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Studies of acculturation have assumed that, under pressure to assimilate, individuals will accommodate by adopting behavioural and attitudinal attributes of the local, dominant culture. In contrast, this empirical study based in the United Arab Emirates used an original survey instrument, together with a range of convergent analytic techniques, to demonstrate pervasive westernization in the Arab and subcontinental-dominant communities. In addition, the study demonstrates a novel use of multiple discriminant analysis to explore differences between cultural and personal identities, a potentially useful tool for the cross-cultural management literature. In contrast to other studies, we examine how individuals perceive themselves as deviating from their home cultures in a context where there is minimal pressure to conform to the local culture and commercial globalization is given free reign. We show that non-westerners perceived themselves both as more deviant from their home societies than those from western nations and as more similar to westerners than to their own societies. The fact that even those born in Gulf Arab nations tended to converge on western beliefs and behaviours suggested the cause of westernization may have been media and western business models. These observations lead us to challenge common theoretical models of acculturation by suggesting that individuals may acculturate by assuming learned transient aspects of cultural identity in order to maximize personal opportunity.

A continuous daily rainfall record provides much information for agriculturalists but initial questions are imprecise and are modified in the light of experience. In order to match this uncertainty the program 'Rainfall Statistics' is designed as a simple interactive procedure for studying quantity probabilities, dry spell frequencies and a simple soil-moisture budget The program has various functions depending upon user requirements. Use of the program is illustrated with rainfall records from northern Thailand.Information about free resources is necessary for successful agricultural development. Ways of presenting rainfall data have been discussed in the context of planning African agricultural development Kassam, 1978; Manning, 1950;Robinson and Glover, 1954), and to assist agriculture in Australia (Fitzpatrick and Nix, 1970;Hall and Barclay, 1975;Keig and McAlpine, 1974). Operational needs in agriculture have also been discussed (Manning, 1956; Walker and Rijks, 1967). General problems of matching data on resources and survey methods to administrative needs are discussed elsewhere (Hills, 1979) but an important constraint has been that data collection has been guided by technocratic approaches to planning and management.The present approach matches uncertainty in management with a flexible program for analysing rainfall. A rainfall record can provide a wealth of guiding information for agriculturalists but only if the information generated can be used in solving operational problems. Many classifications reduce the variety of information provided by rainfall data and disregard the variety and uncertainty which characterize farming. Administrators and agronomists are adaptive and pragmatic, modifying both their aims and operations in the light of experience, so that their needs change as development proceeds. The aim of this study has been to develop a simple but robust tool for analysing rainfall records in a manner which matches the pragmatism of the field agronomist. Practical requirementsMany features of local rainfall will be of interest, e.g. quantity of rainfall, length of dry periods, and level of soil-moisture. A description of the average levels of such variables throughout the year, as well as the variability about these average levels from one year to another, provides a convenient summary of the local rainfall conditions. A record of daily rainfall over a period of several 1 0014-4797/81/0000-0765 $01.00© 1981 Cambridge University Press

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