Personal or self-interest is a psychological topic that continues to attract different views for a long time now. As a result, different theories have been developed to explain the self-centric motivation towards the interests of others. On one or many occasions, people have continued to express self-interest character in the choices they make every day. For starters, self-interest, which is done healthily, is not viewed as being selfish since it is the act of accomplishing self-goals and taking care of one's needs but not at the expense of others. However, different researchers and psychologists believe and argue that self-interest behavior is contributed and determined by various factors such as cultural and historical attributes of the person involved. The culture aspect of the behavior of self-centric is well studied and explained in a study performed by Kitayama, and Park, (2014) in their article entitled E rror-related brain activity reveals self-centric motivation: culture matters .
Summary of Psychological Process, Behavior, or Phenomenon
Kitayama and Park, (2014) asserts that different cultures have different perceptions and behaviors regarding self-centric interests. According to the study, culture matters and plays a significant role when defining and identifying the self-centric character among diversified cultures like the ones used in the study. The other primary focus of the article was two-sided and aimed at first testing whether the existing reasoning of self-interest is connected to neurobiological mechanisms of error processing. These mechanisms are positioned in the subcortical and ventral striatal regions (Kitayama, & Park, 2014). On the other hand, the article also focused on determining whether a cultural bond exists between neurobiological mechanisms and self-interest. The theory in the article dictates that Asians will portray weaker self-centric characteristics since they are considered to be more interdependent than the other cultures involved in the study. On the other hand, Europeans and Americans will have a more substantial self-centric effect, which is an indication of cultural differences in the neural marker of self-centric motivation.
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Description of the Features of the Groups/Cultures
In addition to determining the connection of self-interest to neurobiological mechanisms of error processing, the study also aimed to look deeper into how different cultures differ in terms of Self-Centric Motivation. Therefore, one requirement of the study was to involve the participant from different cultures from different countries. The cultures selected included European Americans and Asians who were further subdivided into other smaller groups of different cultures. A group consisting of thirty-nine undergraduate participants were selected from the University of Michigan, with 24 subjects being female (Kitayama, & Park, 2014). Specifically, European American subjects selected for the study were 19 where fourteen were females with an average age of 19.47. The remaining 20 were Asians with 10 females aged 19.70. Still on Asians, nine participants were born in Korea, China and Taiwan with less than seven years stay in the US while the rest were Asian-Americans. The sample population was required not to have spent more than seven years in the U.S. the other remaining number were those born and raised in the U.S who were all Asian Americans (Kitayama, & Park, 2014). All participants were rewarded with 20 dollars each as their compensation and others chose course credit over money for their participation. Generally, the participants were medically fit, and all were right-handed with normal vision.
Description of Research Findings
Although the differences are not with large margins, there is evidence that indeed different cultures differ in terms of self-centric over the other. Additionally, despite both cultures working hard for themselves and their friends, Error-related negativity expressed some differences that showed Asians to be more connected to their friends than the European Americans. Both cultures also showed no cultural differences in the form of independent self-interest but also proved that Asians are highly interdependent when compared to European Americans, but the difference was not that huge. On the other hand, the ERN for European Americans was higher, especially when they were trying to earn rewarding points for themselves than their friends (Kitayama, & Park, 2014). The results of the study assert that the ERN has shown motivational component, which is entwined with cognitive mechanisms to trigger error detection.
Explanation of Findings
Self-categorization and social identity theories demonstrate how the concepts of collectiveness and self-centric interact with each other, where they postulate that an individual can act as both a social group and a single person. Here, both social and individual persons exist objectively. Self-categorization of individual and social groups offers a binding exemplification of self in various social milieus. The study has shown that cultural differences do exist between European Americans and Asians. These differences can be explained by the behavioral theory that suggests that human behavior is learnt through interaction with social surroundings. Asians have shown high levels of interpersonal relations because they have grown up depending on and valuing one another. This strong bond is primarily due to their societal structure, which is highly collectivistic, which places value on interdependency. Asians have proven to limit contact with other people, which explains their unity. Additionally, Asian women tend to value cultural beliefs than European Americans, accounting for the observed findings. As mentioned, the fact that women were involved in the study contributes more to the cultural difference since they tend to value culture than Asian men. Another limitation to the study is the cultural disparity in self-serving bias, which depends entirely on explicit self-reports.
Conclusion
The study was able to prove the linkage between ERN and the motivational component of self-interest. With the kind of results, it is possible to expect more of the self-interest character other from individuals who are genetically predisposed toward reward seeking. The Asian culture did not indicate the self-centric effect since the results showed that they cared for their friends just as they did for themselves. The effect was absent in the self-report and ERN as well as post-error slowing reports. It does not mean that Asians do not care about themselves since it is their nature to extend their self-love to others. European Americans, on the other hand, indicated a high effect of self-interests but later reported that they worked hard for both self and other in the same way. Therefore, future studies need to focus on how different cultures differ in terms of self-centric effect and what leads to these differences.
Reference
Kitayama, S., & Park, J. (2014). Error-related brain activity reveals self-centric motivation: culture matters . Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143 (1), 62-70.
