Pathogen prevalence predicts human cross-cultural variability in individualism/collectivism
Pathogen prevalence predicts human cross-cultural variability in individualism/collectivism
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DOI：
10.1098/rspb.2008.0094
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发表时间：
2008-06-07
影响因子：
4.7
通讯作者：
Schaller, Mark
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Fincher, Corey L.;Thornhill, Randy;Schaller, Mark
致病性疾病对宿主群体的社会行为施加选择压力。在人类（智人）中，许多心理现象似乎都具有抗病原体防御功能。一个广泛的含义是人类认知和行为中存在跨文化差异，这取决于当地生态中病原体的相对存在。我们特别关注一个基本的文化变量：个人主义价值观与集体主义价值观的差异。我们认为集体主义的特定行为表现（如民族中心主义、从众）可以抑制病原体的传播；因此，我们假设集体主义（与个人主义相比）更常成为历史上病原体流行率较高的地区文化的特征。借鉴流行病学数据和全球个人主义/集体主义跨国调查结果，我们的结果支持了这一假设：病原体的地区流行率与集体主义文化指标呈强正相关，与个人主义呈强负相关。即使控制了潜在的混杂变量，相关性仍然显着。这些结果有助于解释范式跨文化差异的起源，并揭示以前未记录的致病性疾病对人类社会可变性质的影响。
Pathogenic diseases impose selection pressures on the social behaviour of host populations. In humans (Homo sapiens), many psychological phenomena appear to serve an antipathogen defence function. One broad implication is the existence of cross-cultural differences in human cognition and behaviour contingent upon the relative presence of pathogens in the local ecology. We focus specifically on one fundamental cultural variable: differences in individualistic versus collectivist values. We suggest that specific behavioural manifestations of collectivism (e.g. ethnocentrism, conformity) can inhibit the transmission of pathogens; and so we hypothesize that collectivism (compared with individualism) will more often characterize cultures in regions that have historically had higher prevalence of pathogens. Drawing on epidemiological data and the findings of worldwide cross-national surveys of individualism/collectivism, our results support this hypothesis: the regional prevalence of pathogens has a strong positive correlation with cultural indicators of collectivism and a strong negative correlation with individualism. The correlations remain significant even when controlling for potential confounding variables. These results help to explain the origin of a paradigmatic cross-cultural difference, and reveal previously undocumented consequences of pathogenic diseases on the variable nature of human societies.