CROSS-CULTURAL ANALYSIS

Cross-cultural analysis is also known as comparative analysis. A method central to many social sciences involving the comparative examination of differing cultures.

Cross-cultural analysis is crucial for distinguishing universal aspects of human culture and social organization from those which are particular to individual societies.

By observing the range of variation in culture and organization between societies a deeper understanding of individual development, family, gender, crime control and social inequality etc. can be developed.

The Theory of Human Development: A Cross-Cultural Analysis 
Christian Welzel, University of Bremen
Ronald Inglehart, University of Michigan
Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin
ABSTRACT: This article demonstrates that socioeconomic development, cultural change and democratization constitute a coherent syndrome of social progress- a syndrome whose common focus has not been properly specified by classical modernization theory. We specify this syndrome as Human Development, arguing that its three components have a common focus on broadening human choice. Socioeconomic development broadens peoples' choice by increasing their individual resources; cultural change gives rise to self-expression values that let people seek for broader choice; and democratization institutionalizes effective rights, giving human choice a legal basis. Analysis of data from the World Values Surveys demonstrates: (1) that the syndrome of individual resources, self-expression values and effective rights is universal in its presence across nations, regions and cultural zones; (2) that this Human Development syndrome is shaped by a causal effect from individual resources and self-expression values on effective rights; and (3) that this effect operates through its impact on elite integrity, as the factor which makes given rights effective. - repositories.cdlib.org/csd/02-01/

Sense of Competence: A Cross-Cultural Analysis for Managerial Application 
Uma Sekaran, Francis R. Wagner 
Group & Organization Management, Vol. 5, No. 3, 340-352 (1980) DOI: 10.1177/105960118000500307 © 1980 SAGE Publications
This study focuses on developing a simple model of human behavior at work with a sense-of-competence concept. A sample of 545 white-collar employees in service organizations in the United States and 1,123 white- collar employees of banks in India indicates that the experienced mean ingfulness of jobs is the single most important contributor to a sense of competence for employees in both cultures. Because sense of competence has been highly correlated to job performance and the quality of work life, this finding has practical implications for organizations and calls for a redirection of managerial efforts. - gom.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/5/3/340

Toward a Transnational and Cross-Cultural Analysis of Family Violence 
Issues and Recommendations 
Marie-Marthe Cousineau, University of Montréal 
Gilles Rondeau, University of Montréal 
Violence Against Women, Vol. 10, No. 8, 935-949 (2004) DOI: 10.1177/1077801204266456 © 2004 SAGE Publications
This article summarizes issues and priorities for prevalence surveys and intervention studies raised by researchers and practitioners at an international symposium on transnational and cross-cultural research on family violence, convened near Montréal, Canada, in June 2003. The major conceptual questions were What is meant by transnational or cross-cultural research? and What should be included in the definition of family violence? The major methodological questions were What level of standardization of measurement is needed to reliably make comparisons across nations and cultures? and Should the measures be of "acts" of abuse and violence or the "effects" of those acts? - vaw.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/10/8/935

Sociologyindex

Sociology Books 2008

Entailment Theory and Method: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of the Sexual Division of Labor 
Douglas R. White, University of Minnesota 
Michael L. Burton, Stanford University 
Lilyan A. Brudner, University of California 
Cross-Cultural Research, Vol. 12, No. 1, 1-24 (1977) DOI: 10.1177/106939717701200101 © 1977 SAGE Publications
The purpose of this paper is to explore a more precise form for theoretical propositions in certain types of cross-cultural problems and to develop and explicate an accompanying statistical method. An inductive application of the method of entailment analysis has led us to formulate a new and power ful theory of the sexual division of labor. - ccr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/12/1/1

A Cross-Cultural Study of Mexican American, Black American, and White American Women at a Large Urban University 
Shirley B. Zeff, University of Houston 
Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, Vol. 4, No. 2, 245-261 (1982) DOI: 10.1177/07399863820042007 © 1982 SAGE Publications
Abstract: Despite increased emphasis in recent literature on the psychology of women, there are few cross-cultural empirical studies of specific ethnic groups of women. This study examines comparatively how 279 Mexican American, black American, and white American college female freshmen in Houston, Texas, perceive themselves according to masculine, feminine, and androgynous measurements. The study investigates the perceived sex-role differences among the three groups of women according to the Bem Sex Role Inventory. While there were some significant differences among the three groups, the groups were more similar than different with regard to sex-role categories. The greatest percentage of each of the three ethnic/racial groups was androgynous. The findings suggest that social class is more influential than ethnicity/race in determining sex-role behavior of women. As people move upward in social class, they tend to be more homogeneous. - hjb.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/4/2/245

A cross-cultural analysis of ‘motivation for eating’ as a potential factor in the emergence of global obesity: Japan and the United States 
Steven R. Hawks, Hala N. Madanat, Ray M. Merrill, Marylynn B. Goudy and Takeo Miyagawa
Health Promotion International, Vol. 18, No. 2, 153-162, June 2003 © Oxford University Press 2003 
This exploratory study compared motivation for eating between individuals from two different cultures that have moved through the nutrition transition at different rates and to different degrees. The analysis was based on a convenience sample of 1218 participants aged 18 years attending colleges in the US and Japan. The Motivation for Eating Scale (MFES) was used to evaluate different motivations for eating by nation and gender. The MFES consists of 12 items classified into three subscales: emotional, physical and environmental eating. The questionnaire used in the study also included responses about participants’ motivation to lose weight, frequency of dieting, presence of previous or existing eating disorders, and frequency of exercise. Results showed no significant differences in the three MFES subscales for men in the US and Japan. For women, however, significant differences were seen for all three subscales. Women in the US were more likely to initiate eating for emotional reasons, while women in Japan were more likely to eat for physical or environmental reasons. Women and men in the US were more likely than the Japanese respondents to eat in response to watching TV or movies. These results suggest that there are national differences in the cultural environment that may impact individual motivations for eating. As such, various cultural perceptions of food should be considered in attempts to understand more fully the mechanics of the nutrition transition as it operates within a given country. By extension, public health policies and health promotion initiatives that are designed to limit the negative impacts of the nutrition transition may benefit from a greater understanding of the larger role that cultural perceptions of food may play in influencing individual motivations for eating. - heapro.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/18/2/153

Embedding the Truth - A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Objectivity and Television Coverage of the Iraq War 
Sean Aday, School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University, seanaday@gwu.edu 
Steven Livingston, School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University 
Maeve Hebert, Hart Research 
The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics, Vol. 10, No. 1, 3-21 (2005) DOI: 10.1177/1081180X05275727 © 2005 The President and Fellows of Harvard College
This article reports on a cross-cultural analysis of television coverage of the 2003 Iraq War that seeks to assess and understand the dimensions of objectivity in the news during wartime. A total of 1,820 stories on five American networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News Channel [FNC]) and on the Arab satellite channel Al Jazeera were included in the study. The study assessed bias on two levels:tone of individual stories and the macro-level portrait of the war offered by each network. Results showed that at the story level, the overwhelming number of stories broadcast by Al Jazeera and the American networks other than FNC were balanced. Yet the data also revealed a strong bias in support of the American-led war effort at FNC and important differences in how the various networks covered the war. Also, broadcasters showed a war devoid of blood, dissent, and diplomacy, focusing instead on a sanitized version of combat. Overall, the study found evidence that the news norm of objectivity is defined in large part by culture and ideology more than events, as the norm would imply. The study also explored in detail the coverage of embedded reporters to assess their objectivity and compare their coverage to other types of reporters, especially "unilaterals" with whom they shared the battlefield. - hij.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/10/1/3

The Determinants of Motivation for Urban Aboriginal Students 
A Cross-Cultural Analysis 
Dennis M. McInerney, University of Western Sydney 
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 21, No. 4, 474-495 (1990) DOI: 10.1177/0022022190214005 © 1990 SAGE Publications
As part of a larger study into the psychological determinants of motivation of urban Aboriginal school students, the Triandis model of social behavior was used to examine a range of variables considered important in influencing behavior. A comparative study, utilizing multiple regression analysis, was made of the responses of 496 Aboriginal students, 487 migrant students, and 1,172 Anglo students to the Behavioural Intentions Questionnaire. The study demonstrates the cross-cultural relevance and usefulness of the Triandis model. Major findings suggest that of the components of the Triandis model, personal normative beliefs and affect toward the act are the most salient predictors of intention for the three groups studied. Furthermore, although they vary in their relative importance, the consistency of the predictors across the three groups strongly suggests that the same cognitive motivational systems are influencing the intentions to continue with or leave school expressed by Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students. Further study of both the facilitating conditions that may assist inhibit the development of motivation to continue with school and the effect of "habit" on decision making needs to be completed to explain why Aboriginal students drop out of school earlier than non-Aboriginal students. - jcc.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/21/4/474

On the Empirical Identification of Dimensions for Cross-Cultural Comparisons 
Kwok Leung, Michael Harris Bond, Chinese University of Hong Kong 
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 20, No. 2, 133-151 (1989) DOI: 10.1177/0022022189202002 © 1989 SAGE Publications
In cross-cultural psychology a major goal is to identify dimensions of culture. For this purpose, the cross-cultural analysis (referred to as ecological analysis by Hofstede, 1980) is often used. Two methodological difficulties associated with this method are discussed, and their solution is proposed. A method intended to identify universal dimensions of individual difference, the pancultural analysis, is likely to produce results similar to those obtained in a cross-cultural analysis and hence is unable to achieve its purpose of identifying individual dimensions. A new procedure, based on a within-culture standardization procedure, is introduced for this purpose. A case study of the differences in the results produced by the cross-cultural and the new analyses is then used as a springboard for a further discussion of Shweder's(1973) between-within issue. The theoretical meaning of cultural and individual dimensions is also discussed. - jcc.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/20/2/133

A Cross-Cultural Analysis of International Print Advertising: The Case of the U.S.A., Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan
Bob D. Cutler, Rajshekhar Javalgi, L. Craig Foltin, Martin J. Hornyak, D. Steven White, (Cleveland State University)
Abstract: This paper investigates print advertising of the U.S. and the Pacific Rim countries of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. The study empirically analyzes whether components of print advertisements are similar or dissimilar among the four countries identified. This research offers valuable information and insight to international advertising practitioners and marketing academicians regarding the potential for regional standardization of advertising campaigns. - ideas.repec.org/a/maj/ancoec/v9y1994i2p55-62.html

Cross-Cultural Analysis of Social Competence and Behavior Problems in Preschoolers
Peter LaFreniere, Department of Psychology, University of Maine, USA
Nobuo Masataka, Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University, Japan
Marina Butovskaya, Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia
Qin Chen, The Department of Education, Beijing Normal University, China
Maria Auxiliadora Dessen, Institute of Psychology, University of Brasilia, Brazil
Klaus Atwanger, Susanne Schreiner
Ludwig Boltzman Institute for Urban Ethology, University of Vienna, Austria
Rosario Montirosso, Alessandra Frigerio
Scientific Institute "E. Medea", Italy
Early Education and Development 2002, Vol. 13, No. 2, Pages 201-220 (doi:10.1207/s15566935eed1302_6)
Abstract: A multi-national study using the Social Competence and Behavior Evaluation Inventory (SCBE-30) was conducted to investigate preschool children's social and emotional development across cultures. A total of 4,640 children from eight participating countries, including Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, Italy, Japan, Russia, and the United States were evaluated by their preschool teachers. The main objective of the study was to validate the SCBE-30 in each country and build a cross-cultural data set for the investigation of universals, as well as cultural differences, in the development of preschool children's social competence and the frequency and type of their behavioral problems. Results provide a clear case for the structural equivalence of the SCBE-30 across all samples, for universals in the structure of early social behavior, and possibly some differences that may be attributed to culture. The pattern of gender differences found in North American samples was found to generalize across cultural contexts as preschool boys were universally reported to be significantly more aggressive and viewed as less socially competent than girls. Age differences were also found in all eight samples reflecting increasing competence in older children, however age trends in the prevalence of behavior problems were culture specific. 

A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Adult-Child Proxemics in Relation to the Plowman-Protector Complex 
A Preliminary Study
Wade C. Mackey, University of Virginia 
Cross-Cultural Research, Vol. 16, No. 3-4, 187-223 (1981) DOI: 10.1177/106939718101600301 © 1981 SAGE Publications
Cross-cultural analyses have documented linkages between sub sistence economy, socialization pressure, and personality type. Here I extend the sequence to include proxemic behaviors between adults and children. Proxemic data were gathered from eleven cultures; prox emic relationships between men and children varied predictably with variations in other societal components. As the reliance upon the male's superior strength in handling large animals increased and as the ethnic heterogeneity of a community increased, the less equal was his asso ciation patterns toward boys and girls. When the reliance of a com munity upon plowmen or herders was low and the community was ethnically homogeneous, the men associated with children with greater egalitarianism. The woman-child dyad was relatively independent both of the community's reliance upon plowmen and of the level of ethnic homogeneity. However, the woman-child dyad was more likely to as sociate with another woman (rather than with a man) when the re liance upon plowmen/herders and the index of ethnic heterogeneity were both increased. - ccr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/16/3-4/187

A cross-cultural analysis of the effectiveness of the Learning Organization model in school contexts 
Authors: Seyyed Babak Alavi; John McCormick
Source: The International Journal of Educational Management, Volume 18, Number 7, 2004, pp. 408-416(9)
Abstract: It has been argued that some management theories and models may not be universal and are based on some cultural assumptions. It is argued in this paper that the effectiveness of applying the Learning Organization (LO) model in school contexts across different countries may be associated with cultural differences such as individualism, collectivism, power distance, and future orientation. The implementation of elements of the LO model such as systems thinking, managing mental models, team learning, and developing shared visions, may face some difficulties in some cultures. This paper develops some theoretical propositions for further empirical investigations. - ingentaconnect.com

Cross-Cultural Analysis for Conceptual Understanding: English and Spanish Perspectives 
Keville Frederickson, RN; EdD; FAAN, Public University of Nuevo Leon, School of Nursing, Mexico 
Valentina Rivas Acuña, ME, Independent Judarz University of Tobasco, Public Unversity of Nuevo Leon, Mexico 
Martha Whetsell, RN; PhD, Endicott College, Mexico City, Mexico 
Peggy Tallier, RN; EdD, Lehman College, Department of Nursing, New York 
Nursing Science Quarterly, Vol. 18, No. 4, 286-292 (2005) © 2005 SAGE Publications
Abstract: Culture and primary language provides the context for understanding between the patient and the nurse and therefore is part of the foundation for nursing care. Knowledge development in nursing is predicated on mutual understanding and interpretation of language. Concept development has been identified as one of the approaches to the development of nursing knowledge. Since the process of concept analysis is based on understanding a phenomenon through language and experiences, this process is culture-bound and language-specific. The purpose of this column is to discuss the value of interviews with people from two different cultures resulting in an attempt to develop nursing knowledge with international relevance. An example of an analysis of a concept, worry, is provided, and the effects of culture and language on this nursing concept are discussed. The analysis was the result of collaboration among nurses from Mexico and the United States of America. - nsq.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/18/4/286-a

The Experiencing and Remembering of Well-Being: A Cross-Cultural Analysis 
Shigehiro Oishi, University of Minnesota, soishi@tc.umn.edu 
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 28, No. 10, 1398-1406 (2002) DOI: 10.1177/014616702236871 © 2002 Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.
Abstract: Four studies were conducted to examine cultural differences in specific and global reports of well-being. The first two studies were designed to determine whether cultural differences in emotional experiences would emerge at the time of actual experience or at the time of retrospective judgments, using a daily diary and an experience sampling method. Using more controlled methods, Studies 3 and 4 examined the memory, conscious weighting, and nonconscious weighting hypotheses. The results indicate that although there were no cultural differences in online experiences of well-being, European Americans reported a higher degree of well-being than did Asians in retrospective reports. Studies 3 and 4 also indicate that these cultural differences were not due to explicit memory for emotional events or conscious weighting of positive versus negative information. Rather, the cultural difference in retrospective reports of well-being appears to be due to nonconscious weighting of positive versus negative information. - psp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/10/1398

Meanings of Basic Values for Women and Men: A Cross-Cultural Analysis 
Naomi Struch, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, naomiS@jdc.org.il 
Shalom H. Schwartz, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, msshasch@mscc.huji.ac.il 
Willem A. van der Kloot, Leiden University 
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 28, No. 1, 16-28 (2002) DOI: 10.1177/0146167202281002 © 2002 Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.
Do men and women construe basic values in the same way? The authors investigate possible gender differences in value meaning at three levels: 2 dimensions that organize value systems, 10 motivationally distinct values, and 45 value items. They assess differences across and within diverse cultures and perform multidimensional scaling analysis (MDS) and Procrustes analyses on responses to a value survey by 11,244 respondents in eight cultural regions (Chinese East Asia, Eastern Europe, Finland, France, Israel, Japan, Latin America, and the United States). Statistical fit indices and inspection of graphic representations reveal neither cross-culturally consistent gender effects on value meaning nor Gender x Culture interactions. The implications of these findings for theories of gender effects and for the cross-cultural study of gender differences in value importance are discussed. - psp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/1/16

Sex Role Identity among College Students: A Cross-Cultural Analysis 
Brunilda De Leon, University of Massachusetts, Amherst 
Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, Vol. 15, No. 4, 476-489 (1993) DOI: 10.1177/07399863930154003 © 1993 SAGE Publications
This study compared sex role identity of male andfemale college students (N = 763) from four ethnicdracial groups: 203 Puerto Ricans in Puerto Rico (PR-PR) (F = 126; M = 77); 197 Puerto Ricans in the United States (PR-US) (F = 124; M = 73); 198 White-American (Anglo) students (F = 105; M = 93); and 170Black-American students (Blacks) (F = 80; M = 90) using the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI). The majority (51.4%) of males andfemales of the total sample studied were classified as androgynous, indicating high degrees of both masculine and feminine traits. Women of the four ethnic/racial groups were similar with regard to their scores on the feminine scale but differed on the masculine scale, with Blackwomen scoring highest, Anglo women lowest, and Puerto Rican women with intermediate scores. Males from the group were not significantly different from each other on the masculine scale of the BSRI whereas on the feminine scale, Puerto Rican men in Puerto Rico and in the United States scored higher on the femininity scale than did Anglos and Blacks. - hjb.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/15/4/476

Hoyt Edge and Luh Ketut Suryani
A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Volition
Abstract: Western philosophy has emphasized the concept of will (or volition), viewing it as the agent through which we affect the world. That same tradition has put emphasis on an individualist, atomistic concept of the self. In a related vein, cross-cultural psychologists have distinguished between individualist and collectivist cultures, with Western cultures, especially the U.S., being put into the former category, while most non-Euro-American cultures are placed in the latter one.
We delve deeper into the individualist/collectivist distinction by examining the concept of volition, trying to determine whether it is a cross-cultural concept or if it systematically changes according to whether the culture expresses an individualist or relational concept of self. Since the concept of autonomy is related to the concepts of self and of volition, we also question whether it also changes, depending on the culture. In the end, we argue that the concepts of self, volition, and autonomy form a family of concepts, which are systematically different in an individualist and in a collectivist culture.
Our work is based on empirical research gathered by us in Bali and in the U.S. using a survey questionnaire. We found that American and Balinese responses suggested a cross-cultural component of volition, focusing on the ability to take initiative and to persist in action. On the other hand, we found decidedly cultural responses in their views of volition, and these correspond with their different ideas of self. In particular, the Balinese respond that they employ more secondary control, in which they try to conform to the world, while Americans show more primary control, in which one attempts to conform the world to one’s own wishes. Likewise, both cultures respond that autonomy is fundamental to them, but the concept seems to be understood differently, relating to their concepts of self and volitional control. - cah.ucf.edu

A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Academic Dishonesty in High School Economics Classrooms 
PAUL W. GRIMES, Mississippi State University - College of Business and Industry 
Abstract: High school students in six transitional economies, Belarus, Croatia, Kyrgyzstan, Lithuania, Russia, and Ukraine, along with students in the U.S, were surveyed about academic cheating. Regardless of geographic location, a substantial majority of all students reported that they had personally cheated on an exam or course assignment. In general, however, the percentages of students who reported that they had cheated and that they would assist others to cheat were higher in the transitional economies than in the U.S. A bivariate probit model was estimated to determine the factors which contribute to the probability of cheating. The results indicated that the most consistently significant determinants of cheating behavior were personal beliefs about the ethics and social acceptability of cheating and various attributes of the classroom environment. With the exceptions of Lithuania and Ukraine, students in each transitional economy had a higher probability of cheating relative to students in the U.S., ceteris paribus. The relative differences ranged from 8.9 percent for Belarus up to 17.1 percent for Croatia. For Russia, the difference was a relatively high 15.4 percent. These and other results suggests that researchers must be extremely careful in making cross-national comparisons of student outcomes. - papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=410721

Cross-cultural Variation in Professional Genres: A Comparative Study of Book Blurbs
Sujata Surinder Kathpalia, Nanyang Technological University, School of Mechanical and Production Engineering, Nangyang Avenue, Singapore 2263
Abstract: Although cross-cultural variation in spoken interaction has been dealt with extensively in discourse studies, very little research has been reported in the case of academic and professional written genres. The importance of this work is highlighted by the findings that writers from different cultures organize and develop ideas differently in expository writing tasks (Hinds, 1990) and that professional genres like business letters (The Geok Suan, 1986; Bhatia and Tay, 1987), job applications (Bhatia, 1989) and some legal genres (Bhatia, 1993) are sensitive to socio-cultural constraints. In order to gain a better understanding of the role played by socio-cultural factors in shaping a genre, the present paper examines, through a genre-based comparison, the cross-cultural differences between book blurbs of international publishers and local Singapore-based publishers. It is hoped that such a study will demonstrate the fact that genres are socio-culturally dependent communicative events and their success, in part, depends upon their pragmatic value in a specific business/professional environment. An attempt will also be made to relate the findings of this analysis to the dual and conflicting notions of 'linguistic creativity' on the one hand and 'linguistic orthodoxy' on the other. It is hoped that a comparative study of this nature will sensitize researchers/teachers to the cultural factors that are responsible for constraining/shaping genres in particular socio-cultural contexts. - blackwell-synergy.com

Values and Life Styles in Urban Asia: A Cross-Cultural Analysis and Sourcebook Based on the AsiaBarometer Survey of 2003, edited by Takashi Inoguchi, Miguel Basáñez, Akihiko Tanaka and Timur Dadabaev. Mexico City: Siglo XXI, 2005, 503 pp. + CD-ROM, $45.00 (ISBN 9-682-32564-1) 
Kawato Akio, Development Bank of Japan - ssjj.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/jyl016v1
Social Science Japan Journal, doi:10.1093/ssjj/jyl016 - July 18, 2006. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo

Cross-cultural analysis of longevity among Swedish and American elders: the role of social networks in the Gothenburg and Missouri longitudinal studies compared. 
Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics, Volume 28, Issue 2, Pages 131-148 - B. Eriksson - linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0167494398001356

Competitive Sport and Sport Success in the Olympic Games: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Value Systems 
Paavo Seppänen, Department of Sociology, University of Helsinki, Franzeninkatu 13, 0050 Helsinki, Finland 
International Review for the Sociology of Sport, Vol. 24, No. 4, 275-282 (1989) DOI: 10.1177/101269028902400401 © 1989 International Sociology of Sport Association and SAGE Publications
Any culture provides activities which can be identified as a kind of play, game, contest or sport. Equally obvious is the fact that the types of play, games and sport as well as the emphasis put on competition vary greatly from time to time and society to society. For a sociologist the variation is a "why". 
Numerous studies suggest that particular kinds of games and plays are more characteristic than some others of any culture. Similarly it is obvious that the variation, the emphasis put on competition and success in modern sport is based on cultural values and social order. 
The records of medal winners of all the Olympic Games since 1896 suggest that sports achievements and sports success are highly characteristic of Western civilization, which, in the wider sense of the word, covers all the societies whose culture is primarily based on Hellenic-Roman heritage on the one hand and Judaic-Christianity on the other. 
An essential element in Western culture explaining high sports achievements is considered to be a more or less fundamental belief in progress - not only in sports but also in science, technology and economy. The variation of achievements within Western culture is thought to be due to varying nuances of values in various branches of Western heritage and the type of liberties allowed by the existing social order. - irs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/24/4/275

Cross-cultural Analysis of Academic Writing: Insights from Two Studies
Christiane Donahue, University of Maine Farmington and THEODILE
Abstract: While the writing that students do in their university studies is the active subject of research interest in many countries, this writing differs widely across cultural contexts. What methods of analysis might be most useful for researchers who seek to understand university students’ writing across different cultural contexts without slipping into reductive depictions or fixed “feature catalogues” of the various cultural iterations of this writing? 
The proposed session will present highlights from two studies I have conducted, one of the writing of 300 French and United States students at the threshold to university writing, and the other of thirty students across two years of university writing in various disciplines. Both studies show that students’ texts at this stage reveal a transfer of social knowledge and a development of general discursive strategies used to negotiate new settings and new knowledge, far more than an acquisition or demonstration of specific features of kinds of writing. 
The method used for both studies offers us a way to think about the theoretical and practical issues in any cross-cultural, cross-institutional, or even cross-disciplinary project. It involves a preliminary quantitative approach, tracking linguistic features in students’ texts, including modalities of person, forms of sentence construction, isotopes of meaning, or deixis (terms to be explained in the presentation). That quantitative analysis orients a qualitative reading of the texts in order to understand why the identified features may have surfaced for readers and what other textual movements are at work, exploring the texts’ "reprises-modifications" (the ways each text used available language and meaning to create a new text) by pointing to subject positionings, complex coherence devices, intertextualities, and forms of originality. The studies concluded that in most cases what the texts shared, socially and discursively, was more striking than what differed. 
The methodology to be presented draws on French literary theory, discourse analysis, and critical literacy theory (as developed in US composition theory and UK academic literacies theory) to create an analytic meta-frame. The presenter will explain the theoretical concepts supporting this meta-frame which allows us to be consistent in methodology while staying open to cultural and situational differences as they arise. - webhost.ua.ac.be

Postmaterialism, Control Beliefs and Prejudice: A Cross-Cultural Analysis. 
Authors: Nyquist, Linda; And Others 
Abstract: This study analyzed responses to members of different outgroups or persons of another nationality, race, religion, culture, and social class in formerly West and East Germany and in the United States. These analyses support the position that a person's general values, specifically materialism or postmaterialsim, and general beliefs concerning control issues are related to the degree of prejudice shown. Cross-cultural research contributes to understanding of the underlying dynamics of prejudice. In the first step of this analysis, the psychological significance of the postmaterialism dimension is explored by demonstrating its relationship with Rokeach's Terminal Value survey and with general control beliefs. In the second step, the relationship between postmaterialism, control beliefs, and prejudiced reactions towards out group members is investigated. The role of cross-cultural research in studies of prejudiced responses is discussed. The study tries to make the case for considering the postmaterialistic value dimension in social psychological research. Postmaterialism is related to other values and general beliefs, and as such is quite relevant when understanding how a certain worldview shapes a person's outlook on life and reactions. Postmaterialism seems a worthwhile variable when considering prejudiced reactions. Not only does it relate to the level of prejudice, but it also opens a new avenue for studying prejudice by considering the relevance of the context in which it occurs. This study advocates opening up research on prejudiced reactions to include different targets of prejudice and to consider how different cultures relate to members of the same outgroup. - eric.ed.gov

Female Allies and Female Power - a Cross-Cultural Analysis
Yanca, C., Bobbi Low. "Female Allies and Female Power - a Cross-Cultural Analysis." Evolution and Human Behavior, 25 (1): 9-23. 2004. 
Abstract: Societies in which women have substantial control of resources and hold powerful political positions are relatively rare. Among the many circumstances in which women are likely to have resource control and/or political authority, polygyny is not an obvious candidate. However, women's lives are highly variable across polygynous societies. We hypothesized that within polygynous societies, women will have greater resource control and political activity when they have female allies; furthermore, that ecological factors influence women's access to such allies. We examined statistical associations among measures of ecological factors, the presence of female allies, and female power. The results of multiple regression analyses of ethnographic materials demonstrate that, cross culturally, ecological and sociocultural factors interact so that polygynously married women have more resource control and power when they are geographically close to their kin and have sisters as cowives. Additional statistical associations reveal how ecological factors moderate women's access to potential allies, which in turn are associated with resource control, female power/authority, and prevalence of negative attitudes about appropriate female behavior. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. - psc.isr.umich.edu/pubs/abs.html?ID=2388

A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Websites from High-Context Cultures and Low-Context Cultures 
Elizabeth Würtz, Department of Design, Communication and Media, IT University Copenhagen 
Abstract: The aim of this study is to explore and identify the strategies used by High-Context cultures in utilizing the Internet—a largely Low-Context medium—for communication and marketing purposes. It is hypothesized that individuals in High-Context cultures are more likely to adopt the visual effects offered by the Internet to convey their messages efficiently than their Low-Context counterparts. How might High-Context cultures make the most of the potentials offered by the Internet generation of today? Assuming that visual communication is a high priority in the design of High-Context websites, how do the visual methods used on websites vary according to the communication styles in different cultures? Using Hall's High- and Low-Context dimensions as the main parameters, an exploratory analysis of McDonald's websites identified five different strategies by which visual communication is used to support High-Context communication traits. - jcmc.indiana.edu/vol11/issue1/wuertz.html

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