Author name: Stephen Kimunya

The Role of Culture and Self-Awareness in Interpersonal Communication

The Role of Culture and Self-Awareness in Interpersonal Communication:

Culture helps in describing the people’s way of life, depending on their beliefs, values, and practices like religion and law. Culture is generally passed from a generation to the next through communication. Before attempting to understand people’s culture, the integration of interpersonal communication is essential. DeVito (2019) holds that interpersonal communication helps an individual to understand cognitive constraints and different types of barriers like physical and language obstacles that interfere with effective communication. The objective will be identifying the effect of culture on communication, assessing my other orientation, and identifying verbal and nonverbal communication approaches that could be applied in human service.

Impact of Culture on Communication

In this first step, understanding how culture impacts communication is essential. People build trust with others when they first understand other’s cultures to establish the most effective communication tool to use when interacting. Particular considerations that go in place are assessing factors like where, when, what to do, or how much to disclose influence effective communication. Such questions generally eliminate most of the assumptions that people make regarding different cultures globally. From such matters, it is possible to know the behavioral dimensions such as people’s values, norms, beliefs, and expectations (DeVito, 2019). From the identified beliefs, the level of trust and openness in communication differs, hence impacting the context in different cultures. This is another significant aspect that helps in determining the kind of message to deliver to various groups.

For professionals in the human service settings, they have to portray cultural sensitivity the most significant strategy is improving open-mindedness. This helps a human service professional to learn how to accept diverse communication practices from different cultures. For instance, cultures in East Asia like Taiwan, China, Korea, and Japan, among others, have a high-context level of communication. This means that their measure of how messages should be exchanged is high because they prefer non-verbal communication more than the verbal. The non-verbal communication, however, is less direct, and it might confuse people from other cultures if they do not understand what the gestures mean. By looking at the Chinese, for example, minimal eye contact when communicating is a sign of respect, but in western culture, this is a rude gesture. Martin and Nakayama (2013) explain that direct eye contact through communication shows confidence and sincerity. Generally, westerners are low-context cultures, and they prefer verbal communication, for it is straightforward, which helps people understand each other easily. Another strategy is training the human service professionals to communicate with clients and workers with diverse cultural backgrounds. This would also help the professionals learn how to appreciate art, customs, and behaviors of different groups, which is essential in human service settings.

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Assessment of Other Orientation

In my evaluation of my other-orientation, which is one measure of self-awareness, I try to consider other people’s perspectives and communication patterns. This helps me avoid making the “I am right statements,” which do not promote cultural sensitivity (DeVito, 2019). I also acknowledge the importance of other people, whereby I always ask for their views concerning solutions to problems. However, I recognize that I find it challenging, revealing appropriate facial cues, especially when I engage with individuals from different cultures. This challenges me to educate myself about the communication practices of diverse cultures like the Chinese. I have acquaintances from this group; therefore, I would want them to feel that I care about their feelings. I believe having the element of other orientation portrays one’s willingness to promote change by accepting the diverse values, beliefs, and practices of other people.

Personal Strengths and Improvement

Although I have a significant challenge of interpreting facial cues, I can also acknowledge the strength of having a high ambiguity tolerance. Regardless of the working or social settings that I find myself in, I am comfortable with the people surrounding me because I embrace diversity. This has enabled me to engage in unfamiliar tasks freely because I know the importance of seeking advice and working in teams to accomplish the tasks. Also, I communicate with empathy and listen attentively to understand the message from the other person. This has enabled me to show the people I interact with that I care about their emotions, perspectives, and I am curious to know more about them. However, one area I need to improve is learning the nonverbal communication patterns, as identified in my assessment reflection (DeVito, 2019). I believe this would assist me in having a more impactful conversation. In most cases, I always end up dumbfounded when I realize that I have used gestures that have different meanings in different cultures. For example, I once used a thumbs-up sign to show approval in a group activity; however, among the members was an individual from Bangladesh who told me that was an insult. I felt embarrassed since I did not mean any harm. Nevertheless, this was a lesson, and from the cultural awareness course, I am more than motivated to diversify extensively my knowledge concerning interpersonal communication.

Other Orientation and Interpersonal Communication

Generally, having an other-orientation attitude would improve interpersonal communication in human service. On this note, this would enable human service professionals to make their clients happy and comfortable when sharing their issues. Focusing on other people’s perspectives enhance interactions by encouraging an individual to portray traits like honesty and fairness. DeVito (2013) holds that these characteristics in human service influence the development of credibility strategies like competence and charisma. These are essential ethical elements among the professionals which encourage interpersonal communication. Hence, having an other-orientation attitude like acknowledging the beliefs and values of clients, allowing people to express themselves freely, and showing consideration promote interpersonal communication (Martin, 2015). Every client seeking aid from human service settings expect that customer-service delivery is customer-centered. This means that having the other orientation is an indicator that a human service worker appreciates people’s differences in terms of culture.

Also see: Effective Interpersonal-Communication

Culture and Self-Awareness in Interpersonal Communication

To deliver quality services, culture and self-awareness are two critical elements in interpersonal communication. For one, cultural literacy, competence, and cultural awareness are all components that promote cultural intelligence. Achieving this requires an individual to identify strategic ways of enhancing his or her self-awareness. Secondly, the extent to which one knows the strengths, weaknesses, thoughts, feelings, and personality tendencies allows him or her to have an in-depth understanding of how to handle others (Martin & Nakayama, 2013). Therefore, culture and self-awareness are critical in interpersonal communication. In this case, they shape how professionals should communicate, build relationships, make decisions, as well as address tasks. Additionally, both culture and self-awareness motivate individuals in human service settings to enhance metacommunication effective. DeVito (2019) emphasizes that metacommunication is essential in interpersonal communication that encourages people to practice their talk by explaining their feelings appropriately and using straightforward messages. Additionally, they learn how to seek clarification when they are not sure of the message being delivered by the other person. Therefore, having such considerations in interpersonal communication facilitates cultural sensitivity and inclusivity in human service.

Examples of Effective Verbal and Non-Verbal Communication Techniques

Granted that culture and self-awareness are critical in human service, professionals need to identify appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication strategies to apply when serving. A verbal communication technique that a human service professional could consider is extensionalize the message. Professionals are encouraged to distinguish between what exists in the real world and how people refer to objects, issues, and events, among others. Otherwise, treating words and objects as similar aspects prevents one from addressing specific matters that are in question. Another technique is recognizing change, considering that the meaning of words keeps changing. Hence, performing a regular update of the messages and evaluation of beliefs can help in demonstrating self-awareness and culture in human service settings. Additionally, non-verbal communication techniques are also essential, and one of them is conveying a smile to show interest, positivity, and even attention. However, DeVito (2019) illustrates that this should be done moderately; otherwise, overdoing would be perceived negatively. Another technique is using vocal variations to match the emotions being portrayed by the other person communicating. The difference could be in rate, pitch, rhythm, and volume, which again should not be overdone since this might disrupt the communication and also make the person talking to feel uncomfortable. Furthermore, nodding and leaning forward is an approach that is encouraged since it reveals that an individual is interested and is listening keenly to understand the message. When the professionals demonstrate these techniques in human service, they promote their reputation and that of the organization.

Conclusion

In conclusion, culture has a significant impact on communication, and it encourages human service professionals to have self-awareness. These are factors that improve interpersonal communication considering that in human service settings, there are clients from diverse cultures. These people have different needs, and the only way a worker can understand them is by taking an interest in knowing the verbal and nonverbal communication they use to help them. This encourages the concept of other orientation, which every professional should possess to avoid making assumptions of people from different cultures.

Reference

DeVito, J. A. (2019). The interpersonal communication book. Instructor, 1, 18.

Martin, J. N., & Nakayama, T. K. (2013). Intercultural communication in contexts. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Martin, J. N. (2015). Revisiting intercultural communication competence: Where to go from here. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 48, 6-8.

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Emerging Threats and Countermeasures

Stephen Kimunya

Emerging Threats and Countermeasures:Information security has become a crucial issue since technological advances have led to an increase in sophisticated attacks targeting personal and organizational data. Cyberattacks have significantly increased in the twenty-first century, indicating that cybercriminals are increasingly becoming advanced as technologies advance. Saravanan & Bama (2019) asserts that a 2015 survey of web applications found that 95% of web applications have vulnerabilities. Most organizations are vulnerable to cyber-attacks because they have not evolved as technologies advance. To overcome the cyberattacks, organizations have to be knowledgeable of the threats they are facing and the methods they can apply to protect themselves from the attacks. The following are the Emerging Threats and probable countermeasures.

Emerging Threats

One emerging threat is social engineering. Social engineering attacks are used by hackers to gain confidential information by manipulating the users of the system. The hackers trick people into sharing their passwords, sharing their bank information, and even allowing them to use their computers where they can install malicious software that gives them access to details of the user like passwords and bank information. Social engineering is a relatively easy way that hackers’ users to access confidential information since, unlike hacking, the actors only manipulate the trust of a person. One common form of social engineering is sending emails that appear to be from trusted sources. Financial institutions are the organizations that are mostly impersonated in the emails, and in the mails, customers of the organizations are encouraged to share their bank information.

Secondly is a denial of services (DOS) attacks. An attacker makes the DOS attacks with the aim of rendering services unavailable by disrupting the normal functioning of devices. The attacks function by flooding the machine with requests to the extent that it cannot process them and hence results in the denial of service to legitimate users. An advanced form of the DOS attacks is the Distributed Denial of Services (DDOS). Unlike DOS, DDOS attacks target several machines in a network. According to Zlomislić, Fertalj & Sruk (2017), says that DOS attacks aim at resource exhaustion through the generation of excess traffic. The resources that are abused connection limits, network resources, critical node capacity, disk, and memory space.

Malware is another security threat that is affecting organizations today. Malware refers to malicious software that damages systems and data as it gains access to networks. Malware is delivered as links through emails or files such that when users click the links, the file is executed, and the malware takes control of the computer. The files that attackers gain from using malware are used to demand ransom, especially is the data in their possession is sensitive. Even though malware has existed since the 1970s, it has evolved to match technological changes and security upgrades. According to Jang-Jaccard & Nepal (2014), malware evolves to exploit new flaws in emerging technologies and avoid detection. Some examples of malware are viruses’ worms, spyware, trojan, and ransomware, among other malicious software. All these malware operate uniquely, but they are all dependent on user actions. The common ways of propagating malware are emails, executable files, social media, and instant messaging.

A botnet is also a threat to information security. Botnets are interconnected devices that have been infected by malware and are controlled remotely. Most of the time, users are unaware that their devices are infected. Cybercriminals control the devices and often instruct them to perform specific functions, often malicious but hidden from the user. Botnets are used by criminals to send email spams, DDOS, and click fraud campaigns. Criminals that create botnets target vulnerabilities, and they aim to use computer resources to perform automated tasks but remain hidden. Babate, Musa, Kida & Saidu (2015) says that botnets are currently a critical security threat as it is designed to affect computers in varying ways deliberately. After devices are infected with a botnet, the attackers can control the devices using the client-server approach or the peer-to-peer botnet. In the client-server approach, the attacker creates a server for sending automated commands using internet relay chat. In the peer-to-peer botnet, the attacker programs the infected devices to scan and communicate with other botnet devices and share the latest versions of malware for controlling the botnets.

Countermeasures

People can protect their devices from social engineering by using various strategies. One method is desisting from sharing personal information with emails that request username, credit numbers, and passwords. Genuine organizations cannot ask users to share their information, and besides, genuine organizations use digitally signed emails. Another method is using official sites when communicating with financial organizations (Abass, 2018). Legitimate organizations use the https protocol, and therefore communicating with organizations that use the protocol limits cases of phishing attacks. For organizations, educating users about the need to secure systems is crucial in preventing social engineering attacks. The success of the attacks is dependent on the ability to manipulate users into trusting the links they receive. Educating users on the need to avoid clicking random links is crucial in preventing social engineering attacks.

There are various ways of defending against DOS. One method is border filtering, and this is achieved by deploying specialized protection devices that guard against malicious traffic entering the network. Then devices process traffic and prevent malicious data from reaching the internal network. Another method is infrastructure improvements. DOS and DDOS attacks are aimed at overwhelming servers and denying legitimate users services. Increasing server spaces and bandwidth can enable an organization to withstand the attacks. Another method is real-time monitoring. By monitoring a system, unusual behavior can be identified early, and hence the administrator can act accordingly.

There are various countermeasures for malware, and the use of antivirus is one strategy. Antivirus refers to software designed to detect and combat computer viruses. Even though the strategy is not always effective when dealing with targeted attacks, it can aid in preventing the malware from affecting the computer files. Another method is regularly updating software. The latest versions of the software are often advanced from previous ones, and updating aids sealing loopholes that previous versions had. Installing firewalls is another strategy. Firewalls protect against malware by blocking unauthorized access.

For botnets, protection can be achieved by focusing on the protection of the system when creating it. Intrusion prevention systems (IPS) are one way of preventing botnet attacks. The IPS protects devices by monitoring network activity and detects undesirable activities as it prevents them from affecting the device. When IPS detects an unwanted package, it isolates it and allows other traffic to flow. Amoroso (2012) says that early detection of malicious activities is vital in preventing attacks and planning on how to respond to the incidents. Another method is the correct coding of applications. When creating applications, the programmers have to make it resistant to botnet attacks.

Conclusion

Organizations have to be aware of the threats they are facing and strategies they can adopt to protect themselves against the threats. Some of the emerging threats that organizations currently face are malware, social engineering, botnets, and denial of service attacks. In all these attacks, the aim is to steal data, but the approaches are different. For social engineering, the attackers capitalize on the trust of the user to gain their personal information. There are various countermeasures for protecting organizations from the attacks. The methods include using antivirus software, avoiding clicking links from suspicious sources, installing firewalls, and intrusion prevention systems in addition to educating employees on the need to avoid clicking links they receive.

References

Abass, I. A. M. (2018). Social Engineering Threat and Defense: A Literature Survey. Journal of Information Security, 09(04), 257–264. https://doi.org/10.4236/jis.2018.94018

Amoroso, E. G. (2012). Cyber-attacks: protecting national infrastructure. Elsevier.

Babate, A., Musa, M., Kida, A., & Saidu, M. (2015). State of Cyber Security: Emerging Threats Landscape. International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science & Technology (IJARCST 2015), 3(1), 113-119. Retrieved 20 August 2020, from http://ijarcst.com/doc/vol3issue1/ver2/alhaji.pdf.

Jang-Jaccard, J., & Nepal, S. (2014). A survey of emerging threats in cybersecurity. Journal of Computer and System Sciences, 80(5), 973-993. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcss.2014.02.005

Saravanan, A., & Bama, S. S. (2019). A Review on Cyber Security and the Fifth Generation Cyberattacks. Oriental Journal of Computer Science and Technology, 12(2), 50–56. https://doi.org/10.13005/ojcst12.02.04

Zlomislić, V., Fertalj, K., & Sruk, V. (2017). Denial of service attacks, defenses, and research challenges. Cluster Computing, 20(1), 661–671. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10586-017-0730-x

Microsoft Security Response Center

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