East Versus West

Key Thought:

A very un-politically correct article on how research is showing that Asians thinks different from Westerners. The article profile Richard Nisbett, University of Michigan professor.

Summaries:

In one experiment, the Americans went ‘for the biggest, brightest moving object and focused on that and on its attributes’. The Japanese would describe the stream, the water, the rocks and shells…and then there were three big fish swimming off to the left.’

In another study, Nisbett discovered that East Asians have an easier time remembering objects when they are presented with the same background against which they were first seen. By contrast, context doesn’t seem to affect Western recognition of an object.

East Asians	Westerners
see things in context	focus on the point at hand
dependent	independent
holistic	analytic
collectivistic	individualistic

The article goes on to describe more difference. The stock market, Westerner’s preference for lawyers over engineers, Asians higher score in Math in Westerners (no, it’s not Asians are smarter), a lot of Asian would be concert pianists, but fewer opera-singers, and what it means for marketers of consumer goods.

My comments:

The differences are real, they might now always be for the better, but they matter. The final sentence sums up the article well - Nisbett believe that those who will be most successful in the 21st century are the ones who grasp what’s best about both worldviews. The Americans should temper their optimism, Asians their reluctance to take center stage.

Reference: East Versus West: A psychology professor dares to compare how Asians and Americans think, by Hana R. Alberts, Forbes Asia, May 11, 2009, pg 64-65.