Cultures differ in whether identity derives from relationships rather than from category membership

Evidence

Incorporating the distinction between relationshipand categorybased social identities can help make sense of some otherwise anomalous findings in the literature. When looking closely at spontaneously generated social identity descriptions in different cultures, a distinct pattern emerges: while collectivist participants in collectivist cultures generally refer more to social relationships and role identities, those in individualistic cultures are more likely to refer to social group or social category memberships (e.g., Watkins et al., 1998; see also, Brewer & Chen, 2007, for a consistent conclusion). — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1626

Categorization

• XREF: The relationship-vs-category distinction maps onto the Allport thread’s concern with how outgroups get constituted — a category-based self may more readily construct a category-based outgroup, suggesting a cognitive precondition for prejudice not captured by trait-level accounts. — connects to: Cultural identity for hunting peoples is defined by kinship relations with specific animals — Rebecca A. Martusewicz, Jeff Edmundson, and John Lupinacci, EcoJustice Education: Toward Diverse,…, 1648; Identity is constituted through social action and language rather than merely reflected in behavior — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 19; Local identity categories often explain linguistic practice better than analysts’ broad sociological categories. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 35 (+1 more)
• SEED: Essay angle: group prejudice may presuppose category-based self-conception, so relationship-centric cultures could resist classic ingroup-outgroup cognition and its tribal signatures.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1626