Premium
Do birds of a feather universally flock together? Cultural variation in the similarity‐attraction effect
Author(s) -
Heine Steven J.,
Foster JulieAnn B.,
Spina Roy
Publication year - 2009
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/j.1467-839x.2009.01289.x
Subject(s) - attraction , psychology , social psychology , similarity (geometry) , personality , flock , variation (astronomy) , demographics , demography , ecology , sociology , biology , philosophy , linguistics , physics , artificial intelligence , computer science , astrophysics , image (mathematics)
Three experiments explored the similarity‐attraction effect (SAE) among North American and Japanese samples. In all studies, North Americans showed a significantly more pronounced SAE than the Japanese. The North Americans consistently revealed a strong SAE whereas the Japanese effect was only significant in the methods with the most power. The cultural differences emerged across different methods, and for the domains of personality, activities, attitudes and demographics. The cultural difference was mediated by self‐esteem, indicating that a motivation for positive self‐views is a mechanism underlying the SAE.