Interpersonal leveling, independence, and self‐enhancement: a comparison between Denmark and the US, and a relational practice framework for cultural psychology

Abstract

We argue that the relational model that people use for organizing specific social interactions in any culture determines whether people self-enhance. Self-enhancement is not a functional consequence of the (independent or interdependent) cultural model of self. Across three studies, Danes self-enhanced considerably less than did Americans but were more independent on the Twenty Statements Test, made more individual attributions about social life, made more autonomous scenario choices, and were more independent on the self-construal scale. Public modesty did not account for these Danish-American differences in self-enhancement. However, Danes practiced interpersonal leveling, preferring equality of outcome more than did Americans. This leveling strongly and inversely predicted self-enhancement within both cultures and mediated Danish-American differences in self-enhancement. In contrast, no independence measure systematically predicted self-enhancement within both cultures nor mediated the cultural differences in self-enhancement. This dissociation of independence and self-enhancement demonstrates that self-enhancing downward social comparisons are not functionally necessary for an independent concept of self. We conclude that social relationships, not the model of the self, mediate the mutual constitution of psyche and culture.

Love versus loving criticism: Disentangling conventional and constructive patriotism

“…Market Pricing relationships are oriented to socially meaningful rates such as prices, wages, or cost-benefit analyses (Fiske, 2000). The theory has received extensive support in diverse areas (e.g., Biber, Hupfeld, & Meier, 2008;Giessner & van Quaquebeke, 2010;Thomsen, Sidanius, & Fiske, 2007;Whitehead, 2002).…”

The influence of political candidates’ facial appearance on older and younger adults’ voting choices and actual electoral success

“…Although another study of US elections found that babyfaceness was unassociated with electoral success (Olivola & Todorov, 2010), a study of Finnish parliamentary elections found that higher babyfaceness predicted electoral success for male candidates, but not female candidates (Poutvaara, Jordahl, & Berggren, 2009). Since babyfaceness has been associated with greater perceived warmth and honesty as well as lower dominance and shrewdness (see Montepare & Zebrowitz, 1998 for a review), the Finnish election results may be due to preferences for the former traits in Scandinavian culture, which, like Japan, tends to value interpersonal harmony to a greater degree than does US culture (Thomson, Sidanius, & Fiske, 2007). This account can explain why babyfaceness only influenced the electoral success of male candidates, as women are both more babyfaced than men and also viewed as more warm and trustworthy, thus diminishing the degree to which babyfaceness would augment the perception of those traits in women (Brownlow & Zebrowitz, 1990, Zebrowitz, 1997).…”

More Human Than Others, but Not Always Better

“…Although SE was not our primary focus in this article, there seems to be a need to reconceptualize this bias given that it was observed to be relatively high for East Asian participants in certain comparisons (i.e., with actual individuals). Perhaps, independence and interdependence by itself cannot explain the variability in SE within and across cultures, but there may be other societal factors which can complement the current understanding (e.g., "inequality": Loughnan et al, 2011;Thomsen et al, 2007;"vertical individualism": Triandis & Gelfand, 1998). Future research may shed light on this by conducting more nuanced investigations of cultural differences, by comparing North America and Australia, as well as by comparing Japan and Korea, while examining patterns of SE for different targets.…”