Michael Harris Bond

Hofstede's Culture Dimensions: An Independent Validation Using Rokeach's Value Survey

Ng et al. (1982) collected data among students in nine Asian and Pacific countries using a modified version of the Rokeach Value Survey. Their data were reanalyzed by the present authors through an ecological factor analysis that produced five factors. Six of the countries covered also appear in Hofstedes (1983) extended study of work-related values among employees of a multinational corporation in 53 countries and regions. For the overlapping countries a correlation analysis was done between the five factor scores of the Ng et al. reanalysis and the four dimension scores of Hofstede. This correlation analysis revealed that each of Hofstedes dimensions can be distinctly identified in the Ng et al. data as well. This article is presented as an example of synergy between different cross-cultural studies.

Evaluating replicability of factors in the revised NEO Personality Inventory : Confirmatory factor analysis versus Procrustes rotation

Despite the empirical robustness of the 5-factor model of personality, recent confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) of NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI) data suggest they do not fit the hypothesized model. In a replication study of 229 adults, a series ofCFAs showed that Revised NEO-PI scales are not simple-structured but do approximate the normative 5-factor structure. CFA goodness-of-fit indices, however, were not high. Comparability analyses showed that no more than 5 factors were replicable, which calls into question some assumptions underlying the use of CFA. An alternative method that uses targeted rotation was presented and illustrated with data from Chinese and Japanese versions of the Revised NEO-PI that clearly replicated the 5-factor structure.

Pancultural explanations for life satisfaction: Adding relationship harmony to self-esteem

The first part of the study confirmed an additive effect of the newly proposed construct of relationship harmony to self-esteem in predicting life satisfaction across student samples from the United States and Hong Kong. As predicted from the dynamics of cultural collectivism, the relative importance of relationship harmony to self-esteem was greater in Hong Kong than in the United States. In the second part of the study, the independent and interdependent self-construals (H. R. Markus & S. Kitayama, 1991) and the 5 factors of personality (P. T. Costa & R. R. McCrae, 1992) were advanced to be the culture-general determinants of life satisfaction, acting through the mediating variables of self-esteem and relationship harmony. Both self-construals and the 5 factors of personality were shown to influence life satisfaction through the mediating agency of self-esteem and relationship harmony in equivalent ways across these 2 cultural groups.

Stereotype content model across cultures: Towards universal similarities and some differences

The stereotype content model (SCM) proposes potentially universal principles of societal stereotypes and their relation to social structure. Here, the SCM reveals theoretically grounded, cross-cultural, cross-groups similarities and one difference across 10 non-US nations. Seven European (individualist) and three East Asian (collectivist) nations (N=1,028) support three hypothesized cross-cultural similarities: (a) perceived warmth and competence reliably differentiate societal group stereotypes; (b) many out-groups receive ambivalent stereotypes (high on one dimension; low on the other); and (c) high status groups stereotypically are competent, whereas competitive groups stereotypically lack warmth. Data uncover one consequential cross-cultural difference: (d) the more collectivist cultures do not locate reference groups (in-groups and societal prototype groups) in the most positive cluster (high-competence/high-warmth), unlike individualist cultures. This demonstrates out-group derogation without obvious reference-group favouritism. The SCM can serve as a pancultural tool for predicting group stereotypes from structural relations with other groups in society, and comparing across societies.

The measurement of the etic aspects of individualism and collectivism across cultures

The dimension of individualism-collectivism, as identified by Hofstede (1980), was studied using items developed both theoretically and emically in nine diverse cultures. The dimension was found to be analysable into four stable etic factors: Individualism had two aspects (Separation from Ingroups and Self-Reliance with Hedonism) and collectivism had two aspects (Family Integrity and Interdependence with Sociability). These four factors are orthogonal to each other. The location of nine cultures on these four factors was used to compute a “collectivism” score which correlated r = + · 73 with Hofstedes (1980) collectivism scores for the nine cultures. This approach enables the measurement of individualism-collectivism in each culture as well as across cultures, and shows that different methods for measuring individualism-collectivism converge.

On the Empirical Identification of Dimensions for Cross-Cultural Comparisons

In cross-cultural psychology a major goal is to identify dimensions of culture. For this purpose, the cross-cultural analysis (referred to as ecological analysis by Hofstede, 1980) is often used. Two methodological difficulties associated with this method are discussed, and their solution is proposed. A method intended to identify universal dimensions of individual difference, the pancultural analysis, is likely to produce results similar to those obtained in a cross-cultural analysis and hence is unable to achieve its purpose of identifying individual dimensions. A new procedure, based on a within-culture standardization procedure, is introduced for this purpose. A case study of the differences in the results produced by the cross-cultural and the new analyses is then used as a springboard for a further discussion of Shweders(1973) between-within issue. The theoretical meaning of cultural and individual dimensions is also discussed.

Social Axioms: The Search for Universal Dimensions of General Beliefs about How the World Functions

To broaden our conceptual framework for understanding cultural differences, the present article reports two studies that examined whether pancultural dimensions based on general beliefs, or social axioms, can be identified in persons from five cultures. A Social Axioms Survey was constructed, based on both previous psychological research primarily in Europe and North America on beliefs and qualitative research conducted in Hong Kong and Venezuela. Factor analyses of these beliefs from student as well as adult samples revealed a pancultural, five-factor structure, with dimensions labeled as: cynicism, social complexity, reward for application, spirituality, and fate control. In the second study, this five-factor structure, with the possible exception of fate control, was replicated with college students from Japan, the United States, and Germany. The potential implications of a universal, five-factor structure of individual social beliefs were discussed, along with the relation of this structure to indigenous belief systems and to culture-level analyses.

Social Axioms: A Model for Social Beliefs in Multicultural Perspective

Publisher Summary This chapter describes a global research program designed to evaluate the universality and meaning of a five-factor structure of general beliefs or social axioms. Student data from 40 cultures and adult data from 13 cultures are collected, with both types of data providing strong support for the generality of this five-factor structure. The validity and usefulness of this structure are established by correlating citizen profiles across five dimensions—including social cynicism, social complexity, reward for application, religiosity, and fate control for each cultural group with societal characteristics. Within-culture and cross-cultural studies are reviewed to support the meanings of these axioms. A five-dimensional structure of social axioms was identified in Hong Kong and Venezuela, and subsequently replicated in the United States, Germany, and Japan. The universality of this structure of social axioms was evaluated by a round-the-world study, the results of which are presented. The chapter describes a research program designed to identify psychological construct, general beliefs or social axioms. It presents a historical review of the study of shared beliefs in social psychology.

Culture-Level Dimensions of Social Axioms and Their Correlates across 41 Cultures

Leung and colleagues have revealed a five-dimensional structure of social axioms across individuals from five cultural groups. The present research was designed to reveal the culture level factor structure of social axioms and its correlates across 41 nations. An ecological factor analysis on the 60 items of the Social Axioms Survey extracted two factors: Dynamic Externality correlates with value measures tapping collectivism, hierarchy, and conservatism and with national indices indicative of lower social development. Societal Cynicism is less strongly and broadly correlated with previous values measures or other national indices and seems to define a novel cultural syndrome. Its national correlates suggest that it taps the cognitive component of a cultural constellation labeled maleficence, a cultural syndrome associated with a general mistrust of social systems and other people. Discussion focused on the meaning of these national level factors of beliefs and on their relationships with individual level factors of belief derived from the same data set.

College Students' Spontaneous Self-Concept The Effect of Culture among Respondents in Hong Kong, Japan, and the United States

Cross-cultural comparisons of the self-concept have typically used structured inventories created in the United States. Importing and using such methodology may prevent culturally unique dimensions and contents from appearing. To overcome this problem, the Twenty Statements Test was administered to university students in Japan, the United States, and Hong Kong to assess cultural influences on the self-concept assessed from this open-ended inventory. Numerous cultural differences were found in the frequency of categories and subcategories used for self-statements and in the level of self-esteem. These differences were related to previous research on the self-concept, to socialization practices, and to central concerns in these cultural groups.