The topic—the meaning of culture and implications of cultural differences between countries and within the U.S.—is one that concerns many social scientists.

  Does it describe a new discovery or a new methodology that's useful to others?

Our methods, meta-analyses and theory-based review, are not different, however, our "discovery," what emerges from our review, about the nature of cultural difference is quite useful.

  Could you summarize the significance of your paper in layman's terms?

We find that European Americans are more individualistic—valuing personal independence more, and are therefore less collectivistic—feeling less duty to in-groups, than is the average in other countries. However, within the U.S., high individualism is the norm across the three groups described in the literature—African Americans, Latino Americans, and European Americans; indeed, African Americans are more individualistic than European Americans, and Latino Americans do not essentially differ from European Americans on the subject of individualism. Moreover, cross-culturally, Koreans and Japanese are not lower in individualism than Americans are. These findings are important firstly because the content of self-concept and ways of relating to and interacting with others are moderately influenced by individualism and collectivism, and secondly because these cultural differences show large effects on attribution and cognitive style.

  How did you become involved in this research?

I have been studying culture and implications of cultural differences since noticing what appeared to be cultural differences in the meaning of what constitutes the self and what it means to be a self in my first semester of teaching as a beginning faculty member.

Daphna Oyserman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Psychology
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI, USA