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The “common view”, the “cultural binary”, and how to move forward
Author(s) -
Vignoles Vivian L.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
asian journal of social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.5
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1467-839X
pISSN - 1367-2223
DOI - 10.1111/ajsp.12346
Subject(s) - collectivism , individualism , interdependence , cultural diversity , viewpoints , social psychology , diversity (politics) , binary opposition , empirical research , sociology , exploratory research , psychology , individualistic culture , epistemology , social science , political science , law , anthropology , visual arts , art , philosophy
Takano and Osaka's (1997, 1999) careful review of empirical research on individualism and collectivism in the US and Japan revealed a striking lack of support for the “common view” that Japanese individuals are typical collectivists whereas Americans are typical individualists. Two decades on, Takano and Osaka (2018) conclude that empirical studies have continued to fail to support the common view—and yet this view is stubbornly persistent in the literature. More is at stake here than the characterization of two national cultures. The common view epitomizes a widely adopted binary view of culture, which reduces the richness and complexity of global cultural diversity to an oversimplified contrast between individualist/ independent/ Western/ North American and collectivist/ interdependent/ Eastern/ East Asian categories. Unless cultural psychologists can move beyond binary thinking and research practices, correcting an inaccurate portrayal of American and Japanese cultures will be of limited benefit. Future progress might be fostered by (a) defining concepts more precisely, (b) more use of exploratory approaches, (c) wider sampling of cultural groups and contexts, (d) using available methodological guidance for cross‐cultural research, and (e) expanding research into cultural identities and stereotypes.