Some context on context
In anthropology, there’s this concept of high vs low-context cultures.
Low-context cultures assume that listeners know very little and must be told practically everything – i.e. assume there is no shared context. Western countries like the USA and Germany are examples of low-context cultures.
High-context cultures assume that both parties have shared context and background information doesn’t have to be repeated. Thus, people from high-context cultures tend to leave some things unsaid. Eastern countries like China and Japan are examples of high-context cultures.
I’ve mostly seen this written about from a business perspective, e.g. American company + Chinese company leave a meeting with totally different interpretations of an upcoming deadline. Chaos ensues.
But I realized recently that the clash between high and low-context cultures also affected my personal relationships.
Making it personal
I grew up in a Chinese immigrant household in California, so I was exposed to high-context culture at home and low-context in school and eventually work. That led to me subconsciously operating with low-context in professional settings but expecting high-context in personal ones. The results weren’t great.
High-context cultures are more likely to be intuitive and concerned with the collective. In relationships, I equated this to putting others before myself at all costs.
To my partner, making a request was literally just inquiring if the request could be granted – “no” would be an acceptable response. But to me, any request was basically something I had to do. I had to please my partner, and it was an unmitigated disaster if I failed. Even if they didn’t make a request, I went out of my way to predict what I thought they wanted.
On the flipside, if I was feeling upset, I expected my partner to know what was wrong. I would wait for my partner to pick up on my nonverbal signals, and if they didn’t, I would get even more upset. A mismatch in context expectations mutated into unhealthy passive-aggressiveness.
You should just know! Don’t you care about me?
Takeways
This doesn’t mean that low-context is definitively superior to high-context culture. A close relationship between two people must have some shared context – how would you be close otherwise?
It feels nice when someone knows just what to do to make you smile. Certainly better than a low-context game of 20 questions every time something happens between you two.
For me, it’s just helpful to recognize when I’m shifting between cultures and whether my expectations for the situation are reasonable and healthy.
This is such an interesting perspective on the reality of cultural differences!
Shifting contexts at home and at work is probably something that takes a lot of brain-space. And if your partner has not needed to do the same shifts or is from the opposite context culture, I can see how it'd be harder to just flow together. You express this really nicely: "It feels nice when someone knows just what to do to make you smile. Certainly better than a low-context game of 20 questions every time something happens between you two."
This cultural context shifting might be like a higher-level version of communicating in a non-native language. When speaking/listening/reading in a non-native tongue, I can physically feel my brain needing to put in more effort. When I'm tired or unable to focus, the non-native language module in my brain is one of the first to go offline.