Most people throughout the world experience some form of silence. However, people's attitude toward silence is dramatically different in different cultural groups. Northern European and North American societies, for example, view silence as dark, negative, and full of 'nothing' all of which are considered socially undesirable. In other cultures such as Japan, however, silence is often positively valued. Here, breaking silence is a necessary evil; speaking is a nagative act.
According to Wayne's study, the U.S. interpretations of silence are sorrow, criticism, obligation, regret
and embarrassment. Australian interpretations proved to be similar to the U.S. ones. However, the Japanese
attitude toward silence is favorable. Ishikawa's survey on businessmen and businesswomen in Tokyo revealed that men need to be silent to be successful in life and that 65 percent of businesswomen would choose a silent
man to marry.
Not only in business, but in every aspect of social life, people in the United States like to ask questions
and force others to talk to fill interpersonal silences. So in U.S. society and in many European societies, one function of speech is to avoid silence. Contrary to the U.S. practice, in Japanese society, silence is generally
considered to be meaningful.