Repository logo
 

Cultural differences matter, and they don’t: Transcending polarized and polarizing cultural stereotypes in diversity training

dc.contributor.authorMacpherson, Iain
dc.date.accessioned2020-11-05
dc.date.accessioned2022-05-31T01:16:18Z
dc.date.available2022-05-31T01:16:18Z
dc.date.issued2017
dc.description.abstractBased on reported primary and secondary research, this paper proposes an improvement to the way organizational diversity training (DT) is usually designed and delivered. The focused-upon DT shortcoming is its customary emphasis on instructing trainees about cultural differences in such a way that overstates and oversimplifies those differences, typically contributing to poor outcomes such as lack of change in participant attitudes and behaviour, or even a worsening of them (Kowal, Franklin, & Paradies, 2013). The proposed improvement is to instead instil in DT trainees a more accurately nuanced intercultural mindset that this author terms non-binary: an appreciation of how the world’s cultures are both distinct and alike, and how even the most basic differences are often underpinned by paradoxical similarities. By way of concrete example, the sub-construct of Japanese interiorized individualism is modelled. The paper concludes by discussing how such non-binary truths, and an accordant behavioural flexibility in cross-cultural interactions, might be fostered in DT trainees through non-traditional pedagogical approaches such as “embodied learning” (Wilson, 2013) and “paradoxical frames” (Miron-Spektor, Gino, and Argote, 2011).
dc.format.extent709.58KB
dc.format.mimetypePDF
dc.identifier.citationMacpherson, I. (2017). Cultural differences matter, and they don’t: Transcending polarized and polarizing cultural stereotypes in diversity training. IAFOR Journal of Business and Management, 2(2), 51-72. https://doi.org/10.22492/ijbm.2.2.03
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.22492/ijbm.2.2.03
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14078/2031
dc.languageEnglish
dc.language.isoen
dc.rightsAll Rights Reserved
dc.subjectdiversity training
dc.subjectintercultural theory
dc.subjectindividualism/collectivism
dc.subjectnon-binary cultural orientation
dc.subjectinteriorized individualism
dc.subjectexteriorized individualism
dc.titleCultural differences matter, and they don’t: Transcending polarized and polarizing cultural stereotypes in diversity trainingen
dc.typeArticle
dspace.entity.type

Files

Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Name:
Cultural_differences_matter,_and_they_don’t:-_2017_roam.pdf
Size:
709.58 KB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format