Upon completion of this lesson, you should be able to explain individualism, collectivism, tightness, and looseness. In Video 15, we discuss the extent to which many of the social phenomena about which you have learned occur in other cultures. Researchers are discovering that many general psychological phenomena do not necessarily occur in all cultures. For example, there are certain primitive tribes in which all buildings are round, and the people do not have experience with right angles. In other cultures, child-rearing practices are quite different than in industrialized countries.
Social psychologists are interested in both cultural universals and differences in social behavior.
The study of cultural effects on social behavior has many implications, most notably in the workplace. As companies become transnational, it becomes necessary to address the differences in behavior that will occur in workers in other parts of the world. For example, we know that workers in most Asian countries place little emphasis on personal accomplishment. For them, it is group accomplishment that provides the ultimate satisfaction. Thus, if we were to go into a South Korean factory and implement an individual goals program designed to increase motivation and performance, in all likelihood the program would fail, because the workers would not care about meeting individual goals.