Peering into the “Magnum Mysterium” of Culture

The purpose of this research is to test whether descriptive norms, or cognitions about typical beliefs, values, and behaviors of one's group, can explain cultural influence in the domains of blame attribution and harm perception. In Study 1, using participants from the United States and South Korea, the authors find that individuals with lower (vs. higher) collectivistic descriptive norms ascribed more blame after more intentional acts and less blame after less intentional acts. In the second study, using American and South Korean participants, the authors find that individuals with lower (vs. higher) collectivistic descriptive norms perceived more harm after right violations and less harm after duty violations. Collectivistic personal attitudes did not predict the expected differences in attribution of blame or perception of harm. The descriptive norm account of cultural influence provides an alternative to the currently dominant personal attitude paradigm.

[1]  C. Neil Macrae,et al.  HELP, I NEED SOMEBODY: AUTOMATIC ACTION AND INACTION , 1998 .

[2]  David Matsumoto,et al.  Culture, context, and behavior. , 2007, Journal of personality.

[3]  E. Durkheim,et al.  Rules of Sociological Method , 1964 .

[4]  R. Nisbett,et al.  Validity problems comparing values across cultures and possible solutions. , 1997 .

[5]  H. Aarts,et al.  The silence of the library: environment, situational norm, and social behavior. , 2003, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[6]  Fadia Nasser,et al.  A Monte Carlo Study Investigating the Impact of Item Parceling on Measures of Fit in Confirmatory Factor Analysis , 2003 .

[7]  G. Bierbrauer,et al.  Measurement of normative and evaluative aspects in individualistic and collectivistic orientations: The Cultural Orientation Scale (COS). , 1994 .

[8]  Sharon Glazer,et al.  Individualism-collectivism as Descriptive Norms , 2009 .

[9]  M. Bond,et al.  Making scientific sense of cultural differences in psychological outcomes : Unpackaging the magnum mysterium , 2011 .

[10]  S. Schwartz.  Universals in the Content and Structure of Values: Theoretical Advances and Empirical Tests in 20 Countries , 1992 .

[11]  Heather M. Coon,et al.  Cultural psychology, A new look: reply to Bond (2002), Fiske (2002), Kitayama (2002), and Miller (2002). , 2002, Psychological bulletin.

[12]  T. Singelis,et al.  The Measurement of Independent and Interdependent Self-Construals , 1994 .

[13]  Kristopher J Preacher,et al.  Addressing Moderated Mediation Hypotheses: Theory, Methods, and Prescriptions , 2007, Multivariate behavioral research.

[14]  H. Markus,et al.  Culture, Self, and the Reality of the Social , 2003 .

[15]  W. Mischel.  Personality and Assessment , 1996 .

[16]  C. W. Morris.  Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism , 1995 .

[17]  R. Cialdini,et al.  Social influence: Social norms, conformity and compliance. , 1998 .

[18]  Ivy Yee-Man Lau,et al.  Culture as common sense: perceived consensus versus personal beliefs as mechanisms of cultural influence. , 2009, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[19]  J. Darley,et al.  The Psychology of Compensatory and Retributive Justice , 2003, Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.

[20]  Y. Poortinga,et al.  Peeling the onion called culture : A synopsis , 1987 .

[21]  D. R. Lehman,et al.  Psychology and culture. , 2004, Annual review of psychology.

[22]  C. Chiu,et al.  Perceived cultural importance and actual self-importance of values in cultural identification. , 2007, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[23]  Joan G. Miller.  Bringing culture to basic psychological theory--beyond individualism and collectivism: comment on Oyserman et al. (2002). , 2002, Psychological bulletin.

[24]  Dominic Abrams,et al.  Towards a single-process uncertainty-reduction model of social motivation in groups. , 1993 .

[25]  J. W. Whiting,et al.  Children of Six Cultures: A Psycho-Cultural Analysis , 1975 .

[26]  Hannah Faye Chua,et al.  Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin Culture and Diverging Views of Social Events , 2022 .

[27]  M. Gelfand,et al.  Cultural influences on cognitive representations of conflict: interpretations of conflict episodes in the United States and Japan. , 2001, The Journal of applied psychology.

[28]  P. Sheeran,et al.  Descriptive norms as an additional predictor in the theory of planned behaviour: A meta-analysis , 2003 .

[29]  P. Dorfman,et al.  Leadership and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies , 2004 .

[30]  The Cross-Cultural Study of Organizational Behavior , 1974 .

[31]  P. J. Pelto,et al.  The differences between “tight” and “loose” societies , 1968 .

[32]  Arie W Kruglanski,et al.  Groups as epistemic providers: need for closure and the unfolding of group-centrism. , 2006, Psychological review.

[33]  A. Kimball Romney,et al.  Variations in value orientations. , 1961 .

[34]  R. Fischer,et al.  Congruence and Functions of Personal and Cultural Values: Do My Values Reflect My Culture’s Values? , 2006, Personality & social psychology bulletin.

[35]  Curtis D. Hardin,et al.  Social influence effects on automatic racial prejudice. , 2001, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[36]  Curtis D. Hardin,et al.  Shared reality: How social verification makes the subjective objective. , 1996 .

[37]  M. Bond,et al.  Honoring culture scientifically when doing social psychology , 2003 .

[38]  D. R. Lehman,et al.  What's wrong with cross-cultural comparisons of subjective Likert scales?: The reference-group effect. , 2002, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[39]  H. Triandis.  Individualism And Collectivism , 1995 .

[40]  Richard A. Shweder,et al.  The Social Construction of the Person: How Is it Possible? , 1985 .

[41]  C. Stangor,et al.  Perceived consensus influences intergroup behavior and stereotype accessibility. , 2001, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[42]  B. Latané.  Dynamic Social Impact: The Creation of Culture by Communication. , 1996 .

[43]  F. Strodtbeck,et al.  Variations in value orientations. , 1961 .

[44]  B. R. Schlenker,et al.  The triangle model of responsibility. , 1994, Psychological review.

[45]  M. Gelfand,et al.  Cross-cultural organizational behavior. , 2007, Annual review of psychology.

[46]  M. Gonzales,et al.  Explaining Our Sins: Factors Influencing Offender Accounts and Anticipated Victim Responses , 1992 .

[47]  H. Triandis.  The analysis of subjective culture , 1973 .

[48]  Chi-yue Chiu,et al.  Culture and the construal of agency : Attribution to individual versus group dispositions , 1999 .

[49]  Heather M. Coon,et al.  Rethinking individualism and collectivism: evaluation of theoretical assumptions and meta-analyses. , 2002, Psychological bulletin.

[50]  D. Bandalos.  The Effects of Item Parceling on Goodness-of-Fit and Parameter Estimate Bias in Structural Equation Modeling , 2002 .

[51]  Chi-yue Chiu,et al.  Cultural Identity and Dynamic Construction of the Self: Collective Duties and Individual Rights in Chinese and American Cultures , 2001 .

[52]  C. Chiu,et al.  Measuring Cultures through Intersubjective Cultural Norms , 2007 .

[53]  M. Gelfand,et al.  Converging measurement of horizontal and vertical individualism and collectivism , 1998 .

[54]  G. Hofstede,et al.  Culture's Consequences: International Differences in Work-Related Values. , 1982 .

[55]  S. Asch.  Effects of Group Pressure Upon the Modification and Distortion of Judgments , 1951 .

[56]  R. Ryan,et al.  Parent and Teacher Autonomy-Support in Russian and U.S. Adolescents , 2001 .

[57]  J. Storey,et al.  Individualism and collectivism: into the 1990s , 1993 .

[58]  S. Fiske,et al.  The Handbook of Social Psychology , 1935 .

[59]  D. Campbell,et al.  Convergent and discriminant validation by the multitrait-multimethod matrix. , 1959, Psychological bulletin.

[60]  Michele J. Gelfand,et al.  Cultural influences on cognitive representations of conflict: interpretations of conflict episodes in the United States and Japan. , 2001 .