Recognizing group diversity: Individualist‐collectivist and autonomous‐relational social orientations and their implications for intergroup processes

Abstract

A recently proposed taxonomy describes four basic types of groups or group members by crossing the individualist‐collectivist distinction with autonomous versus relational group orientations (Hinkle & Brown, 1990). The model posits that many of the basic relationships derived from Social Identity Theory will be most readily observed amongst collectivist groups with relational orientations. Three investigations (two laboratory experiments and one field study) were conducted to examine the orthogonality of the individualist‐collectivist and autonomous‐relational dimensions and test the hypothesis that significant, positive correlations between in‐group identification and in‐group bias are most apt to occur amongst collectivists with relational orientations. In all three studies, research participants completed an individualist‐collectivist inventory and measures of autonomous versus relational group orientations, in‐group identification, and in‐group favouritism. As expected, correlations between individualism‐collectivism and the measure of autonomous‐relational orientations were quite low; the two dimensions manifested little overlap. Responses to the individualist‐collectivist inventory and autonomous versus relational group orientations scale were used to divide the research participants into the taxonomy's four categories. As hypothesized, in all three studies significant, positive identification/in‐group favouritism correlations were observed for collectivists with relational orientations, whilst these same correlations amongst individualists with autonomous orientations were zero. The results from these studies support predictions derived from Hinkle & Brown's (1990) group taxonomy. The use of different paradigms, subject populations and measures of key constructs in the laboratory and field studies speaks to the model's generalizability. The general implication of these findings for Social Identity Theory and intergroup relations research is that our theoretical understanding and predictive precision can be enhanced by recognizing that the relevant psychological processes can vary across different types of groups and group members.