and success You cannot assume and use your vague knowledge and limited vocabulary and expect to change your life

2.2 Ways of using verbal language to hide bad feelings

In general, there are many negative feelings we may experience such as disagreement, anger, fear, sadness, annoyance, doubtfulness, nervousness, discomfort, boredom, anxiety, shyness, but we do not want to reveal them when we are communicating with other people The reasons for hiding negative feelings are different, depending on each person People hide their bad feelings maybe because of being polite, preventing other people’s embarrassment, preventing yourself from being embarrassed, getting yourself out of troubles, not shocking or surprising others, avoiding giving away information about a third person, avoiding hurting a person’s feelings, minimizing disagreement, hiding one’s true feelings In short, bad feelings may affect our conversations and even loose the interlocutors’ face Therefore, it is better for us to hide our true feelings, but how to hide our bad feelings verbally?

 The easiest way is to use vague or neutral responses, for example:

A: How do you like my new shoes?

B: I don’t think I’ve ever seen any quite like that or OK, they’re nice

In this way, you can not frankly speak what you are thinking of the new shoes ‚Oh, it is colorful‛ Or, ‚It is not suitable to you‛ or something like that If you let your true feelings

be known, you may bore your friend and he/ she will never share his/ her pleasure or sorrow with you In other words, you are widening your friendship by yourself

 Another way to hide your bad feelings is by trying to find one aspect of the item being asked about to compliment

In a relationship, it is important to understand your partner's preference Your communication will be more successful if you excite the person using her preferred sense

For example, you hate your friend’s shirt, but the color is not too bad you may say: ‚Oh, I like the color‛ Your friend will feel happy and pleasant because you like his/ her shirt No

one feel satisfied and excited if they buy something which is worthless Don’t hesitate to

compliment even you are only interested in a small aspect of the item

 Finding one positive aspect of a person to compliment is one of the ways to hide

your negative feelings

As can be seen this communicative strategy and the previous one are alike These strategies work by using positive words to please the listeners The former requires you to complement one good aspect of the item while the latter is used by complimenting one positive aspect of a person There are many ways to hide your true feelings about one person you dislike by dealing with his/ her good aspect as follows:

- ‚Well, she seems nice, but I’ve only known her a few days.‛

- ‚It’s still a little early to tell, but I’m sure I will when I get to know her a little better.‛

- ‚Well, she seems interesting, but I don’t know her very well yet.‛

- ‚She has a good sense of humor.‛

 Giving some excuse is another choice to hide bad feelings in verbal

do something Skilful communicators often give the legitimate excuses in order to avoid

hurting their interlocutors or hide their true negative feelings These excuses may be ‚The

salad is nice, but I’m starting to get full‛ Or ‚It is quite good, but I can’t eat any more

I’m not feeling very well‛ Normally, they try to show one good point of the item being

talked about then using opposite word like ‚but/ however, etc‛ to give excuse This way seems to be tactful, popular and rather effective in hiding bad feelings in daily conversations

 Self-abasement is also a strategy used in hiding bad feelings

Using this technique, speaker has to humble and lower himself/ herself and raise the other self Speaker tries to indicate that hearer is of higher social status than him/ her and that he/ she is not as qualified as hearer Some statements of this kind are:

- Maybe I wasn’t right for the position

- I don’t mind She deserves it

- It’s no problem I know I have to strive much

 Hiding bad feelings by employing flat refusal

This strategy is considered very FTA potential since it gives hearer no more chance to insist Apparently, it is a kind of frankly speaking what the speaker is thinking, however, it can still be heard from truthful people Unless it is tactfully performed, it might cause misunderstanding for hearer For example:

- I prefer not to say anything about it

- Thanks all the same but I couldn’t

- Not for me, thanks

- Thank you, I won’t

 Self-comfort is a way chosen to hide bad feelings

Speaker uses this way to comfort himself/ herself even before hearer does By actively getting involved in the topic, speaker indirectly confesses his loss yet in an optimistic way, that is his/ her hope that the same thing would never occur to him/ her again For example:

- Well maybe next time

- No matter, not this time then another time

- Ok It’s no problem

 The next strategy is wash-back request

Speaker can use this strategy when he/ she does not express his/ her negative feelings In stead of giving an excuse, refusing frankly, or answering the other’s bad request, he/ she will make another request as a respond Supportive examples are as follows:

- Could you tell me why I didn’t get promotion?

- Did you have time to work in group?

- When exactly would suit you?

 If none of the above work, try telling a white lie

I’m not one for lying or for telling people it’s OK to lie Having said that, telling a little

‚white lie‛ every once in a while might actually be healthy when it comes to managing our interpersonal relationships I clearly don’t need to go into all of the reasons why telling the truth is important Now that I got that out of the way, I can talk about some of the reasons

or exceptions to why telling the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, might actually not apply Here are some instances when it’s OK to tell a little white lie:

When the whole truth tears someone down and makes them feel horrible about themselves rather than builds them up, like saying ‚I like your new, extremely short haircut‛ when in reality it’s just awful Brutal honesty can be used as a toxic weapon We are not obligated

to tell the whole truth if it hurts someone’s feelings

It is also worth modifying the truth when it can only inflict hurt without any benefit Thus,

is, before going to a party, your spouse or a friend asks you if he or she looks good, and you think they look awful or are dressed inappropriately, you should tell them the truth Doing so in as tactful a manner as possible will spare them from embarrassment But if somebody at a party asks you how they look, and you think they don’t look well at all, a blunt statement of what you feel may cause the person terrible discomfort, and accomplish

no good whatsoever Before you tell a truth that can cause only pain and inflict gratuitous

hurt, ask yourself why you should tell it There are indeed times when a pretty lie is

preferable to an ugly truth

To sum up, there are many ways of using verbal language to hide your negative feelings in daily conversations However, it is undeniable that hiding bad feelings is often more nonverbal than verbal It involves controlling our facial expressions, hand and body

movements, eye contact, and more For example, we can say, ‚I’m not nervous at all‛, but

if our hands are shaking, our voice is quivering, our palms are sweating, and we can’t look the person in the eye, these nonverbal signals will surely give us away – no matter what our words say Therefore, you should be careful when you use verbal language to cover your bad feelings

Chapter 3: Results and Discussions

Based on the research questions mentioned earlier, the results are divided into two sections: 1) the patterns of verbal hiding bad feelings in American and Vietnamese, 2) the gender difference effect, as respectively demonstrated below

3.1 Ways to express different strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese

Although people can employ many ways to conceal their negative feelings, with respect to general politeness principle and theory of speech acts, the author has made an attempt to categorize the utterances got from the survey questionnaire into 9 main politeness strategies (Stra) which are the most commonly used These strategies, which are described in the preceding part, are as follows:

Strategy 1: Use vague or neutral responses

Strategy 2: Try to find one aspect of the item being asked about to compliment Strategy 3: Find one positive aspect of a person to compliment

Strategy 4: Give some excuse

Strategy 5: Self-abasement

Strategy 6: Flat refusal

Strategy 7: Self-comfort

Strategy 8: Tell a white lie

Strategy 9: Wash-back request

As a matter of fact, few utterances may be a combination of more than one single strategy

The following example is typical: ‚You are teaching in a university You are disappointed when the leader of your department informs you that you will be moved to other department which you don’t like You don’t want to show your true feeling by saying:

‘Thanks, but it’s not that important.’

The utterance ‘Thanks, but it’s not that important.’ is considered a white lie or a

self-comfort In facing with such cases, the classification would be based on their inclination in

particular social relationship involved The categorization is, therefore, only relative and tentative

Research question 1: ‚What are ways to express different strategies to hide bad feelings in American English and Vietnamese?‛

In response to this research question, first of all the author would like to compare the frequency of hiding bad feelings in American and Vietnamese as seen from informants’ parameters, and then discuss general different strategies used by two ethnic groups Finally, some politeness strategies employed in specific situations would be compared and contrasted

3.1.1 Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in American and Vietnamese in particular social groups

R (%)

N (%)

A (%)

S (%)

R (%)

N (%)

Table 1: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of age

According to table 1, American informants tend to hide bad feelings more frequently than those of Vietnamese The rate of American informants below 30 who always conceal their bad emotions is four times higher than that of Vietnamese Meanwhile the number of Vietnamese informants below 30 who sometimes hide their bad feelings is two times higher than American informants In addition, 17.9% American above 30 admit they rarely hide their bad feelings whereas 52.9% Vietnamese informants rarely do this

R (%)

N (%)

A (%)

S (%)

R (%)

N (%)

Table 2: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of gender

A quick look at this table reveals that American females have an intention of hiding their bad feelings more often than males However, there is no difference between Vietnamese females and males Another finding is that both Vietnamese males and females say straight out their minds more often than American males and females when they have bad emotions

R (%)

N (%)

A (%)

S (%)

R (%)

N (%)

Vietnamese 10.7 67.9 21.4 0 12.5 45.8 41.7 0

Table 3: Frequency of verbal hiding bad feelings in terms of marital status

Again, both single and married American are more reserved than Vietnamese people with the rates of 26.7% : 10.7% for single informants and 16% : 12.5% for married informants

in Always column respectively Moreover, the disparities between single and married

informants of two groups are very apparent It can be inferred from the table that single participants of two groups conceal their bad feelings more often than married ones