CULTURAL DIFFERENCES
There is now strong evidence that people in non-Western cultures do not make the same kinds of attributions as people in Western individualistic societies. The fundamental attribution error, which was originally thought to be a universal cognitive bias, is notfound in collectivist cultures. Instead, many non-Western people place less emphasis on internal dispositional explanations, and more emphasis on external and situational explanations (Shweder & Bourne, 1982). Miller (1984) was among the first social psychologists to suggest that such differences arise from different cultural representations of the person that are learned during social development, rather than from cognitive and perceptual factors. Western notions of the person are predominantly individualistic, emphasizing the central importance and autonomy of the person, whereas non- Western notions tend to be holistic, stressing the interdependence between the person and their social relationships, role obligations and situational norms.
Miller (1994) conducted a cross-cultural study to compare the attributions made for prosocial and deviant behaviours by a sample of Americans and Indian Hindus of three different age groups (eight, eleven and fifteen years) and an adult group with a mean age of 40. Miller found that the older Americans made significantly more dispositional attributions than the older Hindus, and Hindus made significantly more situational attributions. There were few significant differences between the American and Hindu children aged eight and eleven. But Miller found a significant linear age increase in dispositional attributions among Americans, and a similar linear age increase in situational attributions for the Indian sample (figure 17.13). It therefore appears that the FAE is very culture specific, and the cognitive and perceptual explanations originally advanced for the FAE need to be reconsidered in light of Miller’s findings. Moscovici and Hewstone (1983) proposed that attributions are not only cognitive, but also social and cultural phenomena that are based on social representations – consensually shared knowledge, beliefs and meaning systems that are learned and socially communicated through language (Moscovici, 1984). Every society has its own stock of common sense and culturally agreed explanations for a wide range of phenomena, such as health and illness, success and failure, wealth and poverty, prosocial and deviant behaviour. People do not necessarily engage in an exhaustive cognitive analysis to explain events around them, as some of the early models of attribution suggest (Kelley, 1967). Instead, they draw on socially shared and readily culturally available explanations.
There is now strong evidence that people in non-Western cultures do not make the same kinds of attributions as people in Western individualistic societies. The fundamental attribution error, which was originally thought to be a universal cognitive bias, is notfound in collectivist cultures. Instead, many non-Western people place less emphasis on internal dispositional explanations, and more emphasis on external and situational explanations (Shweder & Bourne, 1982). Miller (1984) was among the first social psychologists to suggest that such differences arise from different cultural representations of the person that are learned during social development, rather than from cognitive and perceptual factors. Western notions of the person are predominantly individualistic, emphasizing the central importance and autonomy of the person, whereas non- Western notions tend to be holistic, stressing the interdependence between the person and their social relationships, role obligations and situational norms.
Miller (1994) conducted a cross-cultural study to compare the attributions made for prosocial and deviant behaviours by a sample of Americans and Indian Hindus of three different age groups (eight, eleven and fifteen years) and an adult group with a mean age of 40. Miller found that the older Americans made significantly more dispositional attributions than the older Hindus, and Hindus made significantly more situational attributions. There were few significant differences between the American and Hindu children aged eight and eleven. But Miller found a significant linear age increase in dispositional attributions among Americans, and a similar linear age increase in situational attributions for the Indian sample (figure 17.13). It therefore appears that the FAE is very culture specific, and the cognitive and perceptual explanations originally advanced for the FAE need to be reconsidered in light of Miller’s findings. Moscovici and Hewstone (1983) proposed that attributions are not only cognitive, but also social and cultural phenomena that are based on social representations – consensually shared knowledge, beliefs and meaning systems that are learned and socially communicated through language (Moscovici, 1984). Every society has its own stock of common sense and culturally agreed explanations for a wide range of phenomena, such as health and illness, success and failure, wealth and poverty, prosocial and deviant behaviour. People do not necessarily engage in an exhaustive cognitive analysis to explain events around them, as some of the early models of attribution suggest (Kelley, 1967). Instead, they draw on socially shared and readily culturally available explanations.
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