Decoding cultural dimensions

By Annick Holland

When comparing different markets for global insight challenges, it is important to consider the impact of cultural nuances. In this article, INDUSTRY of Us explores Hofstede’s model for cultural dimensions, breaking it down and showing how it can be used at different stages of global research projects.

Interacting with, and understanding different national cultures is one of the most enjoyable aspects of working at INDUSTRY of Us. The global insight and innovation challenges we take on see us regularly partnering with international client teams, interviewing consumers from all over the world and moderating workshops and training sessions with people from different cultures.

Since INDUSTRY of Us was founded in 2019, we’ve built and established a network of 40+ Creative Cultural Guides (CCGs) to help strengthen our approach to global challenges. As one of the first CCGs (and now a permanent member of the team), I supported INDUSTRY of Us in Germany and found this new way of working very exciting. CCGs are local design researchers who help us get rapid contextual, cultural or creative insight in a particular market. This cultural diversity and understanding helps us better frame and respond to global challenges.

Having lived and worked in four different countries myself, something I am highly aware of is the cultural differences that can have a big impact on how people behave and communicate. Identifying and understanding these differences and nuances is particularly important when it comes to running global insight challenges where different markets are compared and contrasted. It has an impact at every stage of the project, from selecting research markets, to designing the study, to moderating sessions, to analysing and making sense of the findings.

It’s an area that requires very careful navigation. For example, some cultural differences that we see when analysing research findings might reveal attitudes or behaviours that differ between markets in a way that is meaningful and relevant for the challenge at hand. Other differences may reflect different cultural reactions to the methodology used, such as the way a specific research question is asked. Therefore, it is important to understand what is driving the differences we might see in the data so that we can interpret it correctly.

Exploring models of cultural differences

At INDUSTRY of Us, when we talk about culture, we are referring to the habits and unwritten rules of people living together in a society. It’s what distinguishes one group of people from another.

There are several interesting models, based on decades of research, which set out to help make sense of cultural differences and complexities. All models assume that each country has a distinct cultural identity and aim to provide a holistic view of different cultures by comparing them across a number of different dimensions.

Each model looks at culture from a different perspective or a different aspect of it. The Culture Map by Meyer looks at eight dimensions that relate to common challenges managers face in international organisations. Trompenaars's model of National Cultural Differences has seven dimensions to help with cross-cultural communication. And, the Tightness/Looseness of cultures by Gelfand describes how strong societal norms are within a society and how much they tolerate deviances from these norms.

In this article, we’ll focus on Hofstede’s Six Dimensions of National Culture since his work addresses national culture in general and is the foundation for many of the newer models that have emerged.

Hofstede’s Six Dimensions of National Culture

Hofstede describes culture by assessing the extent to which a number of dimensions apply to one country, relative to another. It’s important to note that a high or low score in each of the dimensions (described below) does not mean that one is more desirable than the other.

1. Power Distance - To what extent is unequal distribution of power accepted and expected? Societies with a high score on the Power Distance scale often accept a hierarchical order and their place in society, while members try to distribute power equally in societies with a low score.

2. Individualism vs. Collectivism - How tightly-knit is a society? A high score indicates Individualist societies who value self-actualisation and mainly care for close family and friends, while a low score indicates Collectivist societies (or “we-cultures”) who value strong social ties as well as belonging to and caring for a bigger group.

3. Motivation Towards Achievement & Success - What motivates people? To what extent is a society driven by competition? Decisive societies, those with a high score, tend to be motivated by success and materialism, while consensus-orientated societies, those with a low score, prefer quality of life and cooperation.

4. Uncertainty Avoidance - Feeling uncomfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity, which, amongst others, has an impact on rule making. Societies with a high score on Uncertainty Avoidance try to control the future and tend to have rigid beliefs, while societies with a low score are more relaxed and let the future happen.

5. Long term vs. Short term orientation - In what ways do societies prepare for the future? Long term oriented societies (high score) are more focused on the future by encouraging thrift and education, while Short term oriented societies (low score) value traditions and might be suspicious of societal change.

6. Indulgence - How much does a society control their impulses and desires? Indulgent societies (high score) allow relatively free gratification of natural human drivers related to enjoying life and having fun, while Restrained societies (low score) often have stricter social norms and control gratification.

Let’s look at an example:

You can quickly compare countries using Hofstede’s Country Comparison tool. Here’s an example comparing China, Germany and US on the Six Dimensions:

Results of a three country comparison using the tool at www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison/

There are some dramatic differences here that have an impact when running global insight work. Here are a few specific examples from recent projects run by INDUSTRY of Us:

• Market selection - Much of our work involves getting a read on consumer desirability when it comes to new product or packaging ideas. When running global insight projects, market selection is a key consideration, including the extent to which we deliberately select markets with high openness to change (or having low Uncertainty Avoidance) vs. those that are more likely to resist change, or be more sceptical of innovation (or a high Uncertainty Avoidance). In a recent project relating to new applications for a digital technology, we selected both China and Germany as key markets to provide this level of attitudinal contrast.

• Interview moderation - When moderating qualitative research, an understanding of and appreciation of Power Distance is important to get the most out of respondents. In more hierarchical cultures such as those in China and Malaysia, extra care may be needed in the set-up and structure of qualitative research sessions, to allow a more open discussion. For example, recruiting friendship pairs rather than setting up research sessions with strangers, and being aware of workplace hierarchies when running B2B customer research.

• Sense making - Cultural differences can have an impact on how respondents answer questions. In a research setting, this can mean extra care is needed during the interpretation of research results to be able to unpick what is actually said. For example, Collectivist cultures (i.e. those that score low in Individualism), such as those in China and South Korea tend to avoid giving negative feedback and saying ‘no’ because they value loyalty and harmony. In contrast, highly Individualistic markets such as the US value explicit communication and a greater willingness for negative feedback. We saw this on a recent seven market quant study, where respondents in Asia rarely used the“1 - strongly disagree” option on the five point Likert scale (where 1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree). This was consistent across all questions and the whole study, requiring careful navigation during the interpretation of the results.

Reflections on the models

How useful are these models when running global research? For us, they are just one tool we use to provide a high-level frame of reference at key points in global projects. They describe dominant cultural practices and norms which help to explain some of the big cultural differences between countries, and helps us anticipate how a group of people from one culture is likely to behave. It’s a useful starting point.

However, they certainly don’t represent the values or behaviour for every single person from a certain country. Every society contains many sub-cultures that differ from the cultural mainstream, some of which cut across national geographic boundaries. For us, these models don’t replace in-depth consumer research, but help frame our understanding at a high level.

So, next time you are planning a global research study, think carefully about the rationale and reasons behind market choice - what impact could cultural differences have, and which perspectives are important to represent in your study? Carefully consider the impact of the research methodology and the way respondents are likely to behave and respond to enable a more open and fruitful discussion. Finally, be aware of differences in terms of how people from different cultures react to certain types of questions, and be able to account for this during the interpretation of your research findings.