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SPRINGER BRIEFS IN PSYCHOLOGY
CULTURE, ORGANIZATIONS, AND WORK

Catherine T. Kwantes
Sharon Glazer

Culture,
Organizations,
and Work
Clarifying Concepts
SpringerBriefs in Psychology

Culture, Organizations, and Work

Series editors
Sharon Glazer, University of Baltimore, Baltimore, MD, USA
Catherine T. Kwantes, University of Windsor, Windsor, ON, Canada
The SpringerBriefs Series in Culture, Organizations, and Work publishes fully
developed conceptual pieces that focus on current state-of-the-art topics and
research on the interface between culture, organizations, and work. The series aims
to expand upon key concepts, theories, or ideas that require more development than
a typical journal article permits, but still do not require a full-length book. We
encourage authors to disentangle issues that have created confusion or have had
little attention in research and application. Submissions should address issues in
work and organizations from an international, multinational, cross-cultural,
intercultural, and/or cultural perspectives. Authors of published papers should also
provide guidance for applying research findings in practice. Topics can focus on
any and all kinds of cultures, organizations, and work situations. The level of
analysis is open and we also encourage cross-level conceptual pieces. Papers may
include some empirical evidence, but it is not a forum for preparing a longer journal
type manuscript. Importantly, this series aims to publish papers from around the
globe and support views of culture, organizations, and work from different cultural
lenses. We strive to make the series accessible and relevant to practitioners and
academic scholars, including graduate students, who wish to dive deeper into topics
that are currently not represented sufficiently in other publications.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/13335

Catherine T. Kwantes Sharon Glazer
•

Culture, Organizations,
and Work
Clarifying Concepts

123
Catherine T. Kwantes Sharon Glazer
University of Windsor University of Baltimore
Windsor, ON Baltimore, MD
Canada USA

ISSN 2192-8363 ISSN 2192-8371 (electronic)

SpringerBriefs in Psychology
ISSN 2510-1471 ISSN 2510-148X (electronic)
Culture, Organizations, and Work
ISBN 978-3-319-47661-2 ISBN 978-3-319-47662-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-47662-9
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016955321

© The Author(s) 2017

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part
of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,
recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission
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The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
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the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this
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Printed on acid-free paper

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The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Acknowledgments

We thank Michael Harris Bond, Thomas Mitchell, Malgorzata W. Kozusznik, and

Alyssa Gradus, for their thoughtful reviews and suggestions. Special gratitude is
extended to Fresia Jackson for her substantial intellectual contribution to the dis-
cussion of cross-cultural competence and cultural intelligence.

v
Contents

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2 Culture Across Disciplines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.1 Psychology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.2 Anthropology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.3 Sociology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.4 Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
3 Toward an Operationalization of Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 13
3.1 A Macro View of Culture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 14
3.2 Approaching Culture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 15
3.3 Creating Frameworks to Study Culture: The Nomological
Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 16
3.4 Etic Versus Emic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 17
3.5 Methodological and Measurement Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . .... 17
3.6 Identifying Cultural Signatures: Surface Probes
to Deep Dives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
3.7 Geographical Context as Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
3.8 Societal Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
3.9 Diverse/Heterogeneous Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.10 Characterizing Culture: Cultural Values and Beliefs . . . . . . . . . . . 26
3.10.1 Culture as Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
3.10.2 Culture as Beliefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3.10.3 Culture as Values and Beliefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3.10.4 Other Cultural Characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

vii
viii Contents

3.11 A Micro View of Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

3.12 Culture as Presented Through Social Relationships . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3.13 Summary: Operationalizing Culture for This Brief Series . . . . . . . 36
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
4 Organizations and Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ............. 45
4.1 Voluntary Versus Involuntary Membership
with an Organization and Its Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.1.1 Voluntary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
4.1.2 Non-voluntary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
4.2 Organizational Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
4.2.1 Organizational Cultures in Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
4.2.2 Perspectives on Organizational Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
4.2.3 Leadership and Organizational Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
4.2.4 Organizational Culture Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
4.3 Multinational Corporations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
4.4 Industry Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
4.5 Organizational Cultures Around Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.5.1 Safety Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.5.2 Health Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
4.6 Intraorganizational Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
4.7 Team Cultures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.8 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
5 Work and Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
5.1 Work: Person/Input . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
5.2 Work: Throughput/Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
5.2.1 Situated Cognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
5.2.2 Motivation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
5.2.3 Work Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
5.2.4 Decision-Making . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
5.2.5 Negotiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
5.2.6 Justice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.2.7 Trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
5.2.8 Commitment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
5.3 Work: Outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3.1 Contextual Performance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3.2 Task Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
5.3.3 Work Stress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
5.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Contents ix

6 Cross-Cultural Competence and Cultural Intelligence

in the Workplace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
6.1 Cross-Cultural Competence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
6.2 Cultural Intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
6.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
7 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Chapter 1
Introduction

As businesses become more global and the world becomes “flatter” (Friedman
2005), people in the workplace are increasingly adjusting to and navigating through
its cultural complexity. Although international trading has taken place for millennia,
for much of that time trade interactions tended to be between individuals and small
groups from one culture meeting people from another culture to conduct business.
Examples of those interactions were found on the Silk Road trade route, which
connected East Asia with West Asia from around 206 BCE to 220 CE. Later in
history, the purportedly first multinational corporation, the Dutch East India
Company, recorded sending over one million sailors, half of whom were not Dutch,
to work in Asia between 1600 and 1800, with almost 40% not returning alive
(Emmer and Klooster 1999).
Unlike centuries ago when only a few business contributors would travel and
interact with people from different national cultures, in today’s business environment
it is not at all unusual for entire populations of company employees to work phys-
ically and/or virtually across cultures when interacting between organizations, or
even within the same organization. While it used to be a special endeavor to travel
internationally, today international assignments are becoming a much more common
part of many career trajectories. Travel for meetings, global teams, and global virtual
meetings are also occurring with increasing frequency. For these reasons, under-
standing cultures’ effects at work and developing cross-cultural competence in the
business world is becoming of increasing importance. While this importance is
recognized, the statement itself begs the question of what exactly is “cross-cultural
competence?” Implicit in that question, of course, are the questions: What exactly is
culture? And, how are organizations and the experience of work affected by culture?
The approach to addressing these questions in research and practice depends
upon the point of view adopted. Each point of view, cultural, cross-cultural, or
international, brings a different perspective to understanding and addressing societal
influences on business practices, management, and employee attitudes and behav-
iors. Each brings a different ontological perspective regarding culture and to

© The Author(s) 2017 1

C.T. Kwantes and S. Glazer, Culture, Organizations, and Work,
Culture, Organizations, and Work, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-47662-9_1
2 1 Introduction

determining what may or may not be a concern, how best to understand a given
issue, and finally, how to develop an approach to that particular issue.
The particular point of view researchers choose to adopt and the methodological
approach researchers then employ to address culture-related research questions are
important factors to consider from both an epistemological and a practical per-
spective. How people view the origins of culture and the theoretical orientations
they draw on shapes what they believe to know, as that knowledge stems from the
questions asked, how those questions were asked, and the methods used to look for
answers to those questions. Similarly, from a practical perspective, how problems
are addressed will reflect how a given problem is defined and where remedies for
those problems are sought. These assertions are themselves embodiments of an
epistemological assumption that culture is within us, outside of us, and influencing
our interactions with others and entire lifecourse.
Throughout issues of this series scholars will be delving deeper into topics that
address culture, organization, and work at various levels of and units of analysis.
This inaugural issue explicitly utilizes the lens of Industrial and Organizational
(I/O) Psychology, with an implicit assumption that an organization’s resulting
product or service is only as good as the people it employs. For this reason, the
focus is on people’s attitudes, behaviors, and cognitions in the workplace and not
on an organization’s overall performance.
The goals of this first monograph are to identify the myriad ways of studying
culture from the perspective of I/O Psychology, as well as related disciplines,
including ways of operationalizing culture, different levels of culture, culture’s
interplay with the organization and with work. The intent is not to limit the conceptual
approaches for studying culture, organization, and work; rather, it is to present
numerous different ways of viewing the concepts, with the full awareness that these
are not the only ways. Each issue throughout this series is intended to help ideate ways
to enhance and improve empirical work, as well as to create, develop, and employ new
approaches in the realm of applied activities dealing with culture, organization, and
work. The aggregate of the authors’ works in this series will support the ultimate goal
of enhancing individuals’ cross-cultural competence in research and/or in practice.
The penultimate goal for this series of brief books, then, is to bring to light some
of the critical questions related to culture and its effect in the workplace. Bringing a
different focus in each volume on culture, organization, and/or work, the hope is to
distinguish pathways for the myriad reflections of culture in research on work,
personnel, and organizational psychology and behavior, and elucidate contributions
each path makes vís a vís the others.
Culture, organization, and work are envisioned as interacting concepts (see
Fig. 1.1). Culture influences, is influenced by, and interacts with the organization
and/or work performed. It is a macro concept, even though its impact is measured at
the level of individual performance. It is more complex than any one definition or
measurement can encompass, and for that reason flexible enough to assess in a way
that lends itself to individual research interests related to culture.
1 Introduction 3

Fig. 1.1 A model of the

independent and interactive
linkages between culture,
organization, and work
Culture

Organization
Work

The organization represents a meso-level construct and the immediate context in

which a person engages at work. An organization, as a structured entity, does so in
a specific context within the larger social-contextual milieu (societal culture). The
term organization is not meant to put parameters around an organized unit, but
rather we invite authors and readers to conceptualize organizations as institutions
that reinforce particular values, beliefs, practices, norms, assumptions, and rituals in
an effort to promote and give meaning to its (organizational) existence. Thinking of
an organization in this way necessitates the study of its culture as it evidences itself
in the use of physical spaces, division of labor and managerial roles, types of social
groups, and power and hierarchy structures (Porras and Robertson 1992).
Finally, the concept “work” refers to the immediate experience of an individual
who engages in work, as well as the activities that make up the behavior of work.
“Work” may be thought of as a micro-level concept, as it is studied at the level of
the individual. For the purposes of this series, work is viewed as a set of activities
that must be performed within a context that is influenced by societal culture,
organizational culture, and professional/occupational culture, and how well one
performs those activities is further influenced by individual differences, including
temperament, knowledge, skills, abilities, motivations, and other personal charac-
teristics. Work, as conceptualized here, encompasses the meaning people impose on
jobs and job titles, and the kinds of identities people form as a result of job titles,
professional/occupational cultures, organizational cultures, and societal cultures.
Societal and organizational cultures influence work, and work can in some
circumstances influence those cultures in turn (Kwantes and Dickson 2011). The
sizes of the three rings in Fig. 1.1 differ to illustrate unit-level differences, not the
difference in importance or magnitude of influence. In fact, in order of saliency,
predictors of employee behavior are most probably the work itself, then the orga-
nization, and finally the societal culture. However, it is important to emphasize that
all three also interact to influence behavior. Note, too, that there are aspects of
organization and aspects of work that influence each other without the influence
of culture, as well as aspects of each that independently fall outside the reach of
4 1 Introduction

culture. This reflects the position that while culture is important, its influence may
not always be discernable or detected through survey measurement or even
ethnographic evaluations.

References

Emmer, P. C., & Klooster, W. (1999). The Dutch Atlantic, 1600-1800 expansion without empire.
Itinerario, 23, 48–69. doi:10.1017/S0165115300024761.
Friedman, T. L. (2005). The world is flat: A brief history of the twenty-first century. New York:
Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Kwantes, C. T., & Dickson, M. W. (2011). Organizational culture in a societal context: Lessons
from GLOBE and beyond. In N. N. Ashkanasy, C. Wilderom, & M. F. Peterson (Eds.), The
handbook of organizational culture and climate (2nd ed., pp. 494–514). Newbury Park, CA:
Sage.
Porras, J. I., & Robertson, P. J. (1992). Organizational development: Theory, practice, and
research. In M. D. Dunnette & L. M. Hough (Eds.), Handbook of industrial and organizational
psychology (2nd ed., Vol. 3, pp. 719–822). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Press.
Chapter 2
Culture Across Disciplines

Culture is complex to define and yet implicitly known. The difficulty in defining
culture is evident by the myriad of ways people within and across disciplines (e.g.,
psychology, anthropology, and sociology) have attempted to define and opera-
tionalize it. The term “culture” has shifted in meaning from its early use, centuries
ago, to refer to agriculture to its current use in psychology as a collective set of
meanings, beliefs, and behavioral norms (Jahoda 2012). Despite this general
understanding of what culture is, a specific and agreed-upon definition by scholars
in the field remains elusive, and there are many criticisms of how culture as a
construct has been used (cf. Poortinga 2015). As Landis (1972) noted, “there have
been many definitions of culture. None are adequate, for how can one define that
which makes up almost the totality of human experience?” (p. 54). Given the
enormity of the construct, any attempt to operationalize culture will necessarily be
incomplete, but without such attempts it is not possible to understand the influences
of culture. Thus, culture is a concept that is a derivation of the agent’s point of
view: a condition, a process, a product, or any combination thereof.

2.1 Psychology

In psychology, researchers attempt to discover both universal (etic) and

culture-specific (emic) psychological principles (Segall et al. 1998). Typically,
cross-cultural psychologists search for etics whereas cultural psychologists search
for emics. For cross-cultural psychologists, culture is learned and bounded by a
group’s behavioral norms, values, beliefs, and symbols (Hofstede 1991). It is
believed that these culture-bound constructs can be used to understand and explain
similarities and differences in psychological processes across cultures (Triandis
1996) and that, in order to study similarities and differences, various psychological
methods for assessment can be employed, including qualitative (e.g., interviews),
quantitative research (e.g., surveys), and computational modeling.
© The Author(s) 2017 5
C.T. Kwantes and S. Glazer, Culture, Organizations, and Work,
Culture, Organizations, and Work, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-47662-9_2
6 2 Culture Across Disciplines

Cultural psychologists will use many of these same methods, and in addition
may engage in ethnographic and experimental approaches to examine the inter-
section between culture and cognition, focusing on how sociocultural practices
influence mental processes (Shweder 1991). The cultural focus deals with psy-
chological processes that implicitly or explicitly constitute cultural systems within
which members (or individuals) function (see Kroeber and Kluckholn 1952). The
foundational theory for this approach is situationalism, which asserts that “social
context creates potent forces producing or constraining behavior” (Ross and Nisbett
1991, p. 9). As such, culture results from contextual pressures, as well as inter-
nalized cultural values or beliefs that in turn affect how individuals interpret or
understand their experiences. Culture takes on “a life apart from the situations that
gave rise to them and can endure well beyond the demise of those situations” (Ross
and Nisbett 1991, p. 176).
The values and beliefs held by a group of individuals can neither be directly
assessed nor measured. Rather, a group’s values and beliefs are inferred on the basis
of group members’ actions that people label from their point of view (as observers)
or that researchers measure, usually using multiple items to operationalize a con-
struct. From the results of these measures, the existence and the relative strength of
values and beliefs are established.
Further, while specific behaviors may be observed, the reasons for those
behaviors are not necessarily accessible through traditional survey measurement of
values or beliefs. Researchers in India (Sinha et al. 2002) and Canada (Kwantes
et al. 2007a, b) used scenario-based methodology to examine values-based
behaviors and intentions. Specifically, respondents were given multiple scenarios
and asked to choose what action they would take in that circumstance, for example,
if a person has two job offers, one in her own town where her parents live, and a
better offer in a distant town, what should she do? The options reflected behaviors
consistent with values, behaviors incongruent with values, or a mix of the two.
Given the fact that individuals often endorsed behaviors that appeared to reflect one
value while at the same time agreeing with a contrary underlying motive for that
behavior suggests that merely measuring cultural values with a survey does not
necessarily provide information about behavioral choices.
Culture, then, may only be inferred, and its multifaceted and multilayered nature
reflects a great deal of complexity. In order to simplify or draw on cognitive
shortcuts to understand culture, much of the organizational theory and research in
Industrial and Organizational Psychology has focused on specific aspects of culture.
This reductionist approach has both positive and negative implications. Organizing
culture along categorical labels to describe groups of people who share some
similar backgrounds may help to understand antecedents or consequences of some
facets of culture, or to measure aspects of culture.
However, such labels also create barriers to a more inclusive understanding of
what culture is, and its effects on human behavior. As noted earlier, the connection
2.1 Psychology 7

between values and behavior is not always a strong one, meaning that values are not
always good predictors of behaviors. Fishbein and Ajzen (1975) indicated that
global, general values (such as those suggested by Hofstede 1980; Trompenaars and
Hampden-Turner 1998; Schwartz and Bilsky 1987) are typically poor predictors of
specific behavioral outcomes. The Social Axioms Survey was developed as a way
to capture culturally taught beliefs about how the world works, and reflects indi-
vidual expectancies about outcomes for specific behaviors (Leung et al. 2002), thus
allowing for a stronger ability to explain culture’s effect on behavior when com-
bined with values. Although social axioms are measured at the individual level,
they are generated through experiences and therefore reflect general cultural ten-
dencies or norms. For example, one social axiom is that of reward for application,
or the expectancy that increased layout of resources will result in increased rewards
or positive outcomes. A cultural context where hard work does result in desired
outcomes provides a setting to teach this belief in “how the world works” to its
individual members. Similarly, a cultural context in which hard work does not
result in outcomes that differ in any meaningful way from not working hard at all
does not “teach” this belief to its members. “…values and social beliefs are different
domains of discourse, as the correlations between these two constructs are generally
low or absent. …values …tap… self-aware motivational systems, and social
axioms … tap… conceptions of the social context within which an actor must
navigate her or his behavior in negotiating outcomes from the world” (Bond et al.
2004, p. 189). Thus beliefs in how the world works, or social axioms, can add
meaningful explanation for how culture affects behaviors (Leung and Bond 2008).
In contrast to psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists have generally
resisted the dimensional, or categorical, approach to studying culture and insisted
that the construct must be treated holistically (Jahoda and Krewer 1997). As a
result, these academic disciplines employ different methodological approaches to
understanding culture.

2.2 Anthropology

Anthropology, employing a phenomenological approach to studying culture,

investigates cultural experiences as expressed through the lived daily life of a group
of people (not individuals), investigating both current and past cultures (Boas 1928/
1962, p. 13). Cultural anthropology, which focuses on cultural variations in groups
of people, and cognitive anthropology, which studies shared knowledge and
transmission systems, are specializations within anthropology that are particularly
relevant to understanding culture.
Some anthropologists may apply a functionalist perspective, which emphasizes
the role of the sociocultural context as shaping cultural beliefs (including cosmo-
logical myths), values, or norms (see Malinowski 1922/1961). Other anthropolo-
gists may apply a structuralist perspective and study a culture’s systems of
embedded meaning or thought patterns (e.g., how various kinship systems produce
8 2 Culture Across Disciplines

different taboos; Geertz 1990). Data for anthropological inquiry are gathered
through fieldwork, whereby information is derived from observations and/or
gathered from informants’ descriptions of phenomena of culture or civilization
(Mead 1965; Radcliffe-Brown 1958), as well as through historical analysis, eth-
nology, interviews, content, and discourse analysis.
Cognitive anthropologists are particularly interested in understanding how cul-
ture shapes people’s experiences and their interpretations of events (Rubinstein
2003), and how culture bounds people’s expectations (D’Andrade 1982). In other
words, a major focus is the meaning created by the interplay between one’s social
constructions and one’s psychological states. Part of the meaning is derived from
cumulative life experiences and mental schemas provided by the culture (Strauss
and Quinn 1997). People’s experiences are accumulated through interactions within
social structures such as family, marketplace, political settings, and education
systems. Over time common meaning is imposed on the value and relevance of the
social structure, which can then serve to reinforce normative practices in how
people interact, what people know, or how reality is created (D’Andrade 1982).
Particularly important to understanding culture from these research perspectives
is the aspect of the traditional cultural anthropological approach to studying group
phenomena. Anthropologists will seek to view cultures as those on the inside of the
culture see them, taking into consideration the “…complex whole which includes
knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits
acquired by man as a member of society” (Tylor 1871/1924, p. 1).

2.3 Sociology

Sociology is the broad study of society and social activity, with society concep-
tualized as a complex whole with distinctive but interconnected parts. Social
relationships form a central theme of this discipline, with a focus on interpersonal
relationships, inter-group, inter-institutional level relationships, such as govern-
ments, as well as interactions between these relationships, such as the power that
institutions can exert over its citizens (Weber 1962). Scholars of sociology study
multiple layers of groups, including groups organized around religion, race or
ethnicity, job roles, gender, sex, etc., and assume that individuals shape and are
shaped by value systems and acceptable behavioral norms within subcultures
(Weber 1962). For sociologists, culture is not objective and cannot be quantified.
Sociological studies attempt to qualitatively and quantitatively describe society’s
influence on populations within a group setting.
Sociology, then, adds to our understanding of culture with its focus on groups,
their norms, shared expectations, beliefs, and ways of doing things. Cultures are
generally thought to develop as societies deal with the geography that the group
inhabits and the resources available there. Julian Steward (1972), for example,
suggests that the development of culture is inextricably linked with a group of
people’s adaptation to the environment. These adaptations, according to Steward,
2.3 Sociology 9

are functional in that they foster the survival of the group. Culture is maintained,
therefore, by members of a culture teaching newcomers (either by birth or by
immigration) the values, processes, and behaviors that have been perceived as
contributing to the group’s survival. “Different cultures are produced when indi-
viduals get together to live their lives differently” (Anderson 2010, p. 27).

2.4 Business

Not surprisingly, business disciplines focus on culture mainly at the organizational

level, that is, organizational culture, and at the level of the economy. Organizational
culture is viewed as developing from the ideas of institutionalism, or institutional
theory. Meyer and Rowan (1977) refer to “formal and informal organizations” and
point out that organizational behavior is determined in part by the dictates of the
organization, such as the specific work that must take place (e.g., accounting,
production, marketing, etc.; viz., the formal organization), as well as by relational
networks (the informal organization). In fact, they suggest that these relational
networks are key to understanding how day-to-day activities are coordinated and, in
turn, become part of the standard operating procedure of the organization. The
meanings that employees give to activities are important to understanding organi-
zational practices and are related to the cultures that organizations develop (Harris
1994).
Business disciplines also study culture from micro- and macro-economic points
of view. For example, a company wishing to expand its business to another country
may be motivated by economic gains. Analysts will identify business opportunities,
features of available human capital (e.g., potential employees’ education levels,
access to transportation), costs and laws associated with business development, and
competition in the area. For example, off-shoring call centers from the USA to India
was deemed an economically feasible way of maximizing profits given potential
employee education, payroll savings (for both day time and night time work), and
available technology infrastructure, such as making the costs of long-distance calls
virtually zero through computer-mediated communication services (Ellram et al.
2008).
The focus on culture from the business perspective adds to our understanding of
culture with its emphasis on the specific constraints that being a member of an
organization provides, and how those shared constraints result in specific shared
meanings. While organizations develop in response to an identified need, actors in
the environment place constraints and boundaries on organizations’ performance.
These constraints may include factors such as the legal milieu, industry, geo-
graphical location, or any combination of these. These environmental factors also
create parameters around who will be a part of an organization. From a cultural
perspective, despite movement of employees through its permeable boundaries, as
employees come and go, an organization’s culture tends to remain fairly stable over
time, because the values of its founders set a tone and the reason for an
10 2 Culture Across Disciplines

organization’s creation changes when there are major changes to environmental

factors, but less so on individual contributors who come and go. While individuals
can affect an organization’s culture, particularly when there are changes in top
leadership and typically a result of business pressure, the organizational culture may
not substantially change. The balance between the macro and the micro approaches
in business perspectives on culture provides insights into the many forces that can
potentially shape a culture.

2.5 Summary

Culture is such an integral part of human existence that it defies any single, simple
definition. Different disciplines have approached culture from different angles, and
at different levels, to explain the phenomena of interest to that particular discipline.
While this may necessitate isolating elements or layers of culture at times, it is
imperative to remember that this approach results in only a partial understanding of
culture. Culture as an individual phenomenon, that is, internalized cultural values,
beliefs, or practices, still exists in a social context, and therefore by definition
“culture at the individual level” operates within a context of “culture at the group
level.” Each discipline’s perspective on culture adds to the understanding of what
culture as a totality and as a holistic phenomenon is, and how it operates.

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Chapter 3
Toward an Operationalization of Culture

In his seminal book on culture, Hall (1974) noted that there are three fundamental
characteristics of culture: “it is not innate, but learned; the various facets of culture
are interrelated—you touch a culture in one place and everything else is affected; it
is shared and in effect defines the boundaries of different groups” (p. 16). Yet,
culture itself cannot be “touched” directly. What can be grasped are components of
culture, including infrastructure, practices, physical environments, and relationships
between humans or humans with nature. Hall goes on to say that culture affects
each and every aspect of human life, including
… personality, how people express themselves (including shows of emotion), the way they
think, how they move, how problems are solved, how their cities are planned and laid out,
how transportation systems functioned and are organized, as well as how economic and
government systems are put together and function (pp. 16–17).

There are at least two ways to treat culture in a theoretical or empirical context.
The first approach, similar to anthropologists and business anthropologists in par-
ticular, is one where culture is considered holistically, as a multiplicity of contextual
factors that cannot be easily parsed. This view takes the stance that culture cannot
be directly measured, as it is viewed as a complex system of interrelated factors
within a milieu (i.e., people, processes, activities, values, beliefs, structures, etc.).
Therefore, to understand culture, it is necessary to immerse oneself in the culture
and be able to recognize values, beliefs, and behavioral rules, how and when they
are prioritized.
The second approach is to focus on one particular aspect or a set of aspects of
culture and then measure those aspects with a standardized questionnaire, using
those scores to predict or some other variable(s) of interest. While providing a
means to look at specific relationships culture has with outcomes, such as behav-
iors, this particularistic approach reduces the explanatory power of culture by
restricting cultural explanations to one or a few cultural aspects that the researcher
believes to be relevant to the outcome of interest. It rarely takes into account that
each aspect of culture operates in conjunction with other aspects of culture (the

© The Author(s) 2017 13

C.T. Kwantes and S. Glazer, Culture, Organizations, and Work,
Culture, Organizations, and Work, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-47662-9_3
14 3 Toward an Operationalization of Culture

whole package is referred to as cultural syndromes; Triandis 1996). In other words,

this approach focuses on particular aspects of culture, but at the expense of a bigger
picture. These different methods result in different measurement concerns including
conceptualization, placement of culture in a nomological framework, levels of
analysis, and ultimately, an operationalization of culture.

3.1 A Macro View of Culture

Culture comprises meaningful symbols that characterize it, and a social system’s
culture should become apparent when assessing its members’ “intersubjective
reality” (Wan and Chiu 2009, p. 80) of those symbols. Individuals know the cul-
tural milieu in which they are embedded either implicitly, explicitly, or both. They
consciously or unconsciously choose whether or not to follow the cultural pro-
scriptions and prescriptions of that milieu as “the beliefs and values that people
generally believe to be shared in a culture are important guides to its members’
judgments and behaviors” (Chiu and Chao 2009, p. 460). Thus, “culture resides
neither completely external of individuals nor completely in the self-characteristics
of the culture. Part of culture resides in people’s assumptions about the cultural
milieu that they experience” (Wan and Chiu 2009, p. 89). High consistency of
individuals’ agreement on cultural manifestations within a social system would
therefore suggest widely shared meanings, i.e., intersubjective reality. However,
even inconsistency in how people characterize a culture teaches us about a culture.
For example, social systems can be characterized by how tight or loose they are
with respect to cultural norms, values, beliefs, and behaviors (Triandis and Gelfand
1998).
According to Gelfand et al. (2006), the tightness or looseness of a culture refers
to the extent to which norms are clear and consistently agreed upon, as well as the
degree of tolerance a given culture has for non-compliance with those norms. Tight
cultures tend to be rigid and have less tolerance for deviation from norms, whereas
loose cultures tend to be tolerant to non-compliance with norms. Uz (2015) explains
that threat to a culture’s survival will mobilize strict coordination and organization
in an effort to reduce ambiguities and conserve resources needed for survival. Tight
cultures tend to be traditional, repressive, agricultural, economically poor, and
endorse high sanctions for deviations, whereas loose cultures tend to be industri-
alized, globalized, liberal, urban, financially wealthy, democratic, and endorse
freedom of the press (Uz 2015).
While the study of culture is highly complicated, the study of culture’s conse-
quences on human affect, behavior, and cognition is even more complicated. It is
therefore critical to have a foundation for understanding culture and its influence on
human affect, behavior, and cognition. Situated meaning created by individuals’
construal of self and culture provides such a foundation. Taras et al. (2009)
3.1 A Macro View of Culture 15

provide a comprehensive review of different ways in which culture is quantified as

external, that is, pertaining to the context, and psychological, that is, pertaining to
the mind. The general idea behind situated meaning is that interpretations of
thoughts and actions that occur about a given event are governed by one’s point of
view of how social interactions are expected to occur in the situation where the
interaction occurs (Hong 2009). Thus, even if a person’s tendency is to make sense
of events from one cultural lens (e.g., using an independent self-construal), context
can shift that construal (e.g., to using an interdependent self-construal) if the context
and situation deem it necessary (Gardner et al. 1999).
At the cultural level of analysis, or the macro-level, overlapping and competing
cultural characteristics or elements influence how individuals feel, think, and
behave (Fischer et al. 2009; Hofstede 1980; House et al. 2004; Inglehart 1997;
Leung and Bond 2004; Schwartz 1999; Triandis 1995; Trompnaars and
Hampden-Turner 1998). Although individuals themselves might not uphold these
defining characteristics, these characteristics help shape individuals’ affects,
behaviors, and cognitions by virtue of the fact that they create the shared context
within which individuals must operate and function with others.
For example, the USA is often depicted as an individualistic culture, that is, a
society that establishes clear distinctions between self and others (Hofstede 1980,
2001). The individualistic characterization is not, however, an indication that all
people in the USA or of American cultural background perceive themselves as
unique from others. The characterization of a nation as individualistic is not the
same as the characterization of an individual construing himself or herself as
independent. This is similar to the ecological fallacy in assuming that because the
USA is a wealthy nation each individual in that nation is wealthy. It is therefore
important to make explicit the level of analysis that one is referring to when
referencing “culture.”

3.2 Approaching Culture

Some would say that culture is external to the individual (Hofstede 1980, 2001;
Schwartz 1994, 1999, 2009; Smith 2009; Smith et al. 2006), others say it is within
the person (Markus and Kitayama 1991; Shweder and Sullivan 1993), and yet
others say it is both external to the person and within the person (Wan and Chiu
2009). People function within culture and experience it through the values rein-
forced in their context, the beliefs people are expected to hold or personally hold,
the norms people are expected to follow, and the practices they perform.
Schwartz’s (2009) position is that culture is a latent construct and can only be
understood through variables that jointly approximate and create meaning for a
given social system. This perspective, then, suggests that the average of individuals’
values, beliefs, and behaviors does not explain culture, but rather these values,
beliefs, and behaviors are observed as a result of individuals’ responses to the
culture. Thus, individual values can vary greatly across individuals and those values
16 3 Toward an Operationalization of Culture

may be explained against a comprehensive understanding of a social system’s

cultural characteristics, including cultural values. For example, an individual’s
values for conformity or saving face can be seen as a result of a culture’s value for
modesty. However, not all people in a social system that encourages modesty will
conform and behave in ways that are consistent with that value. In such a case,
factors other than a cultural value of modesty would be used to interpret the
non-conforming individuals’ behaviors. In some circumstances, a person’s social
status or social role may influence her or his behavior more than a cultural value
(Bond 2013). Even in a culture that values modesty, a CEO may brag about his or
her accomplishments in an organization, thereby conforming to expectations related
to a social role rather than the cultural value.
The myriad of approaches to consider in the study of culture suggests that there
is no one best way for all research involving culture to be conducted. Ultimately,
what matters most is that researchers and practitioners clearly delineate and
explicate their particular approach to culture in any communication, so that other
researchers and practitioners are able to interpret and understand the perspective
chosen. Thus, researchers and practitioners are urged to conceptualize and opera-
tionalize their working definition and to provide a rationale for their approach.

3.3 Creating Frameworks to Study Culture: The

Nomological Network

Researchers who study culture in relation to organizations and work are challenged
to determine how to conceptualize culture, as well as where to place culture in a
theoretical framework. Borrowing from systems theory, in which there are inputs,
throughputs (i.e., processes), and outputs, it is plausible to consider culture as a
condition, a process, or even a product. Is culture a condition or antecedent variable
of other variables that would require culture to be measured in terms of some
approximation of culture, such as values and beliefs? In other words, does culture
yield consequences? Or, is culture that which is measured as a proxy for behavior or
performance, where culture is the result or the manifestation of some antecedents?
In other words, is culture the antecedent or the consequence? In short, where does
culture belong in a nomological network and framework?
There are several examples of culture as a direct antecedent to various outcomes
of interest. Culture has been studied as a direct antecedent to outcomes as diverse as
how individuals experience satisfaction at work (Kwantes 2010), how trust
develops in the workplace (Whitener et al. 2000), and the norms for how and when
emotions are expressed (Matsumoto et al. 2008).
Culture as a construct is also used as a moderator variable or an explanatory
variable. For example, Gelfand et al. (2013) examined the value of harmony to
explain differences in how Taiwanese or American negotiation teams performed as
a result of team size. Taiwanese team members performed more poorly when team
size increased, whereas U.S. team members performed better as team size
3.3 Creating Frameworks to Study Culture: The Nomological Network 17

increased. More specifically, Taiwanese team members refrained from being

competitive with their opponents as team size increased. Using country as a proxy
for culture, Gelfand et al. attributed the differences to the Taiwanese members’
needs to maintain harmony. Therefore, they concluded that to reduce chances of
creating discord, Taiwanese teams may fail in team negotiations.
There may be no definitive answer to the question, “Where does culture fit?”
With the variety of placements in the nomological net, the definition of culture, the
level of analysis, as well as the potential explanatory power of the construct must be
carefully thought through both to conduct research in culture, and to understand the
findings of that research.

3.4 Etic Versus Emic

Conceptualization and operationalization of culture is essential to understanding the

results of cross-cultural research. As noted above, cross-cultural research may
operate from an “etic” or an “emic” perspective, with an “etic” approach being a
search for universals in human behavior and an “emic” approach reflecting a search
for concepts and behaviors specific to a particular culture (Triandis 1994). The
predominant method for conducting research has been from an etic perspective
(Berry 1989). Researchers take a well-established theory from one cultural context
and test it in another cultural context, often presuming that these theories are
universal. For example, for many years researchers took Meyer and Allen’s (1991)
three-dimensional theory of organizational commitment and applied it to other
countries without considering whether the concept of organizational commitment or
its respective dimensions are even relevant in the societies in question (see
meta-analysis by Fischer and Mansell 2009). In contrast, following recommenda-
tions specified by Berry (1989) and Segall et al. (1998), Wasti (2003) conducted
both an imposed etic and an emic study by developing organizational commitment
items relevant to the Turkish culture, while also modifying established items from
Meyer et al. (1993). Her goal was to ensure that the Turkish sample could respond
to items that they would recognize as aspects of “organizational commitment.” Still,
there are drawbacks to the generalizability of that research method, as the emic
aspects of a measure might only be valid in that particular culture. Thus, inter-
preting findings in relation to other similar studies, but in different countries, may
become problematic.

3.5 Methodological and Measurement Challenges

The social system in which one operates provides a starting point from which to
craft a cultural framework (Kashima 2009) to explain why and how individuals
think, feel, and act. In other words, a given situation is not the reason for a given
18 3 Toward an Operationalization of Culture

effect, but it is quite likely that the meaning projected on to the situation yields a
culturally influenced effect (Oyserman and Sorensen 2009). That explanation does
not, however, mean that all individuals within a social system share meanings,
values, and behaviors that are characteristic of the culture as a whole, as individual
differences exist within the same cultural group. Therefore, researchers must be
very careful to ensure that methods and measurement tools they select are appro-
priate for the level and unit of analysis.
van de Vijver et al. (2010), as well as Schaffer and Riordan (2003), addresses
several major methodological and measurement challenges that arise in
cross-cultural research. These include sample equivalence, procedural equivalence,
material equivalence, measurement equivalence, functional equivalence, and
appropriate levels of analysis. When conducting cross-cultural research on
organization-related topics, researchers must first be aware of the challenges asso-
ciated with sample equivalence (i.e., similarities between different cultural samples).
For example, when educational and/or professional requirements for a particular job
in one country differ from those in another, or when in one cultural context a given
profession may be predominantly male versus female in another cultural context, the
supposedly same sample begins to yield uncontrollable biases. Second, procedural
equivalence, that is, how data will be collected must be carefully planned. Surveys
administered via a web application may engage a different kind of respondent (i.e.,
someone who is comfortable and able to use computer-based technology) from the
paper–pencil respondent or the interviewee respondent. If interviews are conducted,
one must be aware of the sex, status, and ethnicity of the interviewer and how those
may potentially interact with those characteristics of the interviewee. These factors
could have a strong effect on the quality and reliability of interview data.
Material equivalence is a third important feature to consider. It coincides with
procedural equivalence in that the researcher must consider if it is more appropriate
to employ instructions and materials in a single language (i.e., the same language
regardless of cultural context) or translated into the dominant language of the
respondents (Harzing et al. 2013). Will all respondents know the language of the
original materials equally well, or will individual respondents translate the materials
differently for themselves and thus invalidate the data? Likewise, the readability of
the materials is important to consider. This requires careful attention to linguistic
rules in different countries. Survey measurements must also consider cultural
implications of rating scale equivalence. Is spacing between ordinal ratings inter-
preted similarly or is the meaning of scale anchors perceived similarly? In other
words, does “somewhat” or “very” carry the same salience in all contexts repre-
sented in a given cross-cultural study?
When researchers begin to consider matters of measurement equivalence,
emphasis is often placed on translation issues. In particular, when assessing
translation issues, researchers are concerned with conceptual equivalence, func-
tional equivalence, and linguistic equivalence (Schaffer and Riordan 2003).
Conceptual (in)equivalence refers to the extent to which variables in one culture
might have different connotations in another culture. For example, the concept
“career woman” has a negative connotation in Israel and implies a woman who is
3.5 Methodological and Measurement Challenges 19

focused on self-promotion and selfishness. A career woman would unlikely choose

to have and raise children (Glazer 2002). In contrast, “career” carries a positive
connotation in the USA—thus a “career woman” tends to be thought of as someone
who is achievement-oriented, but not necessarily at the expense of having a family
(Etzion and Bailyn 1994).
An increasingly common method to assess whether or not measurement
equivalence exists in cross-cultural and cross-language research is differential item
functioning (DIF, see e.g., Holland and Wainer 1993). This method examines
differences in item functioning across groups and is based on the Rasch model to
check whether or not respondents are answering survey questions in the same
manner. If the probability of members of one group responding in a particular way
to a question is different than the probability of members of a different cultural
group, then measurement equivalence is called into question. More specifically, an
item may exhibit a difference in item performance if respondents from different
backgrounds, but similar underlying traits or abilities (e.g., librarians in different
countries), have different probabilities of answering the item correctly. Differences
that are detected may be indicative of bias. DIF is a particularly apt method to
assess whether or not existing measures that were developed in one cultural context
or language can be applied to a different cultural context or language. The greater
the DIF score, the greater the chances are that the items are understood differently.
Functional equivalence refers to the invariant purpose of a psychological or
behavioral variable across cultures. An example of functional equivalence might be
seen in practices people carry out that serve similar purposes in different cultural
contexts, such as job selection processes. In some countries, such as France,
graphology may be used as a personality assessment tool, whereas in other coun-
tries, such as the USA, a personality inventory may be administered. In this
example, the two approaches differ, but their purpose, to select the right applicant,
is the same. Finally, the manner in which questions are linguistically presented may
yield different responses. For example, “what do you think about…” is cognitively
phrased while “how do you feel about…” is affectively oriented (Schaffer and
Riordan 2003, p. 189). Care in how questions are translated to maintain the focus of
the question, in this case a cognitive or affective focus, is required in cross-cultural
research (Harkness 2003). Additionally, idiographic terms (i.e., terms that are
unique to a culture) and homographic terms (i.e., words or phrases that appear in
different cultures, but carry different meanings, e.g., “stress” in Hungarian would
easily translate to “stresz,” but it means “tension,” whereas in English, it could
mean demand, pressure, and/or tension; Glazer 2008) must be avoided in order to
truly understand the results of research.
Other methodological challenges that researchers face are distinguishing between
levels of analysis and between unit of analysis. As much of the data in cross-cultural
research necessarily come from individual respondents, the referent that is used in
asking questions as well as how individual responses are aggregated must always be
clarified. Asking individuals what their values are is a different question than asking
individuals what their culture values. Aggregating individual responses and
assuming that such an aggregate is representative of the culture at large is an
20 3 Toward an Operationalization of Culture

assumption that may or may not be warranted, as there is a clear distinction between
the cultural level of analysis and the individual level of analysis. Hofstede (1980)
cautions that interpreting findings assumed to be at the culture level of analysis, but
actually based on aggregations of responses at the individual level of analysis should
be undertaken cautiously, if at all, as this endeavor can constitute an ecological
fallacy. Based on this same reasoning, cultural level descriptors should not be
assumed to apply at the individual level. For example, an assertion that any specific
American is individualistic just because s/he belongs to the American culture would
be an ecological fallacy (Hofstede 1980) as a description of a culture is not the same
as a description of a person within a culture. Many theorists have noted that
dimensions that are valid at the individual level of analysis are not necessarily valid
at the group or societal level, nor are group-level dimensions necessarily valid at the
individual level (see, e.g., the classic article by Robinson 1950; as well as more
recent ones by Hofstede et al. 1993; Leung 1989). Examples of why the levels of
analysis issue is critical come from work with the Social Axioms Survey (Leung and
Bond 2008) and Schwartz’s (1994, 1999) values research.
Social axioms, at the individual level of analysis, refer to “generalized beliefs
about persons, the social and physical environment, or the spiritual world, and are
in the form of an assertion about the relationship between two entities or concepts”
(Leung et al. 2002, p. 289). Five social axioms emerged from the initial, individual
level of analysis. These social axioms were cynicism, social complexity, reward for
application, spirituality (later termed religiosity), and fate control. Bond et al.
(2004b) further validated the five dimensions in 41 countries, however when they
conducted a culture-level evaluation of the data they identified only two societal
level social axioms: social cynicism and dynamic externality. Similarly, Schwartz
(1994, 1999) showed that culture-level values do not necessarily match
individual-level values. In particular, at the individual level of analysis 10 value
types, and recently 19 value types, emerged (Schwartz 1992; Schwartz et al. 2012,
respectively), whereas at the culture level seven cultural value types have emerged
(Schwartz 1999). These findings highlight the importance of carefully delineating
which level of analysis is the appropriate level and consistently crafting methods
and methodologies appropriate to the chosen level of interest.

3.6 Identifying Cultural Signatures: Surface Probes

to Deep Dives

Schein (2004) portrays the concept of culture using the metaphor of an onion. At
the outermost layer, there are the visible, observable, physical, audible, touchable,
palatable artifacts, such as building structures, interpersonal communication pat-
terns, procedures to follow, noises in the environment, clothing textures, spices, and
even fumes. The next layer consists of values. The values help to explain the
principles that guide individual actions in a given culture. They explain why people
behave or create “things” as they do. For example, why are some vehicles more
3.6 Identifying Cultural Signatures: Surface Probes to Deep Dives 21

popular than others in some societies? Are the sounds some vehicles emit loud and
rough, whereas others are quiet and soft? What values does a society hold that
would reinforce loud-sounding vehicles? The last and innermost layer in this
metaphor reflects assumptions people hold to be true. It can often be thought of as
the beliefs that people have, which are taken to be absolute truths. For example, a
common adage in the United States, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease,” implies
that the person who is the most noticeable will get the most attention and will be the
most effective. In contrast, a common saying in Japan, “the nail that sticks up will
be hammered down,” means that an individual who stands out from the group will
be criticized until s/he conforms. Together, these three layers (artifacts, behaviors,
and assumptions) form a culture’s unique signatures.
Differences in cultural beliefs manifest themselves in many ways in the business
setting. In Japan employees tend to speak with a common voice or to follow the lead
of a superior, whereas in the USA, unique perspectives tend to be valued and
applauded. Another contrast between the USA and Japan is the Japanese emphasis
on harmony and consensual decision-making against the American emphasis on
overtly exploring alternative approaches. In negotiation meetings, it is common in
Japan for the most senior person to sit away from the center of the negotiating team,
and for the team to develop a consensus that is then reported by a more junior team
member who sits in the center of the table. In contrast, in the United States it is more
common for the head of a negotiating delegation to be the point person and carry out
the negotiations, listening to additional feedback when and if deemed necessary.
In another example, the notion of speed over quality is evident in many aspects
of American culture. This value might explain, in part, why there are fast-food
restaurants on the corners of most busy American street intersections. “Speed over
quality” may be further evident in the expediency by which U.S. managers like to
make decisions (Glazer and Karpati 2014). Managers will often take in as much
information as possible, but within a certain time frame and then escalate the
importance of making a decision at the conclusion of that time frame. In contrast,
“quality over speed” is a belief or an assumption that drives the restaurant industry
in France. Granted, fast-food restaurants are visible throughout major French cities,
but they are not on every corner of major street intersections. And, in contrast to a
utilitarian atmosphere often found in the United States, fast food restaurants in
France tend to be decorated beautifully, with comfortable seating areas in order to
provide a relaxing atmosphere in which people may enjoy their time at the
restaurant. This “quality over speed” belief is also observed in the way French
engage in decision-making (Schramm-Nielsen 2001). Specifically, before rendering
a decision, French decision-makers will take time to fully vet all possible alternative
solutions and evaluate whether a particular decision would be the correct one. They
will not make a snap decision, but rather they approach decision-making with
careful analysis.
In order to understand a culture, therefore, one first identifies artifacts. The
challenge is then to understand how and why (i.e., values and beliefs) the artifacts
came to be. While cultural characteristics are the combination of beliefs influencing
values, which in turn influence artifacts, so do artifacts modify values, which in turn
Another random document with
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418
“So art, whether it be painting or sculpture, poetry or music,
has no other object than to brush aside the utilitarian symbols,
the conventional and socially accepted generalities, in short,
everything that veils reality from us, in order to bring us face to
face with reality itself” (Laughter, p. 157). It is true that if we
read further on this page, and elsewhere in Bergson, we will be
able to see that there is for him in art and in the spiritual life a
kind of intelligence and knowledge. But it is difficult to work out
an expression or a characterisation of this intelligence and this
knowledge. “Art,” he says, “is only a more direct vision of
reality.” And again: “Realism is in the work when idealism is in
the soul, and it is only through ideality that we can resume
contact with reality” (ibid.).
419
It is only fair to Bergson to remember that he is himself aware
of the appearances of this dualism in his writings, that he
apologises as it were for them, intending the distinction to be,
not absolute, but relative. “Let us say at the outset that the
distinctions we are going to make will be too sharply drawn,
just because we wish to define in instinct what is instinctive,
and in intelligence what is intelligent, whereas all concrete
instinct is mingled with intelligence, as all real intelligence is
penetrated by instinct. Moreover [this is quite an important
expression of Bergson’s objection to the old “faculty”
psychology], neither intelligence nor instinct lends itself to rigid
definition; they are tendencies and not things. Also it must not
be forgotten that ... we are considering intelligence and instinct
as going out of life which deposits them along its course”
(Creative Evolution, p. 143).
420
He talks in the Creative Evolution of a “real time” and a “pure
duration” of a real duration that “bites” into things and leaves
on them the mark of its tooth, of a “ceaseless upspringing of
something new,” of “our progress in pure duration,” or a
“movement which creates at once the intellectuality of mind
and the materiality of things” (p. 217). I have no hesitation in
saying that all this is unthinkable to me, and that it might
 indeed be criticised by Rationalism as inconsistent with our
highest and most real view of things.
421
He admits himself that “If our analysis is correct, it is
consciousness, or rather supra-consciousness that is at the
origin of life” (Creative Evolution, p. 275).
422
“Now, if the same kind of action is going on everywhere,
whether it is that which is striving to remake itself, I simply
express this probable similitude when I speak of a centre from
which worlds shoot out as rockets in a fireworks display—
provided, however, that I do not present [there is a great idea
here, a true piece of ‘Kantianism’] this centre as a thing, but as
a continuity of shooting out. God thus defined has nothing of
the already made. He is unceasing life, action, freedom.
Creation so conceived is not a mystery; we experience it in
ourselves when we act freely” (Creative Evolution, p. 262).
423
See p. 155, note 1.
424
It is somewhat difficult, and it is not necessary for our
purposes, to explain what might be meant by the “Idealism” of
Bergson—at least in the sense of a cosmology, a theory of the
“real.” It is claimed for him, and he claims for himself that he is
in a sense both an “idealist” and a “realist,” believing at once
(1) that matter is an “abstraction” (an unreality), and (2) that
there is more in matter than the qualities revealed by our
perceptions. [We must remember that he objects to the idea of
qualities in things in the old static sense. “There are no things;
there are only actions.”] What we might mean by his initial
idealism is the following: “Matter, in our view, is an aggregate
of images. And by ‘image’ we mean [Matter and Memory, the
Introduction] a certain existence which is more than that which
the idealist calls a representation, but less than that which the
realist calls a thing—an existence placed half-way between the
‘thing’ and the ‘representation.’ This conception of matter is
simply that of common sense.” ... “For common sense, then,
the object exists in itself, and, on the other hand, the object is
 in itself pictorial, as we perceive it: image it is, but a self-
existing image.” Now, this very idea of a “self-existing image”
implies to me the whole idealism of philosophy, and Bergson is
not free of it. And, of course, as we have surely seen, his
“creative-evolution” philosophy is a stupendous piece of
idealism, but an idealism moreover to which the science of the
day is also inclining.
425
There is so much that is positive and valuable in his teaching,
that he is but little affected by formal criticism.
426
Cf. “We have now enumerated a few of the essential features
of human intelligence. But we have hitherto considered the
individual in isolation, without taking account of social life. In
reality man is a being who lives in society. If it be true [even]
that the human intellect aims at fabrication, we must add that,
for that as well as other purposes, it is associated with other
intellects. Now it is difficult to imagine a society whose
members do not communicate by signs,” etc. etc. (Creative
Evolution, p. 166). Indeed all readers of Bergson know that he
is constantly making use of the social factor and of “co-
operation” by way of accounting for the general advance of
mankind. It may be appropriate in this same connexion to cite
the magnificent passage towards the close of Creative
Evolution in which he rises to the very heights of the idea
[Schopenhauer and Hartmann had it before him, and also
before the socialists and the collectivists] of humanity’s being
possibly able to surmount even the greatest of the obstacles
that beset it in its onward path: “As the smallest grain of dust
[Creative Evolution, pp. 285–6] is bound up with our entire
solar system, drawn along with it in that undivided movement
of descent which is materiality itself, so all organised beings,
from the humblest to the highest, ... do but evidence a single
impulsion, the inverse of the movement of matter, and in itself
indivisible. All the living hold together, and all yield to the same
tremendous push. The animal takes its stand on the plant, man
bestrides animality, and the whole of humanity, in space and in
time, is one immense army galloping beside and before and
 behind each of us in an overwhelming charge to beat down
every resistance and clear the most formidable obstacles,
perhaps even death.”
427
Cf. p. 160 and p. 262.
428
He comes in sight of some of them, as he often does of so
many things. “It is as if a vague and formless being, whom we
may call, as we will [C.E., p. 281], man or superman, had
sought to realise himself, and had succeeded only by
abandoning a part of himself on the way. The losses are
represented by the rest of the animal world, and even by the
vegetable world, at least in what these have that is positive
and above the accidents of evolution.”
429
From what has been said in this chapter about Bergson, and
from the remarks that were made in the second chapter about
Renouvier and the French Critical Philosophy, the reader may
perhaps be willing to admit that our Anglo-American
Transcendental philosophy would perhaps not have been so
abstract and so rationalistic had it devoted more attention, than
it has evidently given, to some of the more representative
French thinkers of the nineteenth century.
430
We must remember that nowhere in his writings does Bergson
claim any great originality for his many illuminative points of
view. He is at once far too much of a catholic scholar (in the
matter of the history of philosophy, say), and far too much of a
scientist (a man in living touch with the realities and the
theories of the science of the day) for this. His findings about
life and mind are the outcome of a broad study of the
considerations of science and of history and of criticism. By
way, for example, of a quotation from a scientific work upon
biology that seems to me to reveal some apparent basis in fact
(as seen by naturalists) for the “creative evolution” upon which
Bergson bases his philosophy, I append the following: “We
have gone far enough to see that the development of an
organism from an egg is a truly wonderful process. We need
 but go back again and look at the marvellous simplicity of the
egg to be convinced of it. Not only do cells differentiate, but
cell-groups act together like well-drilled battalions, cleaving
apart here, fusing together there, forming protective coverings
or communicating channels, apparently creating out of nothing,
a whole set of nutritive and reproductive organs, all in orderly
and progressive sequence, producing in the end that orderly
disposed cell aggregate, that individual life unit which we know
as an earthworm. Although the forces involved are beyond our
ken, the grosser processes are evident” (Needham, General
Biology, p. 175; italics mine). Of course it is evident from his
books that Bergson does not take much account of such
difficult facts and topics as the mistakes of instinct, etc. And I
have just spoken of his optimistic avoidance of some of the
deeper problems of the moral and spiritual life of man.
431
“This amounts to saying that the theory of knowledge and
theory of life seem to us inseparable [Creative Evolution, p.
xiii.; italics Bergson’s]. A theory of life that is not accompanied
by a criticism of knowledge is obliged to accept, as they stand,
the concepts which the understanding puts at its disposal: it
can but enclose the facts, willing or not, in pre-existing frames
which it regards as ultimate. It thus obtains a symbolism which
is convenient, perhaps even necessary to positive science, but
not a direct vision of its object.”
432
I more than agree with Bergson that our whole modern
philosophy since Descartes has been unduly influenced by
physics and mathematics. And I deplore the fact that the “New
Realism” which has come upon us by way of a reaction (see p.
53) from the subjectivism of Pragmatism, should be travelling
apparently in this backward direction—away, to say the very
least, from some of the things clearly seen even by biologists
and psychologists. See p. 144.
433
As I have indicated in my Preface, I am certainly the last
person in the world to affect to disparage the importance of the
thin end of the wedge of Critical Idealism introduced into the
English-speaking world by Green and the Cairds, and their first
followers (like the writers in the old Seth-Haldane, Essays on
Philosophical Criticism). Their theory of knowledge, or
“epistemology,” was simply everything to the impoverished
condition of our philosophy at the time, but, as Bergson points
out, it still left many of us [the fault perhaps was our own, to
some extent] in the position of “taking” the scientific reading of
the world as so far true, and of thinking that we had done well
in philosophy when we simply partly “transformed” it. The really
important thing was to see with this epistemology that the
scientific reading of the world is not in any sense initial “fact”
for philosophy.
 INDEX

Absolutism, 13, chap. viii.

Action, 91 n., 105, chap. iv.
Activity-Experience, 105, 109
Alexander, S., 163
Anti-Intellectualism, 73, 239
Appearance and Reality, 84
Arcesilaus, 155
Aristotle, 155
Armstrong (Prof.), 49 n.
Attention, 119
Augustine, 107
Avenarius, 41

Bain, 120
Baldwin, J. M., 156, 110 n.
Bawden (Prof.), 17, 85
Belief, 64, 65, 229 n., 251
Bergson, 72, 104, 126
Berthelot, 117
Blondel, 32, 34
Bosanquet, B., 110, 185, chap. viii.
Bourdeau, 26, 133 n., 193
Boyce-Gibson (Prof.), 154
Bradley, F. H., 74, 75, 91
Browning, R., 117
Brunschvig, 30
Bryce, James, 193
Butler, 119

Caird, E., 112

Carlyle, 125
Chesterton, W. K., 117, 156
Cohen, 48 n.
Common-sense Beliefs, 7
Common-sense Philosophy, 117
Comte, 120
Contemplation, 96
Cornford, 184
Curtis (Prof. M. M.), 22

Dawes-Hicks (Prof.), 163

De Maistre, 170
Descartes, 66, 121
Desjardins, P., 37
Dewey, J., 16, 17, 37, 62, 147, 173, 175
Du Bois Reymond, 110
Duncan (Prof.), 122
Duns Scotus, 119

Eleutheropulos, 43
Elliot, H. S. R., 66
Epicureanism, 118
Eucken, 39, 154
Ewald (Dr.), 44, 48

Flournoy, 180
Fouillée, 37 n.
Fraser, A. C., 112
Futurism, 26

Geddes, P., 123

Goethe, 195, 215
Gordon, A., 152–3
Green, T. H., 199
Gregory (Prof.), 24

Inge (Dean), 29, 31

Invention, 192

James, W., 3, 4, 24, 35, 39, 45, 50, 65, 135, 182, 192 n.
Jerusalem, W., 43
Joachim, 56
Jones, Sir H., 56
Joseph, 57

Kant, 119, 121, 247

Kant and Hegel, 183
Knox (Capt.), 15

Lalande, A., 29, 33, 164

Lankester (Sir R.), 167
Lecky, 70
Leighton (Prof.), 133
Le Roy, 31
Locke, 61, 119
Lovejoy (Prof.), 49

MacEachran (Prof.), 49 n.
Mach, 40
Mackenzie, J. S., 112
Maeterlinck, 90
Mallarmé, 214
Marett, 160
Mastermann, G. F. G., 118
M’Dougall, 104
McTaggart, J. M. E., 92
Meaning, 21, 51, 149
Mellone, 57
Merz, 157
Münsterberg, 46

Natorp, 48
Needham (Prof.), 101, 260
New Realism, 53
Nietzsche, 118, 139, 151

Ostwald, 40, 41

Pace (Prof.), 187

Paleyism, 247
Papini, 24, 135
Pascal, 119
Pater, W., 124
Peirce, 3, 22
Perry (Prof.), 53, 185
Perry, Bliss, 171, 179
Plato, 57, 61, 121, 150, 151
Pluralism, 87
Poincaré, 30
Pradines, 36 n.
Pragmatism, and American philosophy, 49, chap. vii.;
and British thought, 54;
and French thought, 28;
and German thought, 38;
and Italian thought, 23;
 a democratic doctrine, 105;
its ethics, 136;
its pluralism, 162;
its sociological character, 164, 262;
its theory of knowledge, 131;
its theory of truth, 127;
its theory of reality, 135
Pratt (Prof.), 51, 127

Radical Empiricism, 85
Renan, 110
Renouvier, 29
Rey, 31
Riley, W., 26 n.
Ritzsche, 45
Royce, J., 54
Russell, B., 61, 66 n., 169

Santayana, 171, 181, 190

Schellwien, 44
Schiller, F. C. S., 12, 14, 16, 132, 133
Schinz, 192 n.
Schopenhauer, 28, 119, 151, 260
Seth, James, 14 n.
Seth-Haldane, 260
Shaw, Bernard, 124
Sidgwick, H., 56, 118, 119 n., 140
Sigwart, 42
Simmel, 44
Spencer, 41 n.
Starbuck, 28
Stoicism, 118
Stout, G. F., 55
Subjective Idealism, 259

Taylor, A. E., 57, 77, 78, 199 n., 219

Teleology, 88, 198
Tertullian, 119
Theism, 215 n.
Themistius, 155
Thompson, J. H., 144
Titchener, 157
Truth, 59, 81, 163
Tufts, 147
Tyndall, 110

Vaihinger, 39

Walker, L. J., 31
Ward, James, 30, 55, 143, 162
Wells, H. G., 123
Westermarck, 145
Windelband, 46, 150
Wollaston, 224

Printed by R. & R. Clark, Limited, Edinburgh.

 Transcriber’s Notes
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not changed.
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correct page references. Index references to footnotes link to
the pages containing the footnote anchors, not to the
footnotes themselves.
Some page links in the Footnotes may be erroneous, as
they actually reference other books.
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