Applicability of Brown and Levinson’s Politeness Theory to a Non-Western Culture

To examine applicability of Brown and Levinson’s politeness theoryto facework in a non-Western culture, we conducted a questionnaire survey of nativeJapanese speakers. A rank order of influences on facework behavior was investigatedamong the five factors: (a) intrinsic factor (Ri; that is, effects caused by differencein settings), (b) contextual factor (Rc; that is, effects caused by difference in typesof interlocutor’s contradictory attitudes), (c) power factor (P; that is, effects causedby age difference with the interlocutor), (d) distance factor (D; that is, effectscaused by difference in familiarity with the interlocutor), and (e) gender factor (G;that is, whether the participant is male or female). Results revealed that factorsrelated to the intrinsic content of the situation (Ri) and the interlocutor’s attitudes(Rc) had stronger influences than those of the inter- and intrapersonal factors of P, D,and G. Based on these findings, we conclude that Brown and Levinson’s formula isapplicable to a non-Western culture, Japan