Telling the truth? A cultural comparison of "facilitating discussion" in American talk

This study examined a form of American talk that may be termed facilitating discussion. In doing this type of talk, Americans propose a new idea, which they do not necessarily hold personally, to facilitate discussion. Compared to another form of talk "expressing opinion," in which people try to get their personal opinions across, the facilitating-discussion talk is marked by 3 characteristics: (a) an invitation to consideration and discussion, (b) openness to disagreement, and (c) a lack of resistance. Furthermore, this form of American talk sounds suspicious to German informants. For them, the American person engaging in the facilitating-discussion talk is not telling the wahrheit (truth). Different cultural rules for speaking can account for the different interpretations of the American talk. For Germans, telling the wahrheit is the critical rule for speaking, whereas for Americans, the rule of reciprocity is desirable. The German notion of "public sphere" and the American value of "personhood" function as assumptions of appropriateness of a type of talk that help people to make sense of the facilitating-discussion talk.