Proposed psychological differences between easterners and westerners 

Experiment 1: Cow, Chicken, and Grass

In one experiment, Developmental psychologist Liang-hwang Chiu showed American and Chinese children photos of a cow, a chicken, and grass; and asked whether the children would pair the cow with the grass or with the chicken. 

Which would you pair with the cow? The chicken, or the grass? 

As it turns out, Nisbett and his team found that most easterners pair together the cow and the grass, while most westerners pair together the cow and the chicken.

Experiment 2: Panda, Monkey, and Banana

In another experiment, Nisbett and his partners Li-jun Ji, Zhiyong Zhang compared US students with Taiwanese students by presenting them with three words - panda, monkey, banana. And asking them to indicate which two of the three were most closely related.

Nisbet’s team found that Westerners tend to focus on taxonomy, categorizations. And for this reason, they tend to pair together the cows and chickens, and the pandas and monkeys. Because they are animals. Easterners, on the other hand, tend to focus on relationships. And for this reason, they are more likely to pair together the cow and the grass (because the cow eats the grass). They also found that Western children tend to learn nouns faster than verbs. While Asian children tend to learn verbs faster than nouns.

Experiment 3: Mothers’ approach to child

In another study, conducted by Developmental psychologists Anne Fernald and Hiromi Morikawa in 1993, researchers went to the homes of mothers with infants six, twelve, or nineteen months old. They presented a stuffed dog and pig and a car and a truck. They asked the mothers to play with the toys with their babies as they normally would. 

As it turned out, American mothers used twice as many object labels as Japanese mothers ("piggie," "doggie") and Japanese mothers engaged in twice as many social routines of teaching politeness norms (empathy and greetings, for example). 

An American mother's patter might go like this: "That's a car. See the car? You like it? It's got nice wheels."

A Japanese mother might say: "Here! It's a vroom vroom. I give it to you. Now give this to me. Yes! Thank you." 

American children are learning that the world is mostly a place with objects, Japanese children that the world is mostly about relationships.

Nisbett writes, “Strange as it may seem to Westerners, Asians don't seem to regard object naming as part of the job description for a parent… American children are learning that the world is mostly a place with objects, Japanese children that the world is mostly about relationships.”

Experiment 4: Under the sea

Ok, another experiment. What do you see?

One of Richard Nisbett’s Japanese students, Taka Masuda, hypothesized that Asians typically view the world from a wide-angle lens, and westerners often have tunnel vision. He tested this by showing a series of colored underwater scenes to Japanese and American students. All scenes had at least one "focal" fish, who was larger, brighter, and faster-moving than anything else in the scene. 

“Each scene also contained some less rapidly moving animals, as well as plants, rocks, bubbles, etc.” When asked about what they had seen, Masuda found that Both eastern and western students reported about an equal number of references to the focal fish. But Japanese students made 60% more references to background elements - including the water, rocks, bubbles, and inert plants and animals. Japanese students also made twice as many references to relationships involving inert, background objects. And perhaps most interestingly, the first sentences of the Japanese students were usually referring to the environment - for instance, “It looked like a pond” Whereas the first sentence of American students were 3x as likely to refer to the focal fish

Experiment 5: Dax

Ok... another experiment! 

We start with a wooden cylinder. And we label this Dax. Which one of these two images would you also label Dax? The wooden triangle, or the metal cylinder?  

Cognitive psychologists Mutsumi Imae and Dedre Gentner found that, on average, across many trials with different objects, more than 2/3 of Americans called the metal cylinder a Dax, whereas more than 2/3 of Japanese people called the wooden triangle a Dax.

Anthropologists characterize the thinking style of the East as “Eastern Dialecticism,” compared to “Western Formal Logic.” 

Dialecticism

Dialecticism is any form of reasoning that finds harmony when presented with two contradictory Arguments.

If you’re familiar with the work of Hegel, in western Dialecticism, there’s a focus on finding a synthesis between two contradictory arguments. But in Eastern dialecticism, there is no synthesis; rather there merely is acceptance of two simultaneous contradictory truth claims. 

The Four tenets of eastern dialecticism

There are four basic tenets of Eastern Dialecticism. 

1. First, The Tao. In Eastern Dialecticism, the goal is knowing “The Way,” (The Tao) in order to find harmony with the Environment and with the community. 

2. Second, Change. Reality is a process of change. And what is currently true will soon be false. 

3. Third, Contradiction. Because change is constant, contradiction is also constant. It’s ok that things are one way today and will be different tomorrow. 

4. And lastly, Relationship - The whole is more than the sum of its parts. Parts are meaningful only in relation to the whole.

In the words of Richard Nisbett, “Change produces contradiction and contradiction causes change; constant change and contradiction imply that it is meaningless to discuss the individual part without considering its relationships with other parts and prior states.”

Eastern Dialecticism Vs. Western formal logic

Now, let us compare this Eastern Dialecticism to Western Formal Logic.

In Western Formal Logic, the goal is not to live harmoniously with nature, with the community. It is knowing and discovering the Truth. As compared to Eastern Dialecticism which embraces contradiction, Western Formal Logic embraces Noncontradiction. A and not-A can’t both be the case. Nothing can be and not be at the same time. As compared to Eastern Dialecticism which embraces Change, Western Formal Logic embraces Identity. A=A. Whatever is, is. A is itself and not some other thing. 

And there is Middle-Exclusion; that is, everything must either be A or not-A. Nothing in Western Formal Logic can be partially A. Of course, these are simplifications, but they are intended to highlight the differences between the two thinking styles. 

Do we find counterexamples? Of course! 

These are gross generalizations. But sometimes generalizations can be useful. And, of course, this is all muddied by an increase in globalization in the last 50 years. More westerners picking up eastern worldview, and more easterners picking up western worldview. What we’re analyzing here, though, is the traditional culture.