Decision Making Across Cultures
The area of decision making that we predominantly analyze in lecture is the predictability of other decisions based on a set of data, either based on their given values or choices. The TED Talk video by Sheena Iyengar that I am going to discuss is about the actual psychology behind decision making. What Iyengar concludes is that this psychology actually across different cultures, particularly because of the differences between an independent and collective mindset.
Typically, a prime example of an independent mindset is our own American culture. We base our society off of capitalism and the idea that the individual person makes decisions and choices based on what is best for him. This differs from the primarily Eastern European and East-Asian mindset of collectivism. A collectivist would think that the decisions that he makes affects the lives of those around him.
One particular point that Iyengar makes is that the act of choosing itself is viewed differently across cultures. She says that Americans feel having the ability to choose, in itself, is a beneficial and that the decisions that we make as individuals are ultimately for our best good. What is surprising is that this mentality is not universal. In other areas such as Eastern Europe, where the values are more collectivist, the idea of choosing can be considered a burden. Iyengar gives the example of something as simple as a choice between different soda brands. To us, Sprite, Coke, and say Orange Soda, are all different choices. They have different tastes and we are usually biased towards one brand over another. However, through an experiment, Iyengar found that people from other countries in Eastern Europe viewed all of these clearly different (to us) types of soda, as one generic “Soda.” Rather than differentiating, they believed that all types of soda were the same; there was no discrimination between the specific types. This showed that they did not believe that there was a choice between which carbonated beverage to drink.
Another point she makes is that some cultures believe that having the opportunity to choose can actually be a burden to people. This makes sense in collectivism, where an individual decision is thought to affect more than just the person making the decision. For example, in a situation in which children from different cultures were given either the choice to pick a puzzle in one group, and in another they were told that their mothers had chosen for them, different cultures had different reactions. The American children performed better when given a choice while the Asian-American children performed better when they were told that their mother had chosen for them. They believed that since someone who had a vested interest in their well- being was making the decision, it had to be a smarter puzzle to choose.
The decisions that people are not necessarily universal, but the theories that apply involving the predictability of decisions can still be traced within a culture with similar values. While we often try to understand the simple causes and effects of decision making, it is interesting to learn the psychology and what makes up the reasons for making a certain choice.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/sheena_iyengar_on_the_art_of_choosing.html