Individualism and Collectivism Culture Theories

Individualism and Collectivism are two accepted theories that are commonly used when dealing with one’s culture and political views. According to Kemmelmeier, H. M. and Coon, Individualism and Collectivism concepts has been used to “depict, clarify, and envision divergence in people’s opinion, behavior, principles, attribution, self perception, socialization, and communication.” Nonetheless, individualism and collectivism has shared some mutual views as well as incongruous stances on humanity, the disposition of human beings, the affiliation of society and the characteristics of people in the individualistic culture. Individualism and Collectivism have shared common goals, nevertheless they agrees on what should be achieve, but their opinion differ in how we should attain what needs to be achieved. Many philosophers has pinpointed a difference in these two theories explaining that “societies can be contrasted along an individualistic-collectivistic axis, with those toward the individualistic end emphasizing the “I” and those toward the other end emphasizing the “we” in thinking about, evaluating, and enacting communicative conducting.” Individualism has been associated with the I- identity and collectivism being associated with the We- identity. In using these pronouns as identification it speaks volume as what each theory is about. The individualism or the I-identity has been categorize as persons that place emphasis on themselves or their immediate family, it has been evident that certain countries has put this identity into practice such as The United States of America, Australia, France, and Canada. Individualist centralize their lifestyles surrounds self actualization and individual achievement; they believe in equality bu...

... middle of paper ...

...fstede, G. (2009, June). Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model in Context. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture (Unit 17, Chapter 14). ©International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology.

Donal Carbaugh, Intercultural Theory [on-line] Available from http://eco.ittralee.ie/personal/theories_III.php#1; Internet.

Lustig, Myron and Jolene Koester. 1998. Intercultural Competence: Interpersonal Communication Across Cultures (3rd Ed.). (Addison-Wesley Publishing, 1998), 30.

Coon, H.M. & Kemmelmeier M. (2001) Cultural orientation in the United States. (re)

examining differences among ethnic groups. Journal of Cross Cultural Psychology

32, 348-364

Stella Ting-Toomey. (2005). The matrix of Face: An Updated Face-Negotiation Theory,” in William Gudykunst, Ed., Theorizing about intercultural communication. Sage Publications. 71-92.