Category Archives: What is culture?

What Are the National Cultures?

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The article comprehensively reviews the concept of national cultures and its validity for cross-cultural research.

The concept of national culture is widespread in cultural and cross-cultural research. It is believed that the residents of certain countries or people of certain nationalities share certain values, beliefs, customs, norms, and patterns of behavior. In this respect, scholars are used to speaking about, for example, British, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Moroccan, German, Austrian, American, Canadian, Japanese, or Chinese cultures.

What are those similarities and shared characteristics? These are frequently the language, ethnicity, religion, historical, and cultural traditions of people residing in certain territories. Such an understanding of national cultures appears quite simple and straight out of common sense. However, …  

Do people in national cultures speak their common languages?

What about language? People in such countries as India, South Africa, Switzerland, Canada, and the Netherlands are multilingual and do not share their language as a cultural commonality. Can we then speak about Indian, South African, Swiss, Canadian, and Dutch national cultures?

Do people in national cultures share their common ethnicities?

What about ethnicity and cultural heritage? Many countries, such as the United States, India, Indonesia, Singapore, and Nigeria, are multiethnic and have emerged due to the conversion of various historical and cultural influences. Can they be considered American, Indian, Indonesian, Singaporean, or Nigerian national cultures?

People in national cultures can be diverse in many ways

Thus, one can see that national cultures can be less homogeneous in terms of languages, ethnicities, cultural history, and other cultural characteristics than researchers expect. Their (sub)cultural variations may expand beyond presumably common national characteristics.

Besides, when people live in countries and likely share national cultures, they can have substantial individual and typological differences that may stretch beyond national similarities.

Do national cultures exist?

In the social sciences, researchers tend to believe that people of such national cultures share certain cultural values, attitudes, personalities, identities, emotional experiences, expressions, and patterns of behavior. These are common assumptions of traditional cross-cultural studies that expect such within-country homogeneities. Extensive cross-cultural research has demonstrated the validity of this assumption. An abundance of findings showed that cultural samples of people from national states have many similar characteristics that are different from the characteristics of people in other cultural samples from other countries (Karandashev, 2019, 2021).

Validity of cross-national comparisons

National cultures exist, and people in those countries share many things. A comprehensive cross-cultural analysis of the data from the World Values Survey demonstrated that the global division of values across national cultures is valid. Researchers found that:

299 in-country regions from 28 countries in East and Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and the Anglo world overwhelmingly cluster along national lines on basic cultural values, cross-border intermixtures being relatively rare. This is true even of countries like Malaysia and Indonesia, or Mexico and Guatemala, despite their shared official languages, religions, ethnic groups, historical experiences, and various traditions. Even the regions of neighboring African nations, such as Ghana, Burkina Faso, and Mali, do not intermix much when they are clustered on the basis of cultural values.

(Minkov & Hofstede, 2012, p.133)

Thus, we can see that the country-average data and results are worthwhile for cross-cultural research. Three other studies, which examined cultural differences between different states of Brazil, supported the notion that national cultures are meaningful units for cross-cultural research. The studies utilized the Hofstede cross-national dimensions and revealed that the Brazilian national culture is common on those parameters across Brazil’s states. It turns out that those cultural dimensions are the same in every state of Brazil, but they are very different from other countries in Latin America as well as other countries around the world.

Thus, one can see that the country-average data and results are worthwhile for cross-cultural research. Three other studies, which examined cultural differences between different states of Brazil, supported the notion that national cultures are meaningful units for cross-cultural research. The studies utilized the Hofstede cross-national dimensions and revealed that the Brazilian national culture is common on those parameters across Brazil’s states. It turns out that those cultural dimensions are the same in every state of Brazil, but they are very different from other countries in Latin America as well as other countries around the world (Hofstede et al., 2010).

Therefore, these findings show that the cultural borders between countries are valid in Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. These findings support the validity of cross-national comparisons.

Limitations of cross-national cultural comparisons

The validity of these findings, however, can have limitations, which social scientists should keep in mind to avoid the pitfalls of generalization. Averaging the data collected from selected samples of people of given nationalities can lead to somewhat misleading conclusions. The simple statistical means of variables collected in cultural samples can hide substantial individual and typological variations. variations within countries (Karandashev, 2021).

Scholars of culture and the general public can also be interested in a large collection of publications titled “What is National Culture,” presented by IGI Global Publishing House.

5 Differences Between Western and Eastern Cultures

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The cultural opposition of Western and Eastern societies has been widely recognized in public discourse and scholarship. This division of the major world cultures had historical roots, valid justification, and adequacy.

Great Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United States of America, and other allied countries were traditionally viewed as having Western cultures. It is thought that ancient Greek and Roman cultures are the origins of Western cultures.

China, Japan, and India have traditionally been considered Eastern cultures. The ancient Confucian and Buddhist cultures are thought to be at the origins of Eastern cultures.

See more in Western versus Eastern cultures.

The scholarly significance of cultural comparisons between the West and the East

Most cultural studies of the past have focused on learning how the “East” is different from the “West”. Since many believed that they knew their own “Western” culture pretty well, they were interested in learning about the mysterious and less-known “East”. Therefore, such cultural opposition has become popular among scholars. Being ethnocentric, Western researchers were interested in knowing how similar or different the unknown East was from the well-known West. The first interest was to search for cross-cultural universality, while the others were more interested in learning about how much the East deviates from our traditional western knowledge. This is why those other societies were often called “nonwestern cultures.”

For comparative cultural studies, the in-group (West) versus out-group (East) dichotomy worked well. This division was basic and straightforward. As I noted above, the approach was largely ethnocentric because the West was viewed as “we” (in-group) and the East was viewed as “they” (out-group).

These cross-cultural comparisons have been valid in many regards, indicating several cultural differences between Western and Eastern societies (Karandashev, 2021). Here are the five main distinctions:

1. Philosophical and Folk Worldviews

Western folk and scholarly worldviews are linear, logical, analytical, and dichotomous, and have a dualistic view of the world and mental life.

Western logical beliefs acknowledge the existence of binary oppositions, such as positive and negative human emotions. According to dualistic Western cultural philosophies, the mind and body are in dualistic relations, and the mind ­(rational) and the heart (emotional) are in a dichotomy with each other.

Eastern folk and scholarly worldviews are nonlinear, wholistic, dialectical, and have a monistic view of the world and mental life.

Eastern dialectical beliefs accept natural contradictions and complementarity of opposition, such as positive and negative emotions. According to monistic Eastern cultural philosophies, the mind and body are in monistic united relations, and the mind (rational) and heart (emotional) are not in dichotomy with each other but rather in wholistic relations.

See more about this in Western versus Eastern cultures and in Perception of a person in relationship contexts.

2. Perception of Social Relationships as Independent Versus Interdependent

Eastern and Western models of social relationships define how the self and others are related.

The individualistic view of Western cultures perceives social and relationship contexts as a free association of independent individuals. Western cultural norms suggest individualistic personhood and individualistic construals of the self and others. These cultural norms impose an independent model of self and culture. These cultural factors determine the person’s self-focused perception and emotional experience.

Eastern collectivistic cultures perceive social and relationship contexts as a strongly and intricately connected network of interdependent members. Eastern cultural norms suggest collectivistic personhood and relational construals of the self and others. These cultural norms impose an interdependent model of self and culture. Cultural factors determine a person’s other-focused perception and emotional experience.

See more about this in Perception of a person in relationship contexts.

3. Individualism Versus Collectivism in Society

The most well-known cultural difference between the West and the East is the distinction between individualistic Western societies and collectivistic Eastern ones. Individualism and collectivism describe how an individual and a group relate to each other in a society.

Western societies are considered to be independent, individualistic cultures. Individualism in a society is defined by cultural values such as personal liberty, initiative, autonomy, and self-reliance.

Eastern societies are considered to be interdependent, collectivistic cultures. The cultural values that go along with collectivism are kinship priority, family unity, in-group integrity, and loyalty to relationships.

See more in Western individualistic cultures and Eastern collectivistic cultures.

4. High-Context Versus Low-Context Cultural Styles of Communication

The concepts of high-context and low-context cultures differentiate the types of cultures that accentuate the importance of implicit versus explicit messages in people’s relationships and daily interactions.

In high-context Eastern cultures, people prefer to use messages that largely convey meanings and connotations via implicit nonverbal codes, the contexts, culturally implied forms of speech, expected patterns of behavior, and the contextual settings of a situation and social relations.

In low-context Western cultures, people prefer to use messages in which the meanings and connotations are primarily expressed via explicit verbal codes, direct words spoken or written, and overt facial and body expressions with evident meaning, like an open smile.

See more in Western low-context versus Eastern high-context interaction style.

5. High-Contact and Low-Contact Cultures

Western and Eastern cultures have certain differences in the cultural dimension of contact versus non-contact cultures. People in non-contact cultures keep their distance in communication and avoid tactile and olfactory sensory modes of interaction, while people in high-contact cultures communicate with a shorter interpersonal distance and higher engagement of tactile and olfactory sensory modes.

Societies from North America, Northern Europe, and Asia tend to be low-contact, whereas societies from Southern Europe, the Middle East, and South America tend to be high-contact cultures. So, we see that this division has a more complex configuration than just West versus East.

See more in Cultural proxemics and immediacy of interpersonal communication.

Cultural Proxemics and the Immediacy of Interpersonal Communication

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Humans are territorial species, even though their notions of territorial space and proxemics are different from many other animals and vary between hunter-gatherer and agricultural societies. Humans, as social animals, tend to form a sense of in-groups and out-groups, as well as in-group space. People identify certain territorial spaces as “ours” and “mine,” whereas they identify other spaces as “theirs.”

Furthermore, social evolution has been changing how people in different cultures understand basic territorial ideas (Hall & Hall, 1990; Karandashev, 2021).

In another post, I briefly explained the typical Western interpretations of proxemics and immediacy. However, the cultural norms of appropriate spatial distance in relationships and the ideas of personal, in-group, and out-group space vary across societies (Karandashev, 2021).

Proxemics, Personal and Public Space Across Cultures and Individual Differences

How close is too close? It depends on where people live. The cultural traditions of some societies make people sensitive to crowds and situations when others intrude on their personal bubble. They may consider the larger space their personal one. In other societies, people can be less sensitive to crowding and view their personal bubbles as smaller.

Cultural Sensitivity to Personal Space

The cultures of different countries also vary in their territorial concepts and sensitivity. People may feel uncomfortable, anxious, or even aggressive when others invade their personal space or in-group territory. Some can be tolerant of such an intrusion, but only for a short period of time. Others can be totally intolerant. Individual differences in personality, as well as cultural traditions, play a role in all these cases.

Such differences, for instance, are evident in rural and urban cultural settings. Across many societies, women value more personal space from strangers than do men. Older people tend to spatially distance themselves from others. On the other hand, young people prefer closer distances in communication (Sorokowska et al., 2017).

Researchers thought that variations in climate and the availability of air conditioning could cause cultural proxemics in spatial behavior. People in warmer climates tend to keep a shorter distance from others than those in colder climates (Andersen, 1988; Sorokowska et al., 2017; Sussman & Rosenfeld, 1982).

These preferences can differ in different types of relationships. Those living in colder climates often prefer to be quite near their friends, perhaps to stay warm. A warm room makes people socially closer. However, those living in warm climates often get closer to strangers.

Cultural Preferences for Interpersonal Distance

People’s preferences for interpersonal distance vary across societies around the world.

For instance, people in Peru, Argentina, and Bulgaria tend to stay spatially close to strangers, whereas those from Hungary, Romania, and Saudi Arabia want to keep the most space. Americans are different from both groups of those countries; they are somewhere in the middle of the range between these two opposite types of cultures (see Sorokowska et al., 2017).

Personal bubbles of people are relatively small in several South American and South European countries, such as Argentina, Peru, Spain, southern France, Greece, and Italy. They are able to communicate easily across a short distance. For example, in Argentina, many people tend to be “close-talkers” and stand about 1 meter, or a little less, away from strangers when chatting.

In general, people in many South American and South European countries expect less personal space in communication than people in Asia. Some exceptions may occur. For example, people in Romania prefer more personal space, standing a spacious 1.5 meters away from strangers. 

Personal bubbles are bigger in North America and many northern European countries, such as England, Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. People tend to preserve their personal distance at all times. People in northern Europe generally feel uneasy when someone touches them or brushes their overcoat sleeve, which is related to their cultural feature of interpersonal spatial communication. For people in the north, the conversational distance that is typical of southern European cultures can be viewed as overly close and intimate.

For example, in some cultures, people may crowd instead of standing in line in front of ATMs or waiting for other public services.

Cultural Proxemics Depend on the Types of Interpersonal Relationships

How close we are to our partners, friends, coworkers, and strangers differs greatly across societies.

It appears that we all understand that our relatives and friends may stay closer to us than strangers. Strangers are expected to keep a public distance, while friends naturally stay closer. For example, in Romania, strangers are expected to keep their distance, but friends can creep up on you.

Surprisingly, however, Saudi Arabians are more distant from their friends than Argentinians are from strangers. Hungarians like to keep strangers and loved ones at arm’s length, or at least 75 centimeters apart. Norwegians want their close friends to be close to them (expected to be about half a meter away), even though they prefer a farther distance with strangers.

Proxemics of High-Contact and Low-Contact Cultures

The American anthropologist Edward Hall (1966) proposed grouping societies into contact and noncontact cultures. Their cultural norms define the social distance that people should prefer in interpersonal communication. Accordingly, people from high-contact cultures favor immediate nonverbal behaviors compared to those from low-contact cultures. They may interpret the same distance differently. It depends on their typical cultural norms of spatial behavior. In non-contact cultures, people stand farther apart and don’t touch as much as in contact cultures. We saw some examples of these social norms above.

All societies across the world have been classified into “contact cultures” (South America, the Middle East, and Southern Europe) and “non-contact cultures” (Northern Europe, North America, and Asia). Generally, those in high-contact cultures communicate with a shorter interpersonal distance and greater touch, whereas people in low-contact cultures prefer to keep their distance and avoid touch. Those from high-contact cultures favor tactile and olfactory ways of communication over people from low-contact cultures (Andersen, 1988; Sussman & Rosenfeld, 1982).

Arabs, Latin Americans, and southern and eastern Europeans are the people of high-contact cultures. They tend to keep interpersonal immediacy in relationships. They do this by increasing sensory input, interacting at closer distances, maintaining more direct body orientations, and touching more frequently. Asians, North Americans, and northern Europeans tend to be relatively low in such spatial behavioral tendencies as people of low-contact cultures (Andersen, 1988; Sussman & Rosenfeld, 1982).

Certain patterns of interpersonal special behaviors of people from high-contact and low-contact cultures are visible in many other situations of everyday life and affective relationships (Karandashev, 2021; Patterson, 1983).

Individualism and Collectivism in Societies

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Individualism and collectivism have been among the central concepts of cross-cultural research. The division between individualistic Western societies and collectivistic Eastern societies is probably the best-known cultural parameter distinguishing the West and East. At least, that is the most common framework that many researchers use when they study different cultures.

Let us take a closer look at what these parameters of individualism and collectivism are.

What Are Individualism and Collectivism in Societies?

Individualism and collectivism is among the earliest cultural constructs that social psychologists identified to characterize differences between Western and Eastern societies (e.g., Hofstede, 1980/1984; Hui & Triandis, 1986; Marsella et al., 1985; Triandis, 1995; see for review, Karandashev, 2021).

These constructs define the relations between an individual and a group in the structure of societal relations. The societal characteristics of individualism and collectivism describe the extent to which individuals in a society are integrated into groups. If most people in a society have individualistic or collectivistic value orientations, researchers call the society “individualistic” or “collectivistic.”

On the one hand, personal freedom, personal initiative, personal autonomy, and self-reliance are the cultural values linked with individualism in a society. On the other hand, family unity, family integrity, and family loyalty are the cultural values linked to collectivism. 

Individualistic cultures have norms and values that stress how important individual goals and personal freedom are for people’s functioning.

“People are supposed to look after themselves and their immediate family only”.

The values and norms of collectivistic cultures emphasize that the importance of group goals and relations with other shall be higher than individual goals.

“People belong to in-groups or collectivities which are supposed to look after them in exchange for loyalty”

(Hofstede & Bond, 1984, p. 419).

Individual Variation of Individualism and Collectivism in Societies

It is worthwhile to note that within a society (either individualistic or collectivistic), individuals can vary in these cultural value orientations. People can also be collectivistic and individualistic to varying degrees within different areas of their relationships. They can differ in the degree of individualism (or collectivism) in their relations with their kin, family members, neighbors, co-workers, or friends.

Therefore, I would suggest that cultural researchers be careful. They should not be too straight-forward and simplistic in attributing their observations of any individual to their individualism or collectivism, especially in any area of their relationships with others.

Individualism in Western Societies

The cultural values and norms in individualistic societies elevate personal independence, actions, autonomy, the primacy of personality uniqueness, self-realization, and individual initiative. The values and norms also emphasize the individual’s rights rather than duties, the high value of one’s independence rather than interdependence, and the priority of one’s self-interest with less concern for other people’s interests.

People in individualistic societies feel quite independent and autonomous in both in-group and out-group relationships. So, their attitudes and behaviors toward people from both their in-group and out-group are quite similar. 

The personal identity of an individual is recognized through the individual’s attributes. The ties between individuals are loose. In motivation, people subordinate the goals of collectivities to their personal goals. The United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark represent the typical examples of individualistic societies. One can easily notice that these are largely Western countries (Hofstede, 1984; 2011; Hui & Triandis, 1986; Gelfand, et al., 2000; Kashima, et al., 1995; Triandis, 1995; see for review, Karandashev, 2021).

Collectivism in Eastern Societies

In collectivistic societies, cultural norms highly praise relational values that foster cooperation within an in-group and the harmony of interpersonal relationships. The norms encourage subordinating a person’s self-assertion. Cultural values and norms of collectivistic societies emphasize that people are the natural parts of strong, cohesive in-groups, such as extended families. An individual’s loyalty to a group and the need to protect the interests and well-being of others in their in-group as opposed to other groups are of high importance. So, group norms encourage people to take part in social activities that help and share with each other.

People in collectivistic societies are highly embedded in their in-group relationships. Such relations with family as unity, loyalty, and integrity are collectivistic beliefs. These are values and rules that emphasize people’s interpersonal bonds, a sense of interconnectedness, solidarity, duty to the group, obligations, in-group harmony, and awareness of the needs of others. These values and rules are called “collectivistic.”

People in collectivistic societies have different standards of behavior for the members of their in-groups and out-groups. They are collectivistic in their interactions with their in-group members (family, friends, etc.). Yet ,in their interactions with out-group members (strangers, people from other cultural groups), they are in-group biased. They strongly distinguish their attitudes and behavior towards those from their in-group versus their out-group.

A personal identity centers on one’s place and role in one’s group. Personal privacy is abridged. In motivation, people subordinate personal goals to the goals of their in-group. Collectivistic values highlight in-group beliefs rather than individual beliefs. The value of in-group views is higher than individual views. Collective responsibility to the in-group precedes individual pleasure in importance.

Independent Individualistic and Interdependent Collectivistic Cultures

Despite being a classical cultural concept distinguishing individualistic and collectivistic societies, individualism and collectivism turned out to be more complex and multifaceted than they appeared at first sight (see Karandashev, 2021).

Researchers use the concepts of interdependent and independent cultures to explain Western and Eastern social structures and relationships between people. The concepts are especially important in the contexts of the mind, emotions, and self of a person. Western societies are characterized by an independent model of culture and self. And Eastern societies are characterized by an interdependent model of culture and self (See more in another article).

Personal Identity in Independent and Interdependent Cultures

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The concept of interdependent and independent cultures tells us something about the internal structure of society and relationships between people, as well as how they are deemed in the mind and self of a person. These are personhood conceptions and construals of the self and others and how the self and others are related. People perceive themselves and others as interdependent or independent from each other based on their cultural values, norms, and people.

An interdependent model of culture and self characterizes Eastern societies, while an independent model of culture and self characterizes Western societies.

Western Analytical and Eastern Holistic Perception

Social perceptions of people in Eastern and Western cultures are more or less dependent on a specific context of perception. Different cultural factors can affect their perceptual and communicative processes through different cognitive mechanisms.

The perceptual processes of people in Western societies are analytical and independent of the context and details in which an object is located. People tend to see an object or a person by focusing on their salient features independently of their context.

The perceptual processes of people in Asian societies are holistic. Perceptiondepends on the full context and details in which an object is located. People tend to see an object or a person in the specific context of a situation, depending on the specifics of the situation and relations.

The social Perceptions that Are either Independent or Dependent on Context

Another study was conducted in accordance with the same idea of cultural differences in perception being interdependent or interdependent on the context (Masuda, Ellsworth, Mesquita, Leu, & Veerdonk, 2008). Researchers investigated the observers’ perceptions of emotional situations when they looked at a situation depicting a person surrounded by four other people. The European-American and Japanese participants rated the emotions of the central person, who appeared either happy, sad, or angry. The other four people, who surrounded the central person, displayed various emotions.

In such experimental situations, European-American participants estimated the emotion of the central person only by his or her facial expression. They did not take into account the emotions of other people around them. Such a characteristic of their assessment of the emotional experience of the central person is in accord with their perception of the central person independently of the context of the situation. They paid attention solely to a salient object—the central person.

In contrast to this, Japanese participants assessed the emotional experience of the central person, taking into account not only his or her facial expression but also the emotions of other people portrayed in the situation. Such a quality in their evaluation of the emotional experience of a central person corresponds with their perception, which is associated not only with the central person but also dependent on the context of the situation. They paid attention to the whole situation and the context in which the central person was.

In other experimental studies, participants assessed the emotions of a person in the context of a situation while researchers recorded the location where they looked using eye tracking. The results were similar. Americans focus mostly on the central person. In contrast to this, the Japanese and Taiwanese distributed their attention, looking not only at the central person but also at the other people in the situation.

The Western perception is independent of a situational context, and the Eastern perception is interdependent on a situational context

So, several studies demonstrated that people in Western cultures, with their perception independent of a situational context, consider the emotions of a person only from their own perspective, independent of the context. They perceive emotional experiences from an individual perspective.

People in Eastern cultures, with their perception interdependent on a situational context, perceive the emotions of a person depending on the contextual perspective and all those involved in the situation. They perceive emotional experiences from a relational perspective. In their judgment of emotions, all people who are present in a situation and their relations with each other are considered, whether they belong to the same group or are related to the person. (Masuda et al., 2008; Tsang & Wu, 2005).

Self-focused Versus Other-focused Perception and Emotions

Social perception, whether independent or interdependent on relationship contexts, is directly related to self-focused and other-focused perceptions and emotional experiences.

Studies found that individuals in Western cultures (i.e., European Americans, British people, and Germans) are characterized by prevalent self-focused perception along with corresponding emotional experiences. They are more likely than people from other cultures to experience socially disengaging emotions such as superiority, pride, anger, and frustration. They generally feel such emotional experiences as being friendly, guilty, ashamed, and connected with others less frequently and less intensely than people in Eastern cultures.

On the other hand, people in Eastern cultures (e.g., Japan, China, as well as Asian Americans) are characterized by the prevalent other-focused perception and associated emotional experiences. They tend to experience and express their emotions more frequently and intensely when they think of family members and other relationships compared to situations when they think of themselves.

They more frequently and intensely experience such socially engaging emotions as being friendly and connected with others, as well as feeling guilty and ashamed. On the other hand, they less frequently and less intensely experience such socially disengaging emotions as the feelings of being proud, superior, angry, or frustrated.

For example, Japanese tend to face situations associated with feelings of shame more frequently than Americans. On the other hand, Americans tend to encounter situations linked to anger more frequently than Japanese.

(For a review of all these studies, see Karandashev, 2021).