Explanations for cultural differences in thinking: Easterners’ dialectical thinking and Westerners’ linear thinking

Abstract

Since Easterners' naïve dialectical thinking, which is contrasted with Westerners' linear thinking, introduced, many cross-cultural studies on human thinking have been conducted, and explanations for the cultural differences have been proposed. First, after examining the robustness of these cultural differences, two existing explanations are discussed in this paper. The first is based on the distinction between Westerners' analytic cognition and Easterners' holistic cognition. This is related to the distinction between Westerners' independent self and Easterners' interdependent self. The second is based on the philosophical tradition of China's Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism, which is contrasted with that of Ancient Greece. Second, we propose a new explanation based on the distinction between Westerners' low-context culture and Easterners' high-context culture. Finally, we show that this distinction can be based on socioecological approaches, and it is expected to explain the cultural differences between the Chinese and Japanese.

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“…This discrepancy may be due to cultural differences in thinking style. Coping research has consistently identified the stress-buffering role of active coping in Western countries (e.g., [ 47 , 48 ]), and the adoption of this direct action-oriented strategy matches the linear thinking style that is prominent among Westerners [ 49 ].…”

The Role of Regulatory Focus and Emotion Recognition Bias in Cross-Cultural Negotiation

“…People in high-context cultures such as Chinese, utilized more nonverbal or situational information in communicating with others, whereas people in low-context cultures such as American were more direct and verbal in their methods of communication [49]. As people in low-context cultures sometimes find it difficult to understand the nonverbal or situational information, when people from high-context and low-context cultures are negotiating, it is best to rely on a direct method of communication, the negotiators' common denominator [50,51].…”

“…People's motivation or motivational patterns serve an important purpose in that these are the reasons why people choose to engage in certain behaviors or strategies over others [21,22]. Most researchers studying cross-cultural negotiation have focused on the specific values or communication methods that affect negotiation performance [46,51]; while these variables provide an extensive explanation for the differences in people's negotiation behaviors, why people in certain cultures develop values or communication methods that are different from those of others warrants further exploration.…”

Hindsight bias in judgments of the predictability of flash floods: An experimental study for testimony at a court trial and legal decision making

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