Social Dilemma Behavior of Individuals from Highly Individualist and Collectivist Cultures

Abstract

Existing studies of social dilemmas in other cultures report patterns of behavior that are very similar to that of American subjects. This has held even in cultures that are seemingly quite different from the United States in terms of their emphasis on the collective over the individual. We argue that, in fact, these cultures are not as different from the United States with regard to collectivity as they seem. In our study, we contrast the American—the most individualistic of all cultures—with the Vietnamese, an extremely collectivist culture. In the first study, American and South Vietnamese subjects played a number of trials of a public goods or resource dilemma game. The patterns of cooperation among the Americans were typical of most social dilemma studies. The Vietnamese, however, cooperated at an exceptionally high rate. In a second study, subjects were pitted against a variety of preprogrammed strategies that varied as to their toughness. The Americans responded in predictable ways, but the Vietnamese were again extremely cooperative, even when competing against an All-D (100% competition) strategy. The results suggest that cultural norms contribute somewhat to mixed-motive behavior.