What Are Friends for in Russia Versus Canada?: An Approach for Documenting Cross-Cultural Differences

Most research on friendship has been grounded in Western cultural worlds, a bias that needs to be addressed. To that end, we propose a methodological roadmap to translate linguistic/anthropological work into quantitative psychological cross-cultural investigations of friendship, and showcase its implementation in Russia and Canada. Adopting an intersubjective perspective on culture, we assessed cultural models of friendship in three inter-related ways: by (1) deriving people’s mental maps of close interpersonal relationships; (2) examining the factor structure of friendship; and (3) predicting cultural group membership from a given person’s friendship model. Two studies of Russians (Study 1, n = 89; Study 2a, n = 195; Study 2b, n = 232) and Canadians (Study 1, n = 89; Study 2a, n = 164; Study 2b, n = 199) implemented this approach. The notions of trust and help in adversity emerged as defining features of friendship in Russia but were less clearly present in Canada. Different friendship models seem to be prevalent in these two cultural worlds. The roadmap described in the current research documents these varying intersubjective representations, showcasing an approach that is portable across contexts (rather than limited to a specific cross-cultural contrast) and relies on well-established methods (i.e., easily accessible in many research contexts).

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Exploring Cross-Cultural Differences In Social Knowledge Creation And Exchange: A Preliminary Examination

International Journal of Management & Information Systems (IJMIS) ◽

10.19030/ijmis.v15i1.1600 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 15 (1) ◽

Author(s):

John Girard ◽

Andy Bertsch

Keyword(s):

Cultural Differences ◽

Knowledge Creation ◽

Cultural Models ◽

Correlation Coefficients ◽

Cross Cultural ◽

Cultural Dimensions ◽

Social Knowledge ◽

Cross Cultural Differences ◽

Cultural Research ◽

The Social

This paper chronicles an exploratory, in-progress research project that compares the findings of Hofstede’s cross-cultural research with those of Forrester’s Social Technographics research. The aim of the project is to determine if a relationship exists between cultural differences and social knowledge creation and exchange. Part one of the study mapped Davenport and Prusak’s information and knowledge creation theories to the six components of Forrester’s Social Technographics study (creators, critics, collectors, joiners, spectators, and inactives). Next, the Social Technographics results from 13 nations were compared with Hofstede’s four cultural dimensions (power distance, individualism, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity). The analysis included exploring the relationship visually using 24 scatter diagrams, running correlation coefficients (Peasson’s r) for each relationship, testing for significance of Pearson’s r, and finally conducting regression analyses on each relationship. Although the authors believe that culture influences behaviours, this study did not reveal any reasonable relationships between culture and placement along the Social Technographics. However, it is possible that there exists problems in the Hofstede scales. The Hofstede scales have been highly criticized in the literature. It may be that other cross-cultural models such as GLOBE, Schwartz, Triandis, or others may yield different results. In this regard, further research is necessary. The next phase of the project will compare Social Technographics with the GLOBE project findings.

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Perception of facial emotional expressions by representatives of Asian and European cultural groups

Experimental Psychology (Russia) ◽

10.17759/exppsy.2017100408 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 10 (4) ◽

pp. 116-132 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Y.G. Khoze ◽

O.A. Korolkova ◽

N.Yu. Zhizhnikova ◽

M.V. Zubareva

Keyword(s):

Cultural Differences ◽

Cultural Study ◽

Cross Cultural ◽

Emotional Expressions ◽

Cultural Group ◽

Cultural Groups ◽

Basic Emotions ◽

Cross Cultural Differences ◽

Cross Cultural Study

The article presents the results of a cross-cultural study of the perception of basic emotional expressions by representatives of Asian and European cultural groups and compares them with the results obtained earlier on Russian sample. Emotional expressions from VEPEL database (Kurakova, 2012) were used as stimuli. We revealed invariant perception within a cultural group and cross-cultural differences in perception of the basic emotions of fear, disgust and anger between Asian and Russian cultural groups; in perception of surprise, fear, disgust and anger between European and Russian cultural groups; and in perception of fear, sadness, disgust and anger between European and Asian cultural groups.

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Cognitive gadgets: A provocative but flawed manifesto

Behavioral and Brain Sciences ◽

10.1017/s0140525x19001134 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 42 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Marco Del Giudice

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Cultural Differences ◽

Twin Studies ◽

Cross Cultural ◽

Evolutionary Approach ◽

Genetic Inheritance ◽

Double Standards ◽

Cross Cultural Differences ◽

Cherry Picking ◽

Dichotomous Thinking

Abstract The argument against innatism at the heart of Cognitive Gadgets is provocative but premature, and is vitiated by dichotomous thinking, interpretive double standards, and evidence cherry-picking. I illustrate my criticism by addressing the heritability of imitation and mindreading, the relevance of twin studies, and the meaning of cross-cultural differences in theory of mind development. Reaching an integrative understanding of genetic inheritance, plasticity, and learning is a formidable task that demands a more nuanced evolutionary approach.

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