Daphna Oyserman

Rethinking Individualism and Collectivism: Evaluation of Theoretical Assumptions and Meta-Analyses

Are Americans more individualistic and less collectivistic than members of other groups? The authors summarize plausible psychological implications of individualism-collectivism (IND-COL), meta-analyze cross-national and within-United States IND-COL differences, and review evidence for effects of IND-COL on self-concept, well-being, cognition, and relationality. European Americans were found to be both more individualistic-valuing personal independence more-and less collectivistic-feeling duty to in-groups less-than others. However, European Americans were not more individualistic than African Americans, or Latinos, and not less collectivistic than Japanese or Koreans. Among Asians, only Chinese showed large effects, being both less individualistic and more collectivistic. Moderate IND-COL effects were found on self-concept and relationality, and large effects were found on attribution and cognitive style.

Does culture influence what and how we think? Effects of priming individualism and collectivism.

Do differences in individualism and collectivism influence values, self-concept content, relational assumptions, and cognitive style? On the one hand, the cross-national literature provides an impressively consistent picture of the predicted systematic differences; on the other hand, the nature of the evidence is inconclusive. Cross-national evidence is insufficient to argue for a causal process, and comparative data cannot specify if effects are due to both individualism and collectivism, only individualism, only collectivism, or other factors (including other aspects of culture). To address these issues, the authors conducted a meta-analysis of the individualism and collectivism priming literature, with follow-up moderator analyses. Effect sizes were moderate for relationality and cognition, small for self-concept and values, robust across priming methods and dependent variables, and consistent in direction and size with cross-national effects. Results lend support to a situated model of culture in which cross-national differences are not static but dynamically consistent due to the chronic and moment-to-moment salience of individualism and collectivism. Examination of the unique effects of individualism and collectivism versus other cultural factors (e.g., honor, power) awaits the availability of research that primes these factors.

Asking Questions About Behavior: Cognition, Communication, and Questionnaire Construction

Evaluation researchers frequently obtain self-reports of behaviors, asking program participants to report on process and outcome-relevant behaviors. Unfortunately, reporting on one’s behavior poses a difficult cognitive task, and participants’ reports can be profoundly influenced by question wording, format, and context. We review the steps involved in answering a question about one’s behavior and highlight the underlying cognitive and communicative processes. We alert researchers to what can go wrong and provide theoretically grounded recommendations for pilot testing and questionnaire construction.

A socially contextualized model of African American identity: Possible selves and school persistence.

Schooling, critical to the transition to adulthood, is particularly problematic for urban and minority youths. To explore predictors of school persistence the authors propose a socially contextualized model of the self. Strategies to attain achievement-related possible selves were differentially predicted for White and Black university students (Study I, n = 105). For Whites, individualism, the Protestant work ethic, and balance in possible selves predicted generation of more achievement-related strategies. For Blacks, collectivism, ethnic identity, and low endorsement of individualism tended to predict strategy generation. In middle school, performance was predicted by gendered African American identity schema, particularly for females (Study 2, n = 146), and the effects of social context appeared gendered (Study 3, n = 55). Balance in achievement-related possible selves predicted school achievement, especially for African American males ( Study 4, n = 55).

Possible selves as roadmaps

Abstract Possible selves, expectations, and concerns about the coming year, can promote feeling good (“I may not be doing well in school this year, but I will next year.”) or can promote regulating for oneself (“I may not be doing well in school this year, but to make sure I do better next year, I have signed up for summer tutoring.”). We hypothesized that improved academic outcomes were likely only when a possible self could plausibly be a self-regulator. Hierarchical regression analyses supported this conclusion, with more support for the influence of self-regulation on change in behavior and academic outcomes than on affect regulation. N =160 low-income eighth graders improved grades, spent more time doing homework, participated in class more, and were referred less to summer school (controlling for fall grades and the dependent variable of interest) when academic possible selves were plausibly self-regulatory.

Thinking about the self influences thinking in general: cognitive consequences of salient self-concept

Two studies support our hypothesis that connected and interdependent self-focus evokes a generally context-dependent cognitive mode (focused on object–context relations) and provide some evidence that separate and independent self-focus evokes a generally context-independent cognitive mode (focused on objects, independent of contexts). Consistent with our predictions, experimental manipulation of interdependent self-focus influences cognitive speed/accuracy (Experiment 1) and memory (Experiment 2). When primed self-focus is congruent with the perceptual task at hand, perceptual speed increases (as shown by a significant task by prime interaction effect) and when primed, interdependent self-focus improves memory for incidentally encoded contextual information. Further research to link primed and chronic self-focus effects is called for.

The Lens of Personhood: Viewing the Self and Others in a Multicultural Society

Some aspects of the subjective experience of individualism and collectivism in Israel, a society that simultaneously emphasizes both worldviews, were explored. Ss were Arab and Jewish Israeli students (Study 1 n=211, Study 2 n=370, Study 3 n=160, and Study 4 n=280). As hypothesized, endorsing individualism as a worldview was related to focusing on private aspects of the self and conceptualizing the self in terms of distinctions between the self and others. Hypotheses suggesting a relationship between collectivism, centrality of social identities to self-definition, a focus on public aspects of the self, and heightened perception of intergroup conflict were also supported by the data

Identity-based motivation and health.

People do not always take action to promote health, engaging instead in unhealthy habits and reporting fatalism about health. One important mechanism underlying these patterns involves identity-based motivation (D. Oyserman, 2007), the process by which content of social identities influences beliefs about in-group goals and strategies. Seven studies show the effect of identity-based motivation on health. Racial-ethnic minority participants view health promotion behaviors as White middle class and unhealthy behaviors as in-group defining (Studies 1 and 2). Priming race-ethnicity (and low socioeconomic status) increases health fatalism and reduces access to health knowledge (Studies 3 and 4). Perceived efficacy of health-promoting activities is undermined when racial-ethnic minority participants who identify unhealthy behavior as in-group defining are asked to consider their similarities to (middle-class) Whites (Studies 5-7).

Identity-Based Motivation: Implications for Intervention

Children want to succeed academically and attend college but their actual attainment often lags behind; some groups (e.g., boys, low-income children) are particularly likely to experience this gap. Social structural factors matter, influencing this gap in part by affecting children’s perceptions of what is possible for them and people like them in the future. Interventions that focus on this macro—micro interface can boost children’s attainment. We articulate the processes underlying these effects using an integrative culturally sensitive framework entitled identity-based motivation (IBM). The IBM model assumes that identities are dynamically constructed in context. People interpret situations and difficulties in ways that are congruent with currently active identities and prefer identity-congruent to identity-incongruent actions. When action feels identity congruent, experienced difficulty highlights that the behavior is important and meaningful. When action feels identity incongruent, the same difficulty suggests that the behavior is pointless and “not for people like me.”

Gender and Thought: The Role of the Self-Concept

In the continuing analysis of sex and gender differences, there is a growing awareness of the possibility of fundamental differences in how women and men perceive themselves and their worlds, in how they take meaning, and in how they come to know or reason (e.g., Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, & Tarule, 1986; Block, 1984; Cantor & Kihlstrom, 1987; Chodorow, 1987; Gilligan, 1982; Miller, 1986; Ruddick, 1980). The nature of these differences and the psychological structures and mechanisms that mediate them are not well understood. Such differences are likely to be subtle and not easily isolated but when closely analyzed may prove powerful. Our goal is to examine the divergent theories of the self that can be held by men and women and to explore how they may influence basic perceptual and cognitive processes.