"Linguistic Distance" as a Determinant of Bilateral Trade

Hutchinson, William K.

doi:10.2307/20062091

Cited by 75 publications

(56 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…As summarized by Sauter (2012), countries with a common language trade 1.5 times more and the language barrier amounts to a tax equivalent of about 7%, while Egger and Lassman's (2015) meta-analysis suggests that a common language increases trade flows by 44%. Related research demonstrates that language is a barrier to trade across Canadian provinces (Sauter 2012), 36 countries (Hutchinson 2005), and a 19 language, 195-country dataset (Melitz and Toubal 2014).…”

Section: Gravity Model Of Tradementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Much of the research carried out in Switzerland (e.g., Steyaert et al 2011, Berthoud et al 2013 and Finland (e.g., Vaara et al 2005; Barner-Rasmussen and Aarnio 2011) explicitly engages with language dynamics in countries with more than one official language. Inter-country research examines the linguistic distance between national languages or between English as a global language and specific countries' official languages to determine the language costs of economic transactions and their effect on bilateral trade (Hutchinson 2005) or the choice of target countries for foreign direct investment (Lien et al 2012). A recent paper develops a measure to capture the aggregate impact of common native language, common spoken language, common official language, and linguistic proximity on bilateral trade, disentangles ease of communication from other trade enabling factors and additionally considers translators and interpreters' roles (Melitz and Toubal 2014).…”

Section: Country Level Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Given the varying linguistic distance of local tongues to English (Hutchinson 2005) as the language of global business, our review also encourages a more comprehensive coverage of influential languages in global business. In a recent study, Ly et al (2013) list Arabic, English, French, German, Hindi, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish as the ten most influential languages on a global scale.…”

Section: Research Settings: Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Cross-national economic research mostly relies on linguistic distance, i.e. a measure of how difficult speakers of one language find it to learn the other (Hutchinson 2005), or as a predictor of trade patterns and various other outcomes (Sauter 2012;Melitz and Toubal 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Language in International Business: A Review and Agenda for Future Research

2017

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A fast growing number of studies demonstrates that language diversity influences almost all management decisions in modern multinational corporations. Whereas no doubt remains about the practical importance of language, the empirical investigation and theoretical conceptualization of its complex and multifaceted effects still presents a substantial challenge. To summarize and evaluate the current state of the literature in a coherent picture informing future research, we systematically review 264 articles on language in international business. We scrutinize the geographic distributions of data, evaluate the field's achievements to date in terms of theories and methodologies, and summarize core findings by individual, group, firm, and country levels of analysis. For each of these dimensions, we then put forward a future research agenda. We encourage scholars to transcend disciplinary boundaries and to draw on, integrate, and test a variety of theories from disciplines such as psychology, linguistics, and neuroscience to gain a more profound understanding of language in international business. We advocate more multi-level studies and cross-national research collaborations and suggest greater attention to potential new data sources and means of analysis.

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Section: Gravity Model Of Tradementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Country Level Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Research Settings: Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Language in International Business: A Review and Agenda for Future Research

2017

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“…2 These linguistic scores have been used to study immigrant earnings as well as international trade patterns Miller 2005 andHutchinson 2005 The self-reported non-English languages spoken at home are identified in the 2000…”

Section: The Data and Empirical Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Negative and Positive Assimilation, Skill Transferability, and Linguistic Distance

Chiswick

Miller

2012

Journal of Human Capital

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. www.econstor.eu There are two complementary models of immigrants' economic and social adjustment -the positive assimilation model of Chiswick (1978Chiswick ( , 1979, and the negative assimilation model of Chiswick and Miller (2011). The negative assimilation model is applicable for immigrants from countries that are very similar in terms of the transferability of skills, culture, and labor market institutions to the host country, and has been tested previously primarily using migration among the English-speaking developed countries. This paper generalizes the negative/positive assimilation models through analyzing the post-arrival earnings profiles of immigrants in the US from non-English-speaking countries according to the linguistic distance of their mother tongue from English. Using data on adult male immigrants from the 2000 US Census, it is shown that all groups of immigrants from non-English-speaking countries are characterized by positive assimilation. Earnings in the immediate post-arrival period are lowest for the language groups furthest from English, and the increase in earnings with duration is steeper the further the immigrant's mother tongue is from English. The linguistic distance of the immigrants' mother tongue from the destination language appears, therefore, to play a crucial role in generating the inverse relationship between post-arrival earnings growth and the initial earnings disadvantage documented in most studies of immigrant earnings. Terms of use: Documents in D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SJEL Classification: J61, J31, F22

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Commonality of Web site visiting among countries

Huang

Chang

2009

J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci.

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Although the role the Internet plays in globalization has been widely discussed, relatively little is known about the extent to which users in different countries visit the same Web sites. Surprisingly, no prior research in the literature has empirically addressed this topic in a systematic way. Based on the theory of life in the round and related concepts of information behavior, this article reports an attempt to fill the gap by looking at how cultural, geodemographical, and economic factors underpin the extent which people from different countries visit the same Web sites. A commonality index to measure the commonality of Web site visiting for the macrolevel, cross-country study is proposed for a large-scale empirical study using online panel data that cover 101 countries. Results from the analyses indicate that as cyberspace is obviously fractured, Internet users in countries that share a common language, religion, and social norms, that have a similar level of economic development, and that are physically nearer to one another are more likely to visit the same Web sites. The relationship between individuallevel information behavior and macrolevel Internet traffic metrics is established; the former helps explain the latter whereas the latter enriches the former.

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"Linguistic Distance" as a Determinant of Bilateral Trade

Cited by 75 publications

References 7 publications

Language in International Business: A Review and Agenda for Future Research

Language in International Business: A Review and Agenda for Future Research

Negative and Positive Assimilation, Skill Transferability, and Linguistic Distance

Commonality of Web site visiting among countries

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