Cultural Differences in Attitudes Toward Action and Inaction

Abstract

The current research examined whether nations differ in their attitudes toward action and inaction. It was anticipated that members of dialectical East Asian societies would show a positive association in their attitudes toward action/inaction. However, members of non-dialectical European-American societies were expected to show a negative association in their attitudes toward action/inaction. Young adults in 19 nations completed measures of dialectical thinking and attitudes toward action/inaction. Results from multi-level modeling showed, as predicted, that people from high dialecticism nations reported a more positive association in their attitudes toward action and inaction than people from low dialecticism nations. Furthermore, these findings remained after controlling for cultural differences in individualism-collectivism, neuroticism, gross-domestic product, and response style. Discussion highlights the implications of these findings for action/inaction goals, dialecticism, and culture.

When Action-Inaction Framing Leads to Higher Escalation of Commitment: A New Inaction-Effect Perspective on the Sunk-Cost Fallacy

“…Future anticipated joy mattered, in support of findings for the role of anticipated regret in escalation of commitment ( Wong & Kwong, 2007 ), as did negative feedback, in support of findings regarding the impact of past experiences and outcomes ( Tykocinski & Ortmann, 2011 ; Whyte, 1986 ). People vary in their attitudes and values regarding action-inaction ( Ireland, Hepler, Li, & Albarracín, 2015 ; Zell et al, 2013 ), in their experienced regret over action-inaction ( Gilovich, Wang, Regan, & Nishina, 2003 ), and in tendencies toward change versus status quo maintenance ( Diefendorff, Hall, Lord, & Strean, 2000 ). These differences have been shown to impact escalation decisions, with seemingly conflicting findings.…”

Neuroticism and Attitudes Toward Action in 19 Countries

“…Individualism-collectivism was calculated as individualism scores minus collectivism scores to increase ease of interpretation. Multilevel confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) showed measurement equivalence across nations for each scale (all RMSEA < .10, CFI > .99, SRMR < .05; see Zell et al, 2012). …”

Omission and commission in judgment and decision making: Understanding and linking action‐inaction effects using the concept of normality

“…Interestingly, omission bias findings showing a preference for inaction over action seem at first to contradict evidence showing general social norms and attitudes favoring action over inaction (Ireland et al, 2015;Zell et al, 2013).…”

“…The very definition and acceptability of action may depend on the broader context, with consequences for subsequent cognition, emotions, and behavior. For example, when a society is very action driven (action-inaction country averages: Ireland, Hepler, Li, & Albarracín, 2015;Zell et al, 2013; US states averages: Ireland, Chen, Schwartz, Ungar, & Albarracín, 2016), action may be perceived as insufficient action or even as inaction, given the comparison to a set level of expected action.…”