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Many previous researchers of conformity have found that people from collectivist cultures have stronger conformity tendencies than those from individualistic cultures. However, as most of these researchers focused on only 1 type of conformity, that is, compliance, these findings are limited. Consequently, little is known about the influence of culture on internalization, another type of conformity. In a series of virtual laboratory (e-lab) experiments in which participants were either simply exposed to choice dilemmas and opinion items or presented with a persuasive argument about each of them, I found that there was a lower level of cross-cultural differences in internalization than in compliance. Thus, only superficial cross-cultural differences may exist in conformity.
Keywords: conformity, compliance, internalization, cross-cultural differences, collectivist cultures, individualistic cultures.
It has long been thought that conformity is, to some extent, a product of culture. More specifically, it has been found that people from collectivist cultures are more responsive to the preferences of others and people from individualistic cultures are more assertive and independent (e.g., Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 2001). However, although compelling evidence for cross-cultural differences in conformity has been provided by Bond and Smith (1996) in their meta-analysis as well as by other researchers (e.g., Barrett et al., 2005; Chen et al., 2006; Cialdini, Wosinska, Barrett, Butner, & Gornik-Durose, 1999; Petrova, Cialdini, & Sills, 2007), these findings are limited because only one type of conformity, that is, compliance, was considered. I am not aware of any studies in which cross-cultural differences in another type of conformity, internalization, were examined. My purpose in this study was to examine whether or not there are cross-cultural differences in the levels of compliance and internalization in attitudinal judgment tasks.
Conformity
Conformity is defined as "movement on the part of the discrepant person towards the group norm as a function of explicit or implicit social pressure from group members" (Turner, 1991, p. 18). Conformity occurs when individuals, influenced by the pressure for uniformity, change their perceptions or behaviors to become closer to the group norm (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004). Asch (1956) provided a dramatic example of social conformity. He asked groups of individuals to estimate which of three comparison lines with different lengths was equal to a fourth standard line. In each group, there was only...