Kim & Markus 1999; Lalwani et al. 2006). However, research has not addressed the mechanisms by which such impression management takes place. Research on automaticity suggests that processes that are practiced frequently over time become automatic (Bargh 1994, 1997; Smith & Lerner 1986). Automaticity of frequently practiced processes will result in these processes becoming relatively effortless, in the sense that they do not require cognitive resources. This suggests that individualists engage in impression management through a more effortful process, whereas collectivists can do so automatically without investing significant cognitive resources. Therefore, we hypothesize that, when motivated to impression manage, collectivists will do so regardless of their cognitive capacity, but individualists will be more likely to impression manage when they have (versus do not have) the cognitive capacity to do so. Experiment 1 Method Eighty-one students participated in a 2 (cognitive load: low vs. high) × 2 (cultural orientation: collectivists vs. individualists) between-subjects study. The high and low cognitive load conditions were based on a well established manipulation (e.g., Gilbert and Osborne 1989). High load condition participants were asked to keep an eight-digit number in memory while answering the questionnaire. Low load condition participants were not given this instruction. Cultural orientation was measured using the 16-item Triandis and Gelfand (1998) scale. The scale contains 8 items measuring forms of individualism (e.g., “I'd rather depend on myself than others”) and 8 measuring forms of collectivism, e.g., “I feel good when I cooperate with others”) which respondents answered on 7-point scales (1=strongly disagree, and 7=strongly agree) (αindividualism = .71 ; αcollectivism = .73)2.
Morris, Michael W. and Kaiping Peng (1994), "Culture and Cause: American and Chinese Attributions of Social and Physical Events," Journal and Personality and Social Psychology, 67 (6), 949-971. Myers, David G. and Helmut Lamm (1976), "The Group Polarization Phenomenon," Psychological Bulletin, 83 (4), 602-627. Nisbett, Richard E., Kaiping Peng, Incheol Choi, and Ara Norenzayan (2001), "Culture and Systems of Thought: Holistic vs. Analytic Cognition," Psychological Review, 108 (2), 291-310. Norenzayan, Ara, Incheol Choi, and Richard E. Nisbett (2002), "Cultural Similarities and Differences in Social Inference: Evidence from Behavioral Predictions and Lay Theories of Behavior," Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28 (1), 109-120. Oyserman, Daphna (2009), "Identity-Based Motivation: Implications for Action-Readiness, Procedural-Readiness, and Consumer Behavior," Journal of Consumer Psychology, 19 (July), 250-260. Paulhus, Delroy L. (1984), "Two-Component Models of Socially Desirable Responding," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46 (3), 598-609. Paulhus, Delroy L. (1988), "Assessing Self-Deception and Impression Management in The Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding," Unpublished manual, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Paulhus, Delroy L. (1991), "Measurement and Control of Response Bias," in Measures of Personality and Social Psychological Attitudes, ed. John P. Robinson and Phillip R. Shaver, San Diego: Academic Press, 17-59.
Schlenker, Barry R. and Beth A. Pontari (2000), "The Strategic Control of Information: Impression Management and Self-Presentation in Daily Life," in Psychological Perspectives on Self and Identity, ed. A. Tesser & R. B. Felson, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 199-232. Schwarz, Norbert (2003), "Self-Reports in Consumer Research: The Challenge of Comparing Cohorts and Cultures," Journal of Consumer Research, 29 (March), 588-594. Shah, James. Y. (2003), "Automatic for the People: How Representations of Significant Others Implicitly Affect Goal Pursuit," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84 (4), 661-681. Smith, M. Brewster, Jerome S. Bruner, and Robert W. White (1956), Opinions and Personality, New York: Wiley. Smith, Eliot R. and Miriam Lerner (1986), "Development of Automatism of Social Judgments," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50 (2), 246-259. Smith, Robert E. and William R. Swinyard (1983), "Attitude-Behavior Consistency: The Impact of Product versus Advertising," Journal of Marketing Research, 20 (August,) Sudman, Seymour, Norman M. Bradburn, and Norbert Schwarz (1996), Thinking About Answers: The Application of Cognitive Processes to Survey Methodology, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Tedeschi, James T. and Paul Rosenfeld, P. (1981), "Impression Management Theory and the Forced Compliance Situation," in Impression Management Theory and Social Psychological Research, ed. J. T. Tedeschi, New York: Academic Press, 147-180.