Correction: the dynamics of democracy, development and cultural values.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: PLOS ONE Staff
PROVIDER: S-EPMC4346258 | biostudies-literature | 2015
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Correction: the dynamics of democracy, development and cultural values.
PloS one 20150302 3
Similar Datasets
Project description:Over the past decades many countries have experienced rapid changes in their economies, their democratic institutions and the values of their citizens. Comprehensive data measuring these changes across very different countries has recently become openly available. Between country similarities suggest common underlying dynamics in how countries develop in terms of economy, democracy and cultural values. We apply a novel Bayesian dynamical systems approach to identify the model which best captures the complex, mainly non-linear dynamics that underlie these changes. We show that the level of Human Development Index (HDI) in a country drives first democracy and then higher emancipation of citizens. This change occurs once the countries pass a certain threshold in HDI. The data also suggests that there is a limit to the growth of wealth, set by higher emancipation. Having reached a high level of democracy and emancipation, societies tend towards equilibrium that does not support further economic growth. Our findings give strong empirical evidence against a popular political science theory, known as the Human Development Sequence. Contrary to this theory, we find that implementation of human-rights and democratisation precede increases in emancipative values.
| S-EPMC4048187 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Understanding global variation in democratic outcomes is critical to efforts to promote and sustain democracy today. Here, we use data on the democratic status of 221 modern and historical nations stretching back up to 200 years to show that, particularly over the last 50 years, nations with shared linguistic and, more recently, religious ancestry have more similar democratic outcomes. We also find evidence that for most of the last 50 years the democratic trajectory of a nation can be predicted by the democratic status of its linguistic and, less clearly, religious relatives, years and even decades earlier. These results are broadly consistent across three democracy indicators (Polity 5, Vanhanen's Index of Democracy, and Freedom in the World) and are not explained by geographical proximity or current shared language or religion. Our findings suggest that deep cultural ancestry remains an important force shaping the fortunes of modern nations, at least in part because democratic norms, institutions, and the factors that support them are more likely to diffuse between close cultural relatives.
| S-EPMC10426017 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Two studies (one preregistered) of Americans (N = 2200) drawn from a nationally representative panel show that both Democrats and Republicans personally value core democratic characteristics, such as free and fair elections, but severely underestimate opposing party members' support for those same characteristics. Democrats estimate that the average Democrat values democratic characteristics 56% (in Study 1) and 77% (in Study 2) more than the average Republican. In a mirror image, Republicans estimate that the average Republican values democratic characteristics 82% (in Study 1) and 88% (in Study 2) more than the average Democrat. In turn, the tendency to believe that political ingroup members value democratic characteristics more than political outgroup members is associated with support for anti-democratic practices, especially among Republicans. Results suggest biased and inaccurate intergroup perceptions may contribute to democratic erosion in the United States.
| S-EPMC9523060 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Video-sharing social media like YouTube provide access to diverse cultural products from all over the world, making it possible to test theories that the Web facilitates global cultural convergence. Drawing on a daily listing of YouTube's most popular videos across 58 countries, we investigate the consumption of popular videos in countries that differ in cultural values, language, gross domestic product, and Internet penetration rate. Although online social media facilitate global access to cultural products, we find this technological capability does not result in universal cultural convergence. Instead, consumption of popular videos in culturally different countries appears to be constrained by cultural values. Cross-cultural convergence is more advanced in cosmopolitan countries with cultural values that favor individualism and power inequality.
| S-EPMC5439684 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The current cross-cultural study aimed to extend research on parenting and children's prosocial behavior by examining relations among parental warmth, values related to family obligations (i.e., children's support to and respect for their parents, siblings, and extended family), and prosocial behavior during the transition to adolescence (from ages 9 to 12). Mothers, fathers, and their children (N = 1107 families) from 8 countries including 11 cultural groups (Colombia; Rome and Naples, Italy; Jordan; Kenya; the Philippines; Sweden; Thailand; and African Americans, European Americans, and Latin Americans in the United States) provided data over 3 years in 3 waves (Mage of child in wave 1 = 9.34 years, SD = 0.75; 50.5% female). Overall, across all 11 cultural groups, multivariate change score analysis revealed positive associations among the change rates of parental warmth, values related to family obligations, and prosocial behavior during late childhood (from age 9 to 10) and early-adolescence (from age 10 to 12). In most cultural groups, more parental warmth at ages 9 and 10 predicted steeper mean-level increases in prosocial behavior in subsequent years. The findings highlight the prominent role of positive family context, characterized by warm relationships and shared prosocial values, in fostering children's positive development in the transition to adolescence. The practical implications of these findings are discussed.
| S-EPMC8651236 | biostudies-literature
Project description:We investigate the role of values in motivating the dissolution of marriage. Drawing on comprehensive value frameworks, we study how cultural values explain cross-national variation in divorce, how personal values explain further variation within nations, and how the two value systems interact together. In three archival studies, including more than 100,000 participants from over 55 countries, we study attitudes toward divorce as well as actual divorce. We found that divorce was more justifiable and likely in nations emphasizing autonomy values, and among individuals ascribing importance to self-direction, stimulation, and hedonism values. Divorce was less justifiable and likely in nations emphasizing embeddedness values, and among individuals ascribing importance to tradition and conformity values. Overall, the impact of personal values was stronger the more the culture emphasizes autonomy (vs. embeddedness) values. Understanding the role of values in divorce may inform individuals as to the values they desire in their future spouses.
| S-EPMC11772675 | biostudies-literature
Project description:National responses to a pandemic require populations to comply through personal behaviors that occur in a cultural context. Here we show that aggregated cultural values of nations, derived from World Values Survey data, have been at least as important as top-down government actions in predicting the impact of COVID-19. At the population level, the cultural factor of cosmopolitanism, together with obesity, predict higher numbers of deaths in the first two months of COVID-19 on the scale of nations. At the state level, the complementary variables of government efficiency and public trust in institutions predict lower death numbers. The difference in effect between individual beliefs and behaviors, versus state-level actions, suggests that open cosmopolitan societies may face greater challenges in limiting a future pandemic or other event requiring a coordinated national response among the population. More generally, mass cultural values should be considered in crisis preparations.Supplementary informationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s43545-021-00080-2.
| S-EPMC7939727 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Associations between the STin2 and 5-HTTLPR polymorphisms within the serotonin transporter gene, SLC6A4, and culture across societies were examined. Based on an analysis of 75 primary studies (28,726 individuals), STin2 allelic frequencies were found to vary widely across countries, ranging from 26% in Germany to 85% in Singapore. Across 53 countries, and after controlling for all major environmental influences of culture, STin2 and 5-HTTLPR were found to explain 23.6% unique variance in monumentalism but none in individualism. Our findings evidence a significant role of genetics in predicting cross-societal cultural values variation, and potentially speak to the need for and importance of incorporating both nature and nurture in theories of cultural values variation across societies.
| S-EPMC10192116 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The current study examined the Five Cs model of positive youth development (PYD; Lerner et al., 2005) in U.S. Mexican-origin youth (N = 674, 50% female) and tested the extent to which ethnic pride, familismo, and respeto, as an index of cultural orientation, predicted PYD across midadolescence. PYD was modeled using a bifactor structure, which defined global PYD and the Five Cs (Caring, Character, Competence, Confidence, and Connection) using theoretically similar measures matched to the conceptual definitions of the Cs. Tests of longitudinal invariance of the bifactor model at ages 14 and 16 established scalar invariance, providing support for the structure and stability of the Five Cs and global PYD using the theoretically similar measures across time. Adolescents' cultural orientation (latent factor incorporating familismo, respeto, and ethnic pride) at age 14 was positively associated with the Five Cs within and across time. Greater cultural orientation at age 14 predicted increased global PYD across ages 14 and 16. The contribution of cultural orientation to the PYD across midadolescence did not differ by adolescent gender or nativity. These findings demonstrate the robust nature and stability of the Five Cs model of PYD and provide novel evidence that ethnic pride, familismo, and respeto promote greater PYD in Mexican-origin youth during midadolescence. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).
| S-EPMC10526651 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Social emotions are key to everyday social life and therefore shaped by cultural values in their expression. Prior research has focused on facial expressions of emotions. What is less clear, however, is the extent to which cultural values shape other modalities of emotional expression. In the present study, we applied a novel paradigm using depth sensor imaging technology to capture changes in participants' body posture in real time. We aimed to (1) identify the nuances in the postural expression that are thought to characterize social emotions and (2) assess how individual differences in cultural values impact the postural expression of emotions. Participants in two separate studies were 132 undergraduate college students whose upper-body postural expansion was recorded after they recalled emotion episodes. Positive emotions elevated participants' upper-body posture whereas negative emotions resulted in lowered upper-body posture. The effects on changes in upper-body posture were moderated by participants' self-ratings of the vertical and horizontal dimensions of individualism and collectivism. The findings provide initial evidence of the nuances in the way cultural values influence the postural expression of emotions.
| S-EPMC8222260 | biostudies-literature