Title: Culture (CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY) iResearchNet
Headings: Culture
Culture
Culture Definition
Background and History of Culture Research
Current Approaches and Knowledge
Culture Research Implications
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Content: As a result, knowledge about culture and behavior increased significantly in the latter half of the 20th century, principally through the work of social psychologists like Harry Triandis, Geert Hofstede, Hazel Markus and Shinobu Kitayama, Shalom Schwartz, and Richard Nisbett, among others. Current Approaches and Knowledge
Many contemporary social psychologists who investigate the effects of culture do so by comparing national cultures to determine universal and culture-specific patterns of behavior. Cross-cultural research is conducted primarily from the sociocognitive perspective and focuses on the cultural values, beliefs, and attitudes or cultural knowledge that distinguishes the behavior of people with different national backgrounds. One prominent tool employed by cross-cultural researchers is to classify nations by their relative support for individualism or collectivism. Individualism is a set of values, beliefs, and attitudes that emphasize the importance of people pursuing their individual goals and behavior. Collectivism is manifest in values, beliefs, and attitudes that emphasize the importance of people following group goals and group norms for behavior. Research has shown North American, Western European, and Australian cultures to be relatively individualistic, while Japanese and Chinese cultures are comparatively collectivistic. Individualistic and collectivistic cultures encourage people to adopt a certain set of interrelated values, beliefs, and perceptions of the self and the group. A person exposed to an individualistic culture is more likely to value personal autonomy, freedom of expression, and self-enhancement than is a person from a collectivistic culture, who would contrastingly be more likely to value obedience, tradition, and group enhancement. In addition, individualistic cultures encourage people to adopt an independent self-view or distinguish the self from others, whereas people in collectivistic cultures view themselves as more interdependent or connected to others.