© 2013 Cengage Learning
Outline
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Types of Cross-Cultural Research
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Method validation studies
Indigenous cultural studies
Cross-cultural comparisons
Types of Cross-Cultural Comparisons
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Exploratory vs. hypothesis testing
Contextual factors
Structure vs. level oriented
Individual vs. ecological (cultural) level
Outline (cont'd.)
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Designing Cross-Cultural Comparative
Research
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Getting the right research question
Designs that establish linkages between culture and
individual mental processes and behaviors
Bias and equivalence
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Conceptual bias
Method bias
Measurement bias
Response bias
Interpretational bias
TYPES OF CROSS-CULTURAL
RESEARCH
Method Validation Studies
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Validity: how accurately does tool measure what
it is supposed to measure?
 Reliability: how consistent is measurement?
 Cannot take scale or measure developed and
validated in one culture and use it in another
 Cross-cultural validation studies:
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Tests equivalence of psychological measures
 Important to conduct before cross-cultural
comparisons
Indigenous Cultural Studies
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Rich descriptions of complex theoretical models
of culture
Predict and explain cultural differences
Psychological processes and behavior can be
understood within cultural milieu
To understand behavior requires in-depth
analysis of cultural systems
Roots in anthropology
Cross-Cultural Comparisons
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Compare cultures on some psychological
variable of interest
Serve as backbone of cross-cultural research
Most prevalent type of cross-cultural study
Different types of cross-cultural studies are
prominent at different times
Own set of methodological issues have an
impact on quality
TYPES OF CROSS-CULTURAL
COMPARISONS
Exploratory vs. Hypothesis Testing
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Exploratory studies: examine existence of crosscultural similarities and differences
Hypothesis-testing: examine why cultural
differences may exist
Strength of exploratory studies: broad scope for
identifying similarities and differences
Weakness of exploratory studies: limited
capability to address causes of differences
Hypothesis-testing leads to more substantial
contributions to theory development
Contextual Factors
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Characteristics of participants or their cultures
Involves any variable that can explain observed
cross-cultural differences
Enhances validity and helps rule out influence of
biases and inequivalence
Evaluation of contextual factor influence can
help to (dis)confirm their role in accounting for
cultural differences observed
Hypothesis testing studies generally need to
include contextual variables
Structure vs. Level Oriented
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Structure: comparisons of constructs, structures,
or relationships with other constructs
 Level oriented: comparisons of scores
 Structure-oriented studies focus on relationships
among variables
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Attempt to identify similarities and differences in these
relations across cultures
Level-oriented studies ask whether people of
different cultures have different mean levels of
different variables
Individual vs. Ecological
(Cultural) Level
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Individual-level studies: individual participants
provide data and are unit of analysis
Ecological- or cultural-level studies: countries or
cultures are units of analysis
Most-well-known ecological-level study of
culture is Hofstede's seminal work
Multi-level studies: use data from at least two
levels
Statistical techniques examine relationship of
data
DESIGNING CROSS-CULTURAL
COMPARATIVE RESEARCH
Getting the Right Research Question
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Research design starts with comprehensive
knowledge of literature
Understanding why study is to be conducted
leads to questions about how to conduct it
Major challenge: how to isolate source of
cultural differences
Identify active cultural (vs. noncultural)
ingredients that produce those differences
Researchers need to pay attention to many
theoretical and empirical issues
Designs that Establish Linkages
between Culture and Individual
Mental Processes and Behaviors
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Unpackaging studies
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Includes measurement of a variable
Assesses contents of culture thought to produce
differences of the variable
Utilizes context variables
Individual-level measures of culture
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Assess variable on individual level thought to be
product of culture
Individualism versus collectivism
Designs that Establish Linkages
between Culture and Individual Mental
Processes and Behaviors (cont'd.)
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Self-construal scales
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Personality
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Measures independence and interdependence on
individual level
Cultural differences may be a product of different
levels of personality traits in each culture
Cultural practices
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Includes child-rearing practices, nature of
interpersonal relationships, or cultural worldviews
Designs that Establish Linkages
between Culture and Individual Mental
Processes and Behaviors (cont'd.)
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Experiments
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Priming studies
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Studies in which researchers create conditions to
establish cause-effect relationships
Experimentally manipulating mindsets of participants
and measuring resulting changes in behavior
Behavioral studies
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Manipulations of environments and observation of
changes in behavior as function of environments
BIAS AND EQUIVALENCE
Bias and Equivalence
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Bias: differences that do not have exactly the
same meaning within and across cultures
Equivalence: similarity in conceptual meaning
and empirical method between cultures
Bias refers to a state of non-equivalence, and
equivalence refers to a state of no bias
If bias exists in cross-cultural comparative study,
comparison loses its meaning
Important to understand many aspects of
studies that may be culturally biased
Method Bias
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Sampling bias
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Linguistic bias
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Are samples appropriate representatives of culture?
Are research protocols semantically equivalent across
languages?
Procedural bias
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Are procedures, environments, and settings
equivalent across cultures?
Measurement Bias
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Degree to which measures used to collect data
in different cultures are equally valid and reliable
 Linguistic equivalence alone does not guarantee
measurement equivalence
 Different cultures may conceptually define a
construct differently and/or measure it differently
 Psychometric equivalence
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Measurement equivalence is on a statistical level
Factor analysis
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Creates groups of items on a questionnaire
Response Bias
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Systematic tendency to respond in certain way
to items or scales
If response biases exist, it is very difficult to
compare data between cultures
Socially desirable responding: tendency to give
answers that make oneself look good
Acquiescence bias: tendency to agree rather
than disagree with items on questionnaires
Extreme response bias: tendency to use ends of
scale regardless of item content
Response Bias (cont'd.)
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Reference group effect: people make implicit
social comparisons with others when making
ratings on scales
 In past, response biases viewed as
methodological artifacts that need to be
controlled
 Today, growing view that response bias is
important part of cultural influence on data
Interpretational Bias
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Analyzing data
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Researchers often use inferential statistics
 Statistics compare differences observed between
groups to differences occurring due to chance
 “Proof by negation of the opposite“
 In past, “statistically significant” results were
interpreted as meaningful
 Statistical differences between means does not give
indication of meaningfulness
Dealing with Nonequivalent Data
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Poortinga (1989):
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Preclude comparison
 Reduce the nonequivalence in the data
 Interpret the nonequivalence
 Ignore the nonequivalence
Interpreting Findings
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Culture can bias ways researchers interpret their
findings
 Data from hypothesis-testing are correlational
 Cultural attribution fallacies: claim that betweengroup differences are cultural without empirical
justification
 Linkage studies address this problem