This article investigates whether the September 11 attack had an impact on cultural values and the level of cosmopolitanism of US university students. Extending a model proposed by Esses, Dovidio and Hodson, we hypothesize a positive effect on the cultural dimensions of collectivism and hierarchy/power distance and a negative effect on cosmopolitanism. Our results - drawn from two separate quasi-experimental studies - support the two latter hypotheses. In addition, supplementary analyses showed that, after the September 11 attack, students exhibited a tendency to trade-in variety, adventure and challenge for security and stability in their ideal job after graduation. Implications for management and for cross cultural management research are discussed.
Adler, N.J. (2002) International Dimensions of Organizational Behavior, 4th edn.Cincinnati, OH: South-Western.
2.
Altemeyer, B. (1988) Enemies of Freedom: Understanding Right-wing Authoritarianism. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
3.
Brewer, M.B. (1993) ‘Social Identity, Distinctiveness, and In-group Homogeneity’, Social Cognition11(1): 150-164.
4.
Campbell, D.T. and Stanley, J.C. (1963) Experimental and Quasi-experimental Designs for Research. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
5.
Cook, T.D. and Campbell, D.T. (1979) Quasi-experimentation: Design and Analysis Issues for Field Settings. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
6.
den Hartog, D.N., House, R.J., Hanges, P.J., Ruiz-Quintanilla, S.A. and Dorfman, P.W. (1999) ‘Culture Specific and Cross-culturally Generalizable Implicit Leadership Theories: Are Attributes of Charismatic/Transformational Leadership Universally Endorsed?’, Leadership Quarterly10(2): 219-256.
7.
Dorfman, P.W. and Howell, J.P. (1988) ‘Dimensions of National Culture and Effective Leadership Patterns: Hofstede Revisited’, Advances in International Comparative Management3: 127-150.
8.
Doty, R.E., Peterson, B.E. and Winter, D.G. (1991) ‘Threat and Authoritarianism in the United States, 1978-1987’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology61: 629-640.
9.
Esses, V.M., Dovidio, J.F. and Hodson, G. (2002) ‘Public Attitudes Toward Immigration in the United States and Canada in Response to the September 11, 2001 “Attack on America”’, Analysis of Social Issues and Public Policy2(1): 69-85.
10.
Gaertner, S.L. and Dovidio, J.F. (2000) Reducing Intergroup Bias: The Common Ingroup Identity Model. Philadelphia, PA: Psychology Press.
11.
Harzing, A.W.K. (2001a) ‘Of Bears, Bumblebees and Spiders: The Role of Expatriates in Controlling Foreign Subsidiaries’, Journal of World Business36(4): 366-379.
12.
Harzing, A.W.K. (2001b) ‘An Analysis of the Functions of International Transfer of Managers in MNCs’, Employee Relations23(6): 581-598.
13.
Harzing, A.W.K., Maznevski, M. and country collaborators (2002a) ‘The Interaction between Language and Culture: A Test of the Cultural Accommodation Hypothesis in Seven Countries’, Language and Intercultural Communication2(2): 120-139.
14.
Harzing, A.W.K., Maznevski, M. and country collaborators (2002b) ‘The Role of Language in Cross-national Mail Survey Research: A Test of the Cultural Accommodation Hypothesis in Fourteen Countries’, paper presented at the 62nd annual meeting of the Academy of Management, Denver, 9-14 August.
15.
Hoecklin, L. (1995) Managing Cultural Differences Strategies for Competitive Advantage. Cambridge, MA: Addison-Wesley.
16.
Hofstede, G. (1980) Culture’s Consequences, International Differences in Work-related Values. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.
17.
Hofstede, G. (1984) Culture’s Consequences, International Differences in Work-related Values, abridged edn.Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.
18.
Hofstede, G.H. (2001) Culture’s Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviors, Institutions and Organizations across Nations, 2nd edn.Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
19.
Hogg, M.A. (2001) ‘Self-categorization and Subjective Uncertainty Resolution: Cognitive and Motivational Facets of Social Identity and Group Membership’, in J.P. Forgas, K. Williams and L. Wheeler (eds) The Social Mind: Cognitive and Motivational Aspects of Interpersonal Behavior, pp. 323-349. New York: Cambridge University Press.
20.
Jick, T.D. (1979) ‘Mixing Qualitative and Quantitative Methods: Triangulation in Action’, Administrative Science Quarterly24: 601-629.
21.
Judd, C.M. and Park, B. (1988) ‘Outgroup Homogeneity: Judgments of Variability at the Individual and Group Levels’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology54: 778-788.
22.
Kirkman, B.L. and Shapiro, D.L. (2001) ‘The Impact of Cultural Values on Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment in Self-managing Work Teams: The Mediating Role of Employee Resistance’, Academy of Management Journal44(3): 557-569.
23.
Kleingeld, P. and Brown, E. (2003) ‘Cosmopolitanism’ in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (web page), 28 June 2002, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2002/entries/cosmopolitanism/, accessed 15 April 2003.
24.
Kluckhohn, F.R. and Strodtbeck, F.L. (1961) Variations in Value Orientations. Evanston, IL: Row, Peterson and Company.
25.
Kogut, B. and Singh, H. (1988) ‘The Effect of National Culture on the Choice of Entry Mode’, Journal of International Business Studies19(3): 411-432.
26.
McCann, S.J.H. (1999) ‘Threatening Times and Fluctuations in American Church Memberships’, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin25(3): 325-336.
27.
Markus, H.R. and Kitayama, S. (1991) ‘Culture and Self: Implications for Cognition, Emotion and Motivation’, Psychological Review98: 224-253.
28.
Maznevski, M.L., DiStefano, J.J., Gomez, C.B., Noorderhaven, N.G. and Wu, P.-C. (2002) ‘Cultural Dimensions at the Individual Level of Analysis: The Cultural Orientations Framework’, The International Journal of Cross Cultural Management2(3): 275-298.
29.
Mook, D.C. (1983) ‘In Defense of External Validity’, American Psychologist38: 379-387.
30.
Osland, J.S. and Bird, A. (2000) ‘Beyond Sophisticated Stereotyping: Cultural Sensemaking in Context’, Academy of Management Executive14(1): 65-79.
31.
Oyserman, D., Coon, H.M. and Kemmelmeier, M. (2002) ‘Rethinking Individualism and Collectivism: Evaluation of Theoretical Assumptions and Meta-analyses’, Psychological Bulletin128(1): 3-72.
32.
Patriot Act of 2001 (2001) Retrieved 13 November 2002 from website http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgibin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=107_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ056.107.
33.
Reid, T.R. (2001) ‘Victims from Around the World: People from More than 50 Countries Died in Blasts’, The Washington Post 18 September: A01.
34.
Sales, S.M. (1972) ‘Economic Threat as a Determinant of Conversion Rates in Authoritarian and Nonauthoritarian Churches’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology23: 420-428.
35.
Sales, S.M. (1973) ‘Threat as a Factor in Authoritarianism: An Analysis of Archival Data’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology28(1): 44-57.
36.
Scandura, T.A. and Williams, E.A. (2000) ‘Research Methodology in Management: Current Practices, Trends, and Implications for Future Research’, Academy of Management Journal43(6): 1248-1264.
37.
Schwartz, S.H. (1992) ‘Universals in the Content and Structure of Values: Theoretical Advances and Empirical Tests in 20 Countries’, in M.P. Zanna (ed.) Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, vol. 25, pp. 1-65. New York: Academic Press.
38.
Schwartz, S.H. (1999) ‘A Theory of Cultural Values and Some Implications for Work’, Applied Psychology: An International Review48(1): 23-47.
39.
Shenkar, O. (2001) ‘Cultural Distance Revisited: Towards a More Rigorous Conceptualization and Measurement of Cultural Differences’, Journal of International Business Studies32(3): 519-535.
40.
Søndergaard, M. (1994) ‘Hofstede’s Consequences: A Study of Reviews, Citations and Replications’, Organization Studies15(3): 447-456.
41.
Tajfel, H. and Turner, J.C. (1979) ‘An Integrative Theory of Intergroup Conflict’, in W.G. Austin and S. Worchel (eds) The Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations, pp. 33-48. Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.
42.
Triandis, H.C. (1995) Individualism and Collectivism. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
43.
Triandis, H.C. and 15 co-authors (2001) ‘Culture and Deception in Business Negotiations: A Multilevel Analysis’, International Journal of Cross Cultural Management1(1): 73-90.
44.
Trompenaars, A. and Hampden-Turner, C. (1998) Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Cultural Diversity in Global Business, 2nd edn.New York: McGraw-Hill.
45.
UNCTAD (2002) World Investment Report. Transnational Corporations and Export Competitiveness. New York/Geneva: United Nations.
