Cross-Cultural Difference

Question 1

What does this definition refer to?

Highly variable systems of meaning that are
learnt and shared by people from one generation to the next in an identifiable population.
Or
The expression of group norms and values at the national, racial and ethnic level.

Answer 1

Culture

Question 2

Psychologists make claims about the generalisability of human behaviour based on WEIRD samples:

What does WEIRD Stand for?

Answer 2

Western usa/uk
Educated uni students
Industrialized
Rich middle class
Democratic

Question 3

Why is culture important?

Answer 3

Human behaviour does not exist in a vacuum.

Culture provides a context for understanding human development and behaviour.

shapes how we perceive situations and behaviourally engage (socially acceptable)

Question 4

What does this definition refer to?

The study of relationships between cultural context and human behaviour (Berry et al., 2011).

Answer 4

Cross-cultural psychology

WEIRD

Question 5

Henrich, Heine & Norenzayan (2010): 96% of samples in psychology come from countries representing only 12% of the world’s population

A randomly selected American UG is
more or less likely to be a participant
than a randomly selected person from a country
OUTSIDE the West!

Answer 5

A randomly selected American UG is MORE likely
to be a participant
-bias

Question 6

Researchers assume there is little variation across populations and that standard subjects are representative of the species.

BUT… WEIRD samples are frequent … across a wide range of psychological domains!

Answer 6

frequent outliers

-shows there was variation
people responded differently to how WEIRD samples previously
responded

Question 7

The Fairness in economic decision making by Henrich et al. (2010):
Ultimatum Game (UG)

Person chooses how much money to keep and split.
Findings between USA and other tribes showed?

Answer 7

USA: out of £10 most give £4/5
USA: most reject lower offers that are not fair

Other tribes: more willing to accept lower amounts

=large variations
Humans do NOT have an innate capacity for fair behaviour
suggests norms have culturally evolved
due to trust

Question 8

During Ash’s Line experiment:
Non-western samples are more/ less likely to conform?

Answer 8

Non-Western samples are MORE likely to conform

But a lot of variations across different samples that were measured.

Question 9

Characterising Cultures by Values:
Factor analysis Questionnaire
(look at how different items cluster together)

What 4 constructs were developed?

Answer 9

Factor analysis revealed:

Power Distance (challenging boss)

Uncertainty Avoidance

Masculinity-Femininity (cultures value masc more)

Individualism-Collectivism = most widely used dimension
Time Perspective*

Question 10

Characterising Cultures by Values:

Match the countries up with these values

Great Britain
Denmark
Hong Kong

Answer 10

Great Britain= individualistic/ material success
Denmark= individualistic/ caring/ egalitarian
Hong Kong= accepting of power hierarchies/ collectivistic

Question 11

What is a person’s identity that is intertwined with others and defined by those relationships?

Answer 11

Interdependent self-construal (InterSC)

-focused on how they want to fit in and adapt (collective)
-influenced by others
-strong traits are shared
-unique traits are muted

Question 12

Women are more likely to define themselves in terms of their relationships.

What does this refer to?

Answer 12

Relational self-construal (RelSC) –

individual difference in the extent to which people define themselves in reference to close personal relationships (e.g., spouse/close friend).

NOT about group membership or social roles.

Question 13

What is a person’s identity
seen as a product of stable internal traits
and is separate and unique from others?

Answer 13

Independent self-construal (IndSC)

-view themselves as autonomous
-act their own way regardless of others
-not as influenced of others
-strong traits are internalised

Question 14

Priming Self-Construal – many different priming tasks

Trafimow, Triandis & Goto (1991) asked people to think of what makes them different from their friends and family (IndSC prime) or what makes them similar to their friends and family (InterSC prime).

Answer 14

Prime people to think in a different
ask what makes them different/ similar
independant or prime interdependant

It assumes that people in all cultures have both the
IndSC and InterSC.
It allows cause-effect relationships to be investigated.

Question 15

Twenty Statements Task:

Participants complete 20 sentence stems that start with
“I am…” Statements are coded into
IndSC,
InterSC and
RelSC.
The number of statements in each category then serves as a measure of self-construal.

What are some issues with the Twenty Statements Task?

Answer 15

Issues with the Twenty Statements Test (TST):

Researchers rarely provide a detailed description of their coding scheme.
Researchers differ in their definition (& hence coding) of InterSC and RelSC.

The task doesnt the importance of self-views to the person.

Question 16

Culture & Attribution:
related to correspondence bias
(we tend to blame someone’s character for a particular behavior they are displaying, even when this behavior is influenced by situational factors.)

Answer 16

USA: She is impatient and inconsiderate person
Other cultures: look at the context

Question 17

Morris & Peng (1994): predicted cross-cultural differences in attribution would occur in social situations due to differences in socialization.

Study 1: 100 Chinese & 100 American school children

Participants watched animated displays of social events (fish swimming) and physical events (football moving).

What was the DV?

Answer 17

DV = ratings of the extent to which the object’s movement
was influenced by internal or external factors (1-5 scale).

Question 18

Morris & Peng (1994): predicted cross-cultural differences in attribution would occur in social situations due to differences in socialization.

Study 1: 100 Chinese & 100 American school children

Participants watched animated displays of social events (fish swimming) and physical events (football moving).

What were the findings?

Answer 18

Found no difference in the Physical tasks

BUT Found differences in the Social task:
Chinese kids more likely to explain situations due to external pushing force

So, cross-cultural differences in explanation of ONLY
social events!

Question 19

Morris & Peng (1994): replicated this finding in two more naturalistic contexts.

Study 2: American newspaper made more dispositional attributions (internal / mental health issue) for a mass shooting, whereas Chinese newspaper made more?

Answer 19

Situational attributions (pressure from ed system/ jobs/ work environment influencing engagement in shooting)

Question 20

Study:
American & Korean participants read
a pro (anti)-capital punishment essay
allegedly written by another student.

No choice condition
Exposure condition
Exposure & arguments condition

DV = rated the extent to which the essay corresponded to the student’s real attitude (1-7 scale).

What were the findings?

Answer 20

American students- more likely to make correspondence bias
or believe John’s writing is due to internal beliefs

Korean students - less likely to make correspondence bias
or believe John’s writing is due to internal beliefs

When you prime K into thinking about the context, they will do it more than A

Question 21

Masuda & Nisbett (2001): a link between self-construal & attention to visual scenes.

East Asian individuals process holistically –
perception of objects is bound to what?
Westerners process the what?

Answer 21

East Asian: The Social Context

Westerners: The Focal Object

Question 22

Masuda & Nisbett (2001): a link between self-construal & attention to visual scenes.

Participants saw 45 original objects & 45 novel objects.
The background was manipulated:
(a) original (b) none (c) novel
Participants indicated whether they had seen the object (Yes/No).
DV: number correctly recalled.

Findings:
2 (culture) X 3 (background) ANOVA revealed:

Answer 22

No interaction,
but planned comparisons found on “previously seen objects”

American participants didn’t really differ across fish scenes
Whereas Chinese did

Question 23

Japanese people are worse on which type of tasks?

Answer 23

worse on absolute tasks

Question 24

Cross-cultural differences in cognitive processing may be differentially advantageous.

What are the 2 types of judgments Tasks require?

Framed line task (FLT): non-social test of cognitive ability

Answer 24

Absolute judgments
-focal object unaffected by context

Relative judgments
-focal object dependent on context

Question 25

Issues with measurement

Identified issues with self-report surveys:

Answer 25

Two factor structure (IndSC & InterSC) is not a good fit
Cronbach’s alpha reliabilities are adequate at best.

Multiple versions of the Self-Construal Scale

Face validity of some items questionable – “I value being in good health above everything” (IndSC item!)

Reference group effect

Question 26

Limitations in Cross-Cultural Psychology

Meta-analysis of IND-COL research revealed:

Answer 26

IND-COL differences often assumed without measurement

-Over-reliance on correlational studies (surveys)

-Lack of replication studies

Question 27

USA people are worse on which type of tasks?

Answer 27

worse on relative tasks
-as they rely on context

Question 28

Japanese people are worse on which type of tasks?

Answer 28

worse on absolute tasks
-as they don’t rely on context

Question 29

Conceptual issues:
COL/IND are reductionist labels.

Some researchers argue labels are start to helping us to understand cultural differences but are too what?

Answer 29

Too Reductionist

-it simplifies cultures in dualistic ways of observing cultures
-needs to go more in-depth to gain more cultural InSite

Question 30

Güngör et al. (2014) argued that while all interdependent cultures value interpersonal connectedness, the nature of the connection differs between face and honour cultures.

Name the 2 types of cultures he identifies:

Answer 30

‘Keeping face’ cultures
- respecting others by observing norms dictated by one’s position in the social hierarchy.

Honour cultures
-pride that is based on social image, reputation and others’ evaluation.

Question 31

Güngör et al. (2014) measured 2 forms of interpersonal agency - conformity & relatedness - in Japanese and Turkish students.

What did participants described their agency as?

COL/IND distinction would have glossed over the nuances between two interdependent cultures!

Answer 31

Japanese described in terms of Conformity
whereas
Turkish described in terms of Relatedness

Question 32

Cohen (2009) There are many different types of culture:
Religion
SES
Region within a country

Psychologists need to expand definition & measurement beyond COL/IND and IndSC/InterSC.

Rather than just collecting data based on…

Answer 32

Surveys/ Questionnaires