Culture, gender and self–close‐other(s) connectedness in Canadian and Chinese samples

Abstract

AbstractFounded upon the theories of Independent–Interdependent Self‐Construal and I–C, the main goal of this study was to test, via an adapted IOS Scale, whether Anglo‐Canadians were more independent than Mainland Chinese in construing their relationship with family members and friends. Strong cultural differences were found in self–family connectedness, but not in self–friends connectedness. Chinese were closer to their family members than Canadians, but Canadians were as close to their friends as Chinese. In both samples, gender difference was found in self–friends connectedness, but not in self–family connectedness. In the Canadian sample, females were closer to their friends than males, while in the Chinese sample, males were closer to their friends than females. In conclusion, this study contributes to the field in three ways. First, the finding that Canadians are as connected as Chinese to their close friends unprecedentedly contests one fundamental assumption of the theories of independent‐interdependent self‐construal (Markus & Kitayama, 1991) and I–C (Hofstede,1980; Triandis, Bontempo, Villareal, Asia & Lucca, 1988) that individualists (e.g. Anglo‐Canadians) are more independent than collectivists (e.g. Chinese) on all dimensions of human relations. Second, the proposition (Cross & Madson, 1997) that Western males and females differ in the same way individualists and collectivists differ in their self‐construal is not supported. Finally, the adaptation of the IOS Scale proposes a refreshing direction in cross‐cultural research. Graphic representations may be less susceptible to cross‐cultural misconstrual than verbal statements since the former involves little or no translation from one language to another. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.