Perceived Cultural Importance and Actual Self-Importance of Values in Cultural Identification

• Main Authors: WAN, Ching, CHIU, Chi-Yue, TAM, Kim-Pong, LEE, Sau-Lai, LAU, Ivy Yee-Man, PENG, Siqing
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2007
• Subjects: cultural identification; cultural values; social identity; values; Multicultural Psychology; Sociology of Culture
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/146; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soss_research/article/1145/viewcontent/Perceived_cultural_importance_and_actual_self.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Cross-cultural psychologists assume that core cultural values define to a large extent what a culture is. Typically, core values are identified through an actual self-importance approach, in which core values are those that members of the culture as a group strongly endorse. In this article, the authors propose a perceived cultural importance approach to identifying core values, in which core values are values that members of the culture as a group generally believe to be important in the culture. In 5 studies, the authors examine the utility of the perceived cultural importance approach. Results consistently showed that, compared with values of high actual self-importance, values of high perceived cultural importance play a more important role in cultural identification. These findings have important implications for conceptualizing and measuring cultures.