Cultural differences are real, but often not straightforward.

Simple categories can obscure important real-world complexity.

A study of IBM employees shaped our view of national cultures.

Authored by Miles Thompson, Rachel Peal, and Ada Toprak.

You may have heard that Western cultures are individualistic and Eastern cultures are collectivist. So had we. So we set out to explore the research behind these ideas to see what it might teach us about our wider project, which is using psychology to help bring about a better world. In short, while the above distinction captures something real, we also came to understand that the underlying research is more complicated and nuanced than the simple statement above suggests.

The labels individualism and collectivism tend to be applied to whole countries or even global regions. By way of illustration, and using stereotypical examples, individualistic societies are generally associated with “the West” (e.g., the United States). They tend to have a greater emphasis on personal autonomy and individual goals, with individuals relying less on each other. Japan or China, on the other hand, are stereotypically used as exemplars of more collectivist societies. In these societies, individuals tend to be more interdependent, and group relationships and obligations are given greater importance.

Individualism-collectivism research is often traced back to Geert Hofstede (1928-2020). Hofstede’s original work in the late 1960s and early 1970s used factor analysis to examine the results of a global survey of employee work values, conducted within IBM (International Business Machines). This research gathered data from mainly skilled, educated, middle-class employees working for a single multinational technology company in different locations around the world (Hofstede, 1980). This raises sampling questions, both in terms of who was sampled and the extent to which that data can represent national cultures.

Hofstede’s original framework included four dimensions of culture; later versions included six, of which individualism-collectivism is only one. Among the many items included in the survey, six came to be associated with the individualism-collectivism dimension. Here, participants were asked about factors they would like to see in an ideal job. The three individualism items focused on (i) having a job that allows time for personal and family life, (ii) having freedom within your job, and (iii) having challenging work resulting in a sense of accomplishment. The three collectivism items........

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