I think power imbalance leads to passive aggression much more than the Hint or Ask character of the culture.
Hint and Ask are basically preferred communication protocols and most Hint people I know will adjust if the hints are clearly not working. But there is a big difference between
Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Dear, can you please take out the garbage?
and
Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. You never pay any attention to me and you screwed up my whole life, you ungrateful bastard!
I think power imbalance leads to passive aggression much more than the Hint or Ask character of the culture.
But that is largely the same thing. The classical boss-subordinate relationship is ask (order) down, guess up. Passive-aggression is extreme (angry, upset) guess, active aggression is extreme (angry, upset) ask/order.
When whole cultures are all-ask or all-guess that is probably a sign of egalitarianism—within that subset.
The classical boss-subordinate relationship is ask (order) down, guess up.
It’s more complicated. Ask/tell is simpler, faster, and more efficient so in the workplace (where status and power relationships are largely formalized) it tends to dominate anyway.
Also, as anecdata, I know a girl who is a very pronounced Hint/Guess person, but she’s a manager and has underlings. She quite successfully manages them mostly on the Hint/Guess basis (within reason, of course).
The idea that there’s a gender correlation, whether for cultural or biological reasons certainly is something I’ve seen a fair bit when this comes up as a subject. See for example here. This one where cultural distinctions are going to be very difficult since some cultures (e.g. China) are so heavily on one side. It would I think be very interesting to see if the obvious gender trend in the West still is true in those extreme examples- it would be pretty strong evidence of a biological basis.
In a way the gender aspect could be seen as a micro culture thing as women operating in their own social circles build up these sub-protocols (influenced due to power structures of ourse).
I don’t know if I am willing to accept it as a such tight relation. For one thing, being passive-aggressive is usually not one particular action, an outburst when upset, it’s more like a an attitude, a continuous inclination/slant/flavour.
I think that passive vs. active aggression depends much more on power, status, and specific circumstances rather than on usually preferred communication styles.
That’s pretty classical passive-aggressive behaviour. I don’t think it has much to do with guess-vs-ask cultures.
But I agree that there is probably some gender correlation.
It seems plausible that Hint cultures lead to passive aggression—if you can’t be just plain aggressive, what have you got left?
I think power imbalance leads to passive aggression much more than the Hint or Ask character of the culture.
Hint and Ask are basically preferred communication protocols and most Hint people I know will adjust if the hints are clearly not working. But there is a big difference between
Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Dear, can you please take out the garbage?
and
Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. You never pay any attention to me and you screwed up my whole life, you ungrateful bastard!
But that is largely the same thing. The classical boss-subordinate relationship is ask (order) down, guess up. Passive-aggression is extreme (angry, upset) guess, active aggression is extreme (angry, upset) ask/order.
When whole cultures are all-ask or all-guess that is probably a sign of egalitarianism—within that subset.
It’s more complicated. Ask/tell is simpler, faster, and more efficient so in the workplace (where status and power relationships are largely formalized) it tends to dominate anyway.
Also, as anecdata, I know a girl who is a very pronounced Hint/Guess person, but she’s a manager and has underlings. She quite successfully manages them mostly on the Hint/Guess basis (within reason, of course).
The idea that there’s a gender correlation, whether for cultural or biological reasons certainly is something I’ve seen a fair bit when this comes up as a subject. See for example here. This one where cultural distinctions are going to be very difficult since some cultures (e.g. China) are so heavily on one side. It would I think be very interesting to see if the obvious gender trend in the West still is true in those extreme examples- it would be pretty strong evidence of a biological basis.
In a way the gender aspect could be seen as a micro culture thing as women operating in their own social circles build up these sub-protocols (influenced due to power structures of ourse).
Yes, but passive-aggression is what guess-people do when upset, and active-aggression is what ask-people do when upset.
I don’t know if I am willing to accept it as a such tight relation. For one thing, being passive-aggressive is usually not one particular action, an outburst when upset, it’s more like a an attitude, a continuous inclination/slant/flavour.
I think that passive vs. active aggression depends much more on power, status, and specific circumstances rather than on usually preferred communication styles.