A. Lavin Application Article Week 10

The article I chose this week is an academic commentary by Harry Triandis on the work of Geert Hofstede, a pioneer in the sociological study of culture.  This week the class read about Hofstede's five dimensions of national culture: Power distance, Uncertainty Avoidance, Individualism, Masculinity, and Long Term Orientation, in Dementionalizing Culture: The Hofestede Model in Context. In this academic article, The Many Dimensions of Culture, Harry Triandis explores the importance of Hofestede's work and reveals its value to the study of psychology from his perspective.  I find this particular article relevant not only because of our readings this week which discussed company culture, structure, and Hofstede himself, but also because culture relates to everything from work dynamics to thought process and can even be connected to the recent election which many pundits attributed the win or the loss of their particular candidate to the culture change happening in the U.S.

In my article, Triandis notes that in the mid- 1950's the study of culture was marginal and many psychologists favored cross-cultural studies only as a means of confirming that their findings were universal and eternal.  However, Triandis explains that he reacted to these studies similarly to Hofestede identifying that the biased findings would not be true in X culture.  He explains that they were able to see this cultural disconnect because they were both multi-cultural and multi-lingual (Triandis, 2004).  

In 1980, Hofstede's publication increased the influence of the minority.  Tridanis explains that even as recent as 1980, culture was still thought of as an out-there concept and was of little importance to psychologists.  A major turing point occurred when culture started to be conceived as "inside" the person, which argues that all psychological processes have a cultural component (Tridandis, 2004).  Through this view, psychologists suddenly realized that what was considered universal in psychology was actually only true in the west or in other individualist cultures and not valid everywhere after all.

Individualism-Collectivism

Hofstede introduced the term individual-collectivism.  His work was at a cultural level and at the time at that level, individualism and collectivism were on opposite ends (Tridanis, 2004).  However, further analysis shows these factors are no longer on opposite poles, but could be correlated so that a person could be high in both collectivist and individualist tendencies.  For example, one study has shown that people who were raised in a collectivist culture and then lived in an individualist culture for several years were high in both collectivism and individualism. Other studies suggest that people raised in both individualism and collectivism were better adjusted and could deal with adversities more successfully(Triandis, 2004).  Tridanis writes that this significant correlation is almost like the argument that one should invest in a diversified portfolio!

Collectivist Cultures vs Individualist Cultures 

There are significant differences in the perceptions of behavior of people in the collectivist cultures and individualist culture (Triandis, 2004).  For example, perhaps the most significant characteristic difference between people in collectivist cultures relative to those in individual cultures is the emphasis on context more than on content (Tridanis, 2004).  For example, when talking with one another, those in collectivist cultures pay more attention to how something is said like the tone of voice and the gestures used, than to what is said.  This can lead to catastrophic results as displayed in Geneva in 1991 when Secretary of State James Baker told the Iraqis "We will attack you if you do to get out of Kuwait," however they understood that the Americans would not attack because Baker was calm and did not seem angry (Tridanis, 2004).  Oops!

Implications for Working in Another Culture

As countries become more affluent, their populations become more individualist.  However, this change requires several generations (Triandis, 2004).  Individualist cultures have a greater use of human resource practices.  For example, people are hired for individual attributes while in collectivist cultures, they are more likely to be selected on the basis of group memberships (Triandis, 2004).  Paternalism is a more common leadership style in collectivist cultures and in fact the boss is more likely to be personally involved with the private lives of the employees.  Managers in collectivist cultures are nota s concerned with performance as managers in individualist cultures, but they are more concerned with interpersonal relationships than managers in individualist cultures are.

Tridanis observes that almost every publication which deals with cultural differences and includes many cultures is likely to reference Hofstede and that his work has become the standard against which new work on cultural differences is validated (Tridanis, 2004).

References

Triandis, H.C. (2004).  "The Many Dimensions of Culture". The Academy of Management Executive 1(18), pp. 88-93.