Beliefs about aggression in British students from individualist and collectivist cultures

This study assessed the hypothesis that people from an individualist culture (100 British Anglo-Saxon students) would show higher instrumental (1) and lower expressive (E) beliefs about aggression than those from a collectivist culture (100 British Asian students). The hypothesis was not supported and, at an individual level, there was no association between cultural orientation and beliefs about aggression. Asians showed higher I beliefs about their aggression than did Anglo-Saxons, and the typical sex differences in I and E beliefs were more pronounced in the Asian than the Anglo-Saxon sample. The study also assessed the relationship between I and E beliefs and instrumental and expressive personality traits in the two cultures. Moderate associations were found between I and E beliefs and the corresponding instrumental and expressive personality traits, which were unrelated to measures of cultural orientation. These findings show that despite superficial similarities in measures of cultural orientation, beliefs about aggression, and gender stereotypic traits, they are relatively unrelated constructs. (c) 2005 Wiley-Liss, Inc.