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Cultural differences between China and United states

Group Project
By
Tina Chen and Judit Alphonse
IMS 3310.001

Abstract:

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Purpose: China and United States are completely different in terms of background and nature of
their cultures. Both of these countries point of views on business is entirely different. The
United States and China have been conducting business with each other frequently in recent
years. On their way in doing business, both of the countries face several problems including
differences in language, foods, values, and habits. The differences between these two countries
might delayed the success of their business. It is extremely important that expatriates understand
these kinds of problems in terms of business between two countries. If both countries expatriates
understand each others cultural differences, they can reduce the chances of having any
unpleasant misunderstandings and have a great experience in doing business with each other.
Design/Methodology/Approach: This particular paper is spotlighting on the cultural differences
between United States and China. The cultural differences valued based on these two surveys:
Hofstede Values Dimensions and Rokeach Values Survey helped to complete this paper. The
difference in the belief, culture, and lifestyle of these two countries play a big role to influence
their business decisions making.
Findings: In business, knowing the cultural differences and how it has impact on decision
making might allow long term business relationship more likely to success.
Research limitations/Implications: Each of every research generally understands and expresses
each of the countrys culture and values.

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Practical implications: Every country has their own unique system to operate in terms of the
economy, values, beliefs and politics. In global business, every country should identify and
understand the countrys they are conducting business with in terms of the values, beliefs,
culture, and economy in order to maintain a successful business.
Originality/ Values: This paper will demonstrate the cultural difference between United States
and China using examples, surveys and models. To get more in depth about the cultural
difference between these two countries, individual can read this paper to have a better
understanding on this topic.
Keywords: United States, China, Global business, Rokeach values, Hofstedes Values
Dimensions, Culture, Guanxi.

Introduction

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Global business plays a very important role in between countries in this contemporary
world. Multinational business is a bridge to understand two countries in terms of language
differences, cultural difference and background, cuisine, religious beliefs, norms and technology
development. In managers perspective when they do and develop the business in international
level, understanding the cultures and their business ethics would improve their countries
economics system (Gift.M).
Global business not only gives benefits, at the same time there are some negative
conflicts would arise when two countries agreed to d business. According to C Liu.et.al, China
and United States has three conflict behaviors in terms of intellectual differences. Those three
conflicts are collectivistic, Confucianism and social connections.
Chinese people consider themselves as collectivistic and socially connect with each other
(Hofsteade, 2001). On the other hand, Americans consider themselves as individuals in terms of
everything.
Second conflict is Confucianism, means that they do not like to get embarrassed or afraid
of shame (Hofsteade, 2001). In terms of behavior, Chinese people control their negative behavior
in public. Also they believe that controlling their negative behavior would change the conflict
situation. In contrast, Americans do not control their personal emotions and behavior in public.
As an individual Americans tend to express more anger frequently in a conflict situation
(Markus).

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Third conflict is social connections, explains that Chinese people are family oriented and
they like to be connecting with the surrounding and their co workers. Likewise, Americans are
not family oriented and they like to do everything individually.
When comes to business, both countries should get to each others cultural values and
differences in order avoid conflicts. Lack of understanding would create wrong decisions and
unsatisfied business at the end.

Languages Differences
Communication is one important factor that is absolutely needed for any type of business.
Knowing the language of the country a company is about to conduct business with is definitely
important, language is one interesting topic and worth to be mentioned as part of the cultural
differences between China and US. Even though China is one country with all Chinese, there are
actually seven major groups of dialects of the Chinese language that has been spoken in the
country which refer to the regional languages. Unlike the United States, English is the standard
language that everyone uses to communicate with one another among the US people. As for
China, each of the dialect has its variation. Most of the people in China speak mandarin,
estimated 71.5 percent of the population, then Wu, which only has about 8.5 percent of
population that speaks the dialect. The third one is Cantonese, which 5 percent of the population
uses this dialect. Followed by Xiang, 4.8 percent, Min 4.1 percent, Hakka, 3.7 percent and last

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Cultural differences between China and United states

but not least, Gan 2.4 percent. The 1.2 billion of people in China speaks one or more varieties of
Chinese.
Hofstedes Five Cultural Dimensions
Geert Hofstede studied on differences in cultures and he developed a model that
demonstrated five dimensions which he did his research on in many countries back in 1967 to
1973. According to Geert Hofstedes Cultural Dimensions, it is a framework that is to help to
assess a selected culture and so to understand it in depth thus for better decision making. it is
based on values that can be placed within these dimensions below: Power distance, individualism
vs. collectivism, uncertainty avoidance index, masculinity vs. femininity, long term orientation
vs. short term orientation.
The first dimension is Power distance, according to Hofstede, power distance is the
extent to which the less powerful members of organizations and institutions (like the family)
accept and expect that power is distributed unequally. (Hofstede, 1984). This dimension is to
analyze the people in a given culture about how they feel toward the different level of power
distribution within a country. In large power distance societies would have characteristics that
include centralized authority, autocratic leadership, centralized authority, multiple hierarchical
levels, and a big amount of the supervisory staff, has the concept that power had its privileges,
and understanding there is an inequality of power differences. In societies that have small power
distances tend to have characteristics include the decentralized authority and the responsibility of
making decisions, as well as having flat organizational structure with very small amount of the

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supervisory staff. Also. The societies are usually lacking acceptance and authority in
questionings. Last but not least, they have the tendency toward the belief in the equality of all
people, especially in life of social, political, and economics.
The second dimension is Individualism vs. collectivism. Individualistic focuses more on
oneself; everything is focus on I or ones that are really close to them, for instance, their loved
ones. They strongly valued their own goals, interests, privacy, independence and self sufficiency.
They believe and pursue their own happiness, things that they enjoy, mostly go after pleasure.
They are likely to care for the social norms or their responsibilities, duties. As well as believing
beliefs in their own way of living, their unique lifestyle. The Individualistic usually have
horizontal relationship which is more spouse to spouse, they are more likely to rely on each
other. On the other hand, collectivism is totally the opposite. Collectivistic are more into group
interest, strongly focus on we, they often pursue social harmony. They strongly believe in
complete a task as a group would be stronger verses one individual trying to complete a task.
Also, they value group interest way more than personal interest. One person would be willing to
give up his or her personal interest just to reach the groups harmony. Every decision making is
to be made as a whole instead of individual. They tend to follow the rules and see great
importance of having the social norms. Stronger believers in hierarchy within a formed group;
usually they tend to form in small groups and they would make sure they take good care and be
considerate about the group members. It is important to have a great balance and harmony within
the group. Very opposite from the individualistic when it comes to the relationship, instead of

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having horizontal relationships, they prioritized their relationship in a vertical way like parents to
children.
Third dimension is Uncertainty Avoidance. It is defined as how people act in a societys
tolerance for any uncertainty, unclear situations which refer to how uncomfortable the people are
and try to avoid it by using the behavior codes. With a society that is strong believers of
Uncertainty Avoidance would avoid making any decisions under an unknown situation, they are
usually very uncomfortable with a unconstructed situations and they have no tolerance. They
are Active, aggressive, emotional, security-seeking, and intolerant (Hofstede, 1984). With a
society that has low uncertainty avoidance, they tend to more of the risk takers side and they
have fewer of the formal and informal governing structures. Usually, they are less religiously
engaged. When conducting business in the low Uncertainty Avoidance societies, be prepared
with their new ideas to be presented and accepted, as opposed to the society with large
uncertainty avoidance which one really need to be patient, they are the opposite, they tend to
make decisions fairly quickly. Knowing the concept of uncertainty avoidance is very important
and it is critical to negotiators for businesses. When a negotiator can clearly identify and learn his
or her own culture, he or she would be able to resemble their own culture. Then they would need
to identify and learn the culture they are about to negotiate with, by knowing and get full
understand of both culture would most likely to have a smooth negotiation process and result in
one agreement.

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Masculinity vs. Femininity is the fourth dimension, which is defined as the two different
socially role for men and women. As for the role of the men, they are socially expected to be
very ambitious, strong, and competitive, always pursue success. On the other hand, women
should be serving for the non quality of life, as for their children or the weak. With a culture that
has high masculinity indicates that there is an existence of a high level of gender differentiation.
They tend to be more ego oriented, money and materialistic things are important; there would be
a gender differences in terms of job paying and management positions. Religion is also very
important to them and only men can become priests. Having a very traditional family structure as
boys do not cry they only fight conversely, girls cry but they do not fight. As for a culture that
has low Masculinity, the people would be more relationship oriented, they believe in people are
very important. They tend to care a lot about the quality of their lives and they work to live as
opposed to strong masculinity society who lives to work. When a conflict arises, the people use
negotiation skills to solve the problem vs. culture with high Masculinity; people use force to
solve the problems. There tend to be a smaller gap on wages, more women are in managements,
and people tend to have preferences on fewer working hours. As well as the flexible family
structure, in school, boys and girls are equal thus they both cry; neither of them fights. If facing
an obstacle or with a failing situation, it is seen as a minor accident, vs. strong masculinity view
it as a disaster.
Long Term Orientation which was added by Hofstede after the first original four, and the
purpose was to differentiate the process of thinking differences between the East and West, this is

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the cultural characteristics that is defined as the perspective of peoples time. Hofstede developed
a Chinese value survey and distributed to 23 countries, having the results and knowing the
influence on the philosophy of Confucius of the East, the Long Term Orientation vs Short Term
Orientation was created as the fifth dimension. The characteristics of Long Term orientation are
that people are persistence; they would maintain their purpose despite of difficulty or obstacles.
People were taught to be thrifty, as well as learn to save for future. Usually they have a strong
sense in shame when doing or saying anything in a negative way. For Short Term Orientation,
they value personal steadiness and stability. It is very important to protect their face, respect
the tradition, and fulfilling social obligations. When it comes to conducting business, manager
might want to have business decision making based on the Long Term Orientation, it benefits the
business better by reducing the chances of possible errors.
Hofstedes 5 cultural dimensions for China

Dimension
China score

PDI

IDV

UAI

MAS

LTO

80

20

30

66

118

Sources was obtained from website: http://geert-hofstede.com/china.html

PDI= Power Distance, IDV= Individualism, UAI= Uncertainty Avoidance, MAS=Masculinity,
LTO=Long Term Orientation
From the table above that shows the Hofstedes 5 culture dimension of China
demonstrated high level of Power Distance, China scored 80 compares to the worlds average of

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56.5. The society has great respect for elderly, when greeting one to another, people would start
greeting the elders first then to the younger ones. The social status is recognized by their age,
work experience, the university and degrees that a person graduated from. Always address
someone by their title with their last name. Never call someone by their first name until they
allow doing so. Employees in China always obey their seniors workers or whoever has higher
position than them. Workers in China usually try their best to get promoted or obtain a higher
position title, because that represents their social status. The higher your position is the more
respect you will get from people; which means better reputation; Chinese call it save the face.
The higher ones position is the more power he or she has. Thus, they will have many followers
who will be treating them with all respect. If an employee has different opinion than the
manager, most likely he or she is going to keep it to him or herself, or try to talk to manager
privately. They believe it would bring negative impression to the manager if different opinion is
voiced in public, in order to save the face of their manager, it is better to stay quiet at the time.
This concept of social status on respect the elders were originally from the philosophy of
Confucius. It was stated as son and daughters should listen and pay respect to parents as parents
should provide love, care and kindness to children, King should care and respect his chancellor
as chancellor should show full loyalty to the king. This concept from 2000 years ago and is still a
concept that people follow and practice in.
Chinas score of 20 is fairly low in the dimension of Individualism. It indicates that the
culture believe in Collectivism. It means they care for bigger group as a whole vs. one self.

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Chinese has a strong mind set on personal relationship; in Chinese they called it Guanxi.
Having a great relationship with people who they work with is their number one priority on the
list. They strongly believe in having close relationship to their co workers, exchange all
information needed, hearing opinions from each other, instead of trusting their own instincts and
judgments. They are also heavily relying on each other, especially with their family, which is
known for the cheapest type of guanxi one can have, because they do not need to spend money to
build relationship with family.
With a score of 30, China also scored really low with uncertainty avoidance. Business
people tend to play business games safely, thus they make all decisions cautiously. They rather
take their steps slowly than taking a risk, they want to know and make sure they are in control of
all decisions and outcomes; they do not like unclear or unpredictable decisions or outcome. A
great example would be students in China, most of them pick their major and school from their
possible future opportunities. They might have no interest in the path they choose but they would
take their parents, professor, and elders suggestions over their own. Again, they would not want
to take any risk and end up regretting their own decision by choosing what their interests are or
what they actually like to do.
China is definitely a masculine country that they value the importance to work, their
strong belief in living to work. Since the men in China have the status of being ambitious, strive
for success, being competitive naturally results in situation where many men would live in a
different country for years on his own just to work and make lots of money and send the money

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back to home. They tend to not care as much when it comes to building family relationship or the
quality of lives.
With a high score of 118 on the Long Term Orientation, it represents the measurement of
the cultures patience, their persistence, and how they overcome any obstacles in the ways. The
Long-Term Orientation (LTO) dimension measures the extent a culture participates in long term
relationships (Ray 2011).
Hofstedes 5 Cultural Dimensions for United States

Dimension

PDI

IDV

UAI

MAS

LTO

US

40

91

46

62

30

Sources was obtained from website: http://geert-hofstede.com/china.html

PDI= Power Distance, IDV= Individualism, UAI= Uncertainty Avoidance, MAS=Masculinity,
LTO=Long Term Orientation
United scored 40 on Power Distance, which indicates that they are not likely to accept
unfairness. Americans are more willing to stand up for themselves, fight for justice and their
rights. Between the upper managers and employees, employees are more likely to speak up their
opinions, and would not just follow everything the upper managers say.

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Cultural differences between China and United states

With the high score of 91 on the dimension of Individualism shows how much Americans
value themselves and how independent people should be and they should be in control of their
lives and situations. Compared to Chinese people, they tend to think as a group and usually leave
important decision up the upper management. A big difference between United States and China
is that Americans tend to keep their personal life and work life separate and keep it simple, as
opposed to Chinese people believe that is important to build close relationship with their co
workers.
United States scored 46 on Uncertainty Avoidance, even though it is not very high but it
is higher than Chinas score of 30. This shows that Americans are more willing to take risks
when they conduct businesses. They are willing to easier to accept any uncertainty or
unpredictable situations and also like to come up with their own ways to solve problems. On the
other hand, Chinese tend to be more reserved when it comes to decision making and thus they
are less likely to take risks. They like to do business safely and prefer to take instructions from
their upper management.
High score on Masculinity is the measurement of a countrys value on the importance of
the quality of life. Comparing the US and China, their score is actually pretty close, 66 and 62.
Both countries value their quality of life about the same level. Being the employees in China, it
is a very competitive country which everyone strives for success; similarity for United States,
people are also competitive and always try their best to move up to higher positions. There is an
inequality between the expectation of women and men in China. The society believes that men

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Cultural differences between China and United states

should be responsible to bring money home and support the family and women are mostly
housewives.
Comparing the score on Long Term Orientation between China and United States, China
has 118 and US has 30. This indicates that Chinese are more persistence, thrifty, have much more
patience, willing to take time when it comes to an issue comparing to the people in the Unites
States who believe in immediate actions.
Religious Difference between China and United States
Freedom for religion is very important thing in the business world. Fewer people do not
believe religion, on the other hand maximum number of people strongly believes in their
religion. Most of the time ethical behavior and norms determine based on how religious a person
is. Lack of understanding between countries would make a huge impact on their global business.
Since China is a multi religious country, there are five religions in China which are
Buddhism, Protestantism, Taoism, Islam and Christianity. 80.27 million People has changed
their mind and turned into atheism by 2010. (Du.X.x). at the same time the author says that 1.2
million people have the right to choose their religion, beliefs and values. Religion and ethical
behavior correlated each other. If managers and higher representatives believe in religion then,
they follow the rules and norms in business in order to maintain an unbiased business. According
to the article Does religion . the author mentioned, religion is playing a significant role in
individual life and business in China. When China does business with any other countries around

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the world, their religious norms and believes influence in their business in a positive way
(Du.X.x).
On the other hand, according to the first amendment in United States all the people in
United States have the right to choose their own religion and perform the rituals. Majority of the
people follow Christianity, and fewer percentage does not believe in religion. Since America
welcomed all country people, they all have different religion including Catholic, Hindu, Muslims
and Buddhists. In this contemporary word religion is a focal point and playing an important role
in United States business.
Among the Asian countries China is the most favorable and strongest country to perform
global business. Since Unites States has their most of the business with china, both countries
should respect their religion in order to precede the business and develop their national
relationship. China and the United States juxtapose each other on religious issues. While
religion has few implication for Chinas foreign policies, one distinct source of individuals
interpretation of US activities in the global community derives from their religious beliefs and
principles (Kim.M). Over all, China and United States has their own religion believes and
norms which influence in their business globally.
These two countries not only influence in their business they also influence another Asian
countries such as Malaysia, Singapore and Srilanka.

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Cultural differences between China and United states

Comparison of US and Chinas influence in Asia, by religious affiliation. (Notes. The

influence variables range from 0 (very bad) to 4 (very good). The religious affiliations are
arranged from the largest gap to the lowest between the United States and China.). Source: Asia
Barometer, 2003. (Kim.M)
Furthermore, China and United states has to be respect their religion, especially now a
days there is a certain religion go beyond everything including killing people crucially which is
not acceptable by any countries. When two countries agreed to do business in short term or long
run, they suppose to respect each other, and their religion whether they belief it or not give and
take each others respect is important to successfully continue their business and enhance their
value economically.
Food and beverage difference in China and United states
Food itself gives explanation that what is their culture and its meaning. Every culture has
different and unique food and beverages in order to express their healthier culture and satisfied
their essential need. Some countries differentiate their food from regular meal and occasional
meal.
If there is anything we are serious about, it is neither religion nor learning, but food.
This is how Sinologist Lin Yutang (1936, p.138) introduces his countrymen to foreign readers
(Qin.J). The above single quote explains very well that, how well food is important for Chinese.
According to Qin.J, Chinese has a three meals system which is breakfast, lunch and dinner. In

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Cultural differences between China and United states

terms of beverages, tea is always is in the first place. There are varieties of tea including
tieguanyin, Chrysanthemum tea, and pearl milk tea. Chinese people eat cooked food and raw
food. Cooked food and regular meals are Ma Po tofu, Gong Bao chicken, Dumplings, Wontons,
Chow Mein, spring rolls and Peking roasted duck.
According to Qio.J, Chinese food has correlated with human emotions. If a person has
vegetarian then that persons patience, kindheartedness and inner peace would increase than the
other people who eat meat and stuff like that. Chinese time for eat breakfast, lunch and dinner is
7.00 am, 12.30 pm and 6.30 pm respectively.
United States does not have cultural food to identify their culture by themselves. Fast
food represents the United States food culture such as hamburgers, potato fries, hot dogs,
macaroni and cheese. Since America welcoming different ethnicity from variety of countries,
those countries food influence the originality of the United States food.
China and United has two contradicted food culture even though when they do business
they both suppose to respect and try their cultural food due to business courtesy.
Limitations and Suggestions Future Research
This research paper simply shows the culture differences and behaviors of people in two
different countries, China and United States. As stated from the Hofstedes 5 cultural dimensions,
it is clear to see how they can influence people from two different countries when conducting
businesses. It has limitation because there should be more topics that are not covered in these

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cultural dimensions and has not yet been developed, more likely there are exceptions that are not
presented in this paper.
The study of the differences in cultures are not simply just in the 5 cultural dimensions,
there should be more opportunities for future research on cultures that are more in depth. People
from China and Unites have different ways of thinking, values, cultures which has a big impact
when it comes to making business decisions. It would be great to conduct future research on
younger generation of Chinese people who have their education in United States and Americans
who have their educations in China, and see what the differences would be and what the score
would be in these 5 dimensions.

Work cited
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Du, X,x. (2013). Does Religion Matter to Owner-Manager Agency Costs? Evidence

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Kim.M. (2013). Too Far, Too Close: Religious Affiliations and Asians Perceptions of

US and Chinas Influence Too Far, Too Close: Religious and Asians Perceptions of US and
Chinas influence. International Studies Perspectives, 14(1), 56-78. Doi:10.1111/j. 15283535.2012.00485.x

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Cultural differences between China and United states

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Qin, J. (2014). Food and Binary Oppositions in the Chinese Meal System. Society,

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