The self and social behavior in differing cultural contexts.

Abstract

Three aspects of the self(private, public, collective) with different probabilities in different kinds of social environments were sampled. Three dimensions of cultural variation (individualism-collectivism, tightness-looseness, cultural complexity) are discussed in relation to the sampling of these three aspects of the self. The more complex the culture, the more frequent the sampling of the public and private self and the less frequent the sampling of the collective self. The more individualistic the culture, the more frequent the sampling of the private self and the less frequent the sampling of the collective self. Collectivism, external threat, competition with outgroups, and common fate increase the sampling of the collective self. Cultural homogeneity results in tightness and in the sampling of the collective self. The article outlines theoretical links among aspects of the environment, childrearing patterns, and cultural patterns, which are linked to differential sampling of aspects of the self. Such sampling has implications for social behavior. Empirical investigations of some of these links are reviewed. The study of the self has a long tradition in psychology (e.g.,

The shifting basis of life satisfaction judgments across cultures: Emotions versus norms.

“…Accordingly, to have one's behavior judged as appropriate by others becomes an extremely important task. Because much of one's attention is aimed externally to monitor what others feel, think, and expect, the private elements of the self in this other-oriented culture are not as elaborated and organized as in more individualist cultures (e.g., Bond & Cheung, 1981;Cousins, 1989;Rhee, Uleman, Lee, & Roman, 1995;Triandis, 1989).…”

“…In highly individualistic cultures, such as North America and Western Europe, the self is viewed as a relatively autonomous, self-sufficient entity that is essentially independent from its surrounding interpersonal context (Geertz, 1984;Triandis, 1989). The goal for an individual is to become independent of others by attending to her or his private qualities and cultivating and expressing the inner attributes that uniquely distinguish her or him from others (Markus & Kitayama, 1991).…”

Culture, gender, and self: A perspective from individualism-collectivism research.

“…One type of construal is described by such concepts as individualist, independent, autonomous, agentic, and separate, and the other by their antonyms such as collectivist, interdependent, ensembled, communal, and relational (Bakan, 1966;Gilligan, 1982;Markus & Kitayama, 1991;Sampson, 1989;Triandis, 1989). The first set is often attributed to men and people in the Western individualist cultures (e.g., Hofstede, 1980;Triandis, 1994), and the second set to women and people in the Eastern collectivist cultures.…”

O individualismo e o coletivismo como indicadores de culturas nacionais: convergências e divergências teórico-metodológicas

“…Por fim, quanto mais o indivíduo se move entre os grupos sociais existentes em diferentes regiões, menor a probabilidade de que ele sofra influências destes grupos e, portanto, maiores serão as possibilidades de que ele se torne mais individualista. Triandis (1989) faz distinção, ainda, entre a cultura subjetiva, que se expressa ao nível da estrutura social, e os atributos de personalidade, que, no plano individual, constituem reflexos desta cultura. Com base nessa diferenciação, prefere reservar os termos individualismo e coletivismo para o nível cultural e utilizar os termos idiocentrismo e alocentrismo para designar as tendências pessoais mais freqüentemente observadas em culturas individualistas e coletivistas, respectivamente.…”