SENSITIVITY OF CHINESE AND AMERICAN-CHILDREN TO SOCIAL INFLUENCES

The present experiment studied cross-cultural differences in imitation and conformity between American and Chinese children in a series of ambiguous perceptual tasks. Three hundred and twenty Chinese and American second-grade boys and girls were exposed to experimental treatments, such as material reinforcement and model status/competence manipulations, and their imitation of the choices of 40 models in a paired setting was analyzed. As compared to a single, continuous measurement of imitation, a two-dimensional conformity-anticonformity-independence framework was more discriminative and was able to show the following cultural differences: (a) more Chinese were either conformers or anticonformers, and more Americans were independent of the model's choice; (b) Chinese were more sensitive, whereas Americans were more indifferent to the status/competence treatments of the model; (c) Chinese girls conformed more than Chinese boys whereas no difference was found between American girls and boys. However, the material reinforcement used failed to influence children of either nationality in any significant way. Thus Hsu's hypothesis that Chinese children are socialized earlier in life and are more responsive to environmental influences than American children was partly supported. © 1979 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.