Culture and the distinctiveness motive: constructing identity in individualistic and collectivistic contexts

The motive to attain a distinctive identity is sometimes thought to be stronger in, or even specific to, those socialized into individualistic cultures. Using data from 4,751 participants in 21 cultural groups (18 nations and 3 regions), we tested this prediction against our alternative view that culture would moderate the ways in which people achieve feelings of distinctiveness, rather than influence the strength of their motivation to do so. We measured the distinctiveness motive using an indirect technique to avoid cultural response biases. Analyses showed that the distinctiveness motive was not weaker-and, if anything, was stronger-in more collectivistic nations. However, individualism-collectivism was found to moderate the ways in which feelings of distinctiveness were constructed: Distinctiveness was associated more closely with difference and separateness in more individualistic cultures and was associated more closely with social position in more collectivistic cultures. Multilevel analysis confirmed that it is the prevailing beliefs and values in an individual's context, rather than the individual's own beliefs and values, that account for these differences.     

Cultural Dimensions,Gender, and the Nature of Self-concept: A Fourteen-country Study

Ratings of the importance of and satisfaction with 20 areas of the self were obtained from 3604 first or second year social science undergraduates from 14 countries (15 cultures). Factor analysis at the culture by gender level supported four factors for both sets of ratings. The resulting factor scores were analyzed for mean differences according to the cultural dimension of Individualism-Collectivism by Gender and by correlations with other cultural dimenions and economic indicators. It was found that participants from the 10 collectivist cultures placed greater salience for their self-concepts on “family values” than did those from the individualist cultures. However, this cultural difference was not found for “social relationships”. The expected gender differences, with females valuing “family values” and “social relationships” more highly, were found only for the individualist countries. The findings indicate that there may be a strong cultural level interaction effect between gender and Individualism-Collectivism on the nature of self-conceptions, and that the “family” and “social” aspects of self-concept in collectivist countries need to be considered separately.     

Salient material properties and haptic volume perception: The influences of surface texture, thermal conductivity, and compliance

We investigated the influences of surface texture, thermal conductivity, and compliance on the haptic perception of the volume of small cubes. It was hypothesized that an object containing highly salient material properties would be perceived as larger in volume than the same object without these properties. Blindfolded subjects were asked to explore pairs of cubes differing in their material properties and to select the one with the larger volume. The results showed that, counterintuitively, a smooth cube was perceived as being significantly larger than a rough cube of the same physical volume, with average biases of about 19 %. Furthermore, cubes with a higher thermal conductivity were perceived as significantly larger than cubes with a lower thermal conductivity (average bias of about 7 %). In addition, the magnitude of the bias in this condition was not changed by increasing or decreasing the temperature of the test objects, suggesting that the effect of thermal conductivity could not be attributed directly to the heat flow. Finally, a hard cube was perceived as significantly larger than a soft cube of equal physical volume, with an average bias of about 25 %. These results reveal that the studied material properties have significant and consistent influences on the haptic perception of volume. The observed biases provide an indication of the levels at which the processing of haptic information on volume and material properties occurs.