1. Culture and Social Behaviours Part II Interpersonal relationships

2. Introduction Human beings are in between of being a separate individual or connecting to one another. This lecture will highlight how people in different cultures behave differently or similarly in social contexts.

3. Overview Ingroup/outgroup relationship Interpersonal attraction Love and intercultural marriages Attribution Aggression Conformity, Compliance, Obedience, Competition

4. Differences between ingroups and out- groups Ingroups More of Familiarity, intimacy, trust Bonded by common goals Outgroups Hostility, aggression, aloofness, superiority No bonds with outsiders Note: The dichotomy of ingroups/outgroups helps to understand people’s social behaviour across cultures.

5. Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships  Structure and format of in/outgroup relationships – People of different cultures may have different view on who should be called outgroups/ingroups. North America – IG/OG membership is stable/unconditional. In Asian cultures – amongst businessmen – business competitors are outgroups. Outgroups may be ingroups when there is a need to do that (normally because of sharing the same goal(s)). E.g. Malaysian students overseas look at themselves as “ Malaysians” when in a prestigious badminton tournament in England.

6. Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships People of different cultures perceive relationships differently. Forgas & Bond (1985) - HongKong and Australia participants were asked abt 27 social episodes related to student life – to group the episodes into similarities, to label the groupings, and identify subgroups with the most similar episodes within those groups.

7. Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships Results from multi-dimensional scaling showed that: a. Hong Kong – 4 dimensions: power distance, task vs social orientation, evaluation, involvement b. Australia – 4 dimensions: Competitiveness, social vs task oriented, involvement, self- confidence Results indicated cultural values in the two countries, i.e.: a.strong communal feelings, collectivism, social usefulness, acceptance of authority, in HK student,and b.competitiveness, self-confidence, freedom and hedonistic in Australian students.

8. In Zimbabwe culture, social support provides intimacy; in American culture social support provides affection Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships

9. The meaning of IG/OG relationships - the use of cultural dimension of individualism vs collectivism helps to understand IG/OG r/ship In Individualistic cultures, people often belong to multiple ingroups (music, sports, church, football season) Whilst in Collectivistic cultures, people often belong to fewer ingroups.

10. Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships The diff. between I and C cultures in I/O membership influences the degree of commitment people have to different groups. In C – greater commitment, as people identify more with the groups they belong to (being part of themselves)  More cohesion/ more harmony to the group, but more stress to individuals as to conform to group norms. In I –less commitment to the groups they attend, move easily from one group to another  less cohesion/less dependency to the group, more room for individual uniqueness.

11. Consequences of self-ingroup relationships in I and C cultures: C– more sacrifices of individual goals, needs and desires for the benefit for all. Cooperation is much appreciated and realised. I – fewer sacrifices of individual goals, needs and desire, no fear of group disharmony, expressive of own feelings or attitude, uniqueness, treat outgroup persons equally, Cultural differences In/Outgroup relationships

12. Interpersonal attractions Definition of attractiveness is very subjective, and a relative concept. Japanese – large eyes, small mouth, small chin Korean – large eyes, small and high nose, thin and small faces  maturity/likability Attractive faces to Koreans are more socially + intellectually competent, better adjusted, less modest and sexually interesting people. Most cultures relate attractive people (facial) with positive attitudes/characteristics Studies are being messed up by the over-presentation of the beauty in men n women in media.

13. Love and interpersonal attraction in the USA  Proximity influences attraction  Although people are attracted to physical properties of a person (normally in romantic relationship) but there are other considerations. – Matching hypothesis – Reciprocity hypothesis – Similarity hypothesis

14. Love and interpersonal attraction in the USA Hartfield & Berscheid’s (1988) theory of love: Passionate Companiate Sternberg (1988) – similar theory, but companiate love is seen as intimacy and commitment.

15. Intercultural marriages Individualistic cultures – love as essential in establishment of a marriage Arranged marriages occur mostly in collectivistic societies such as, India, Pakistan, Arab continents, Japan and China Intracultural vs intercultural marriages – challenges lie in child rearing practice, identity of children

16. Attributions Atrributions = inferences people make about the causes of events and their own or others’ behaviours. Covariation model by Kelley (1967) – assumes that people consider 3 types of info when making attributions, i.e. consistency, distinctiveness, consensus. Behaviours with high consistencies but low distinctiveness or consensus  internal attributions Behaviours with high in the 3 aspects  external attributions

17. Fundamental attribution error = a bias toward explaining the behaviour of others using internal attributions, but explaining our own behaviours using external attributions. Self-serving bias = tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal factors and one’s failures to situational factors. Defensive attributions = tendency to blame victims for their misfortune Attributions

18. Attributions styles across cultures differs in academic and non-academic areas Attributions

19. Aggression Some people being called “fierce people” – (aggressive tendency) Aggression would be more acceptable in relationships where status and power are unequal (cultures with high power distance).

20. Conformity, Compliance, Obedience and Cooperation Conformity = yielding to real or imagined social pressure. Compliance = yielding to social pressure in one’s public behaviour Obedience = a form of compliance that occur when people follow direct commands, usually from someone in a position of authority Cooperation = people’s ability to work together toward common goals.