Dyadic Equivocal Communication In Organizational Settings: Subordinates' Inference Of Implicature From Their Superiors' Equivocation

Based on the previous equivocal communication theory, theory of cognitive pragmatics, and the comprehension tests conducted on the equivocal conversations between the superior and subordinate, the present research makes an attempt to discover a general pattern that can describe the subordinates' inference process of implicature from their superiors' equivocation. It starts from a correlation analysis between equivocal degree (ED) and comprehension difficulty (CD) of each conversation, to a comparison between the job-experienced and non-experienced subjects in understanding the superiors' equivocal utterances. Meanwhile, qualitative methods such as the while-test think-aloud and after-test interview are adopted as a complementary aid to collect more subtle evidence showing how the subjects identify the adequate implicatures implicitly conveyed by the superiors.As can be seen from this research, though equivocal degree positively correlates with both comprehension difficulty and comprehension correctness (CC), job experience seems to correlate with them in a negative way. It is the experienced subjects who generally comprehend the superiors' equivocation more poorly than the non-experienced as a result of stereotypical thinking mode and excessive inference.Difference is shown in the CC rate and frequency of comprehensive strategy use to a varying degree between the experienced and non-experienced subjects, however, it does not affect much the general pattern of inferential comprehension of the superiors' equivocation. As our study indicates, both the situational factors and cognitive factors play a part unable to be underestimated in the context construction for implicature identification, and the up-to-down characteristics and the deliberate vagueness of superior/subordinate communication make the comprehension be proceeded with so much prudence that remedial methods are frequently employed with a view to minimize communication failure.At the end of the research, emphasis is laid on the practical importance of equivocal communication study, not only in organizational settings, but also in other interactive occasionsand other fields like language and communication teaching.