Validity of Auto- and Ieterostereotypes among Japanese and American Students

Abstract

Japanese and American undergraduates responded to three scenarios describing interaction among individuals who had conflicting views. They provided judgments about their own and others' behavior in such situations and of "typical" Japanese and Americans, thereby providing auto- and heterostereotypes of these samples. The "validity" of these stereotypes is reflected in the rank-order correlations of "own" and "typical" judgments, and was found to be a function of the similarity of the two cultures when reacting to a particular episode. Many of these stereotypes reflected "false consensus." Thus, when the cultures were similar in their perceptions of an episode the stereotypes were valid, and when they were dissimilar they were invalid. The Japanese responses suggested that the Japanese sample passively accepted inconsistencies between their public and private self in such situations and behaved according to the group norm (public self), even when their attitudes (private self) were inconsistent with such behavior. Americans showed an active reduction of the discrepancy between private and public self (e.g., tried to make the other's attitudes like their own).