Culture, self-understanding and the bicultural mind : a study in Greece and the Netherlands

The present thesis investigates impact of culture at the between the Dutch and the Greek cultures level by focusing in the Greek society and the within individual level in the form of Dutch-Greek biculturalism. The Netherlands is an individualist society, while Greece is traditionally considered to be more collectivist, although currently undergoing transition. Two main lines of inquiry are discussed: firstly, Dutch-Greek biculturalism and in specific the Cultural Frame Switching hypothesis, and secondly self-perceptions and how they relate to positive psychological function. The individualism collectivism dimension is used to facilitate predictions (i) for obtaining the default patterns to base our experiments on biculturalism upon (ii) to examine self understandings comparatively and (iii) to study how self-understandings evolve in Greece. Attention has also been given to local cultures specific context. We conducted three experimental priming studies. The bicultural samples consisted of early adolescent- and adult individuals of Greek origin who live in the Netherlands and are highly competent in both the Dutch and the Greek language. They were randomly assigned either to the Greek or the Dutch cultural priming condition. Cultural frame was manipulated by using culture-specific symbols and language. The Cultural Frame Switching hypothesis was examined in relation to social explanations, personal and social self-evaluations, identification with friends, and endorsement of values (friendship, family integrity and obedience). The responses of the bicultural participants were affected by cultural priming: when assigned to the Greek culture condition they provided more external attributions, identified more strongly with friends, evaluated the personal self less positively and the social self more positively, than when assigned to the Dutch culture condition. Responses of bicultural participants were compared to those of mono-cultural control groups in the Netherlands and in Greece. Results show a clear pattern of the shifting responses of the bicultural participants. In addition, the mediating role of social identification on the effects of cultural priming is discussed. We furthermore improved our insight in this hypothesis by examining it at the level of culture-bound networks of associations. Dutch-primed bicultural participants reproduce the Dutch specific networks of associations and Greek-primed replicate the Greek specific ones. These findings indicate that networks of meanings are affected by cultural priming too and provide support for the dynamic constructivist approach to culture. Two studies comparing personal and social self-understandings found that self-evaluation trends and how they relate to psychological well-being differ in the Dutch and Greek culture. In the changing Greek culture, a distinction could be made between the collectivist and the neo-collectivist group. For the ‘neo-collectivist’ group a more positive personal self-evaluation enhances its role in predicting well-being, but without changing the critical role of the collective self. This combination makes a difference with the Dutch culture, where personal self is the only key predictor. Findings have implication for self-theories and theoretical frameworks for predicting psychological functioning. In another comparative study the focus was on social self-understandings. Results show that the relational self has primacy in both cultures and for different age groups, but there are important cultural differences in the ways of understanding it. Hence, a distinction should be made between the endorsement of a concept and the cognitive patterns related to it. These studies on the self may contribute to modernization theories and the role of local cultures