Is the east really different from the west: a cross-cultural study on information technology and decision making

With the growing globalization of business in today’s environment, increased multiculturalism has encouraged scholars to examine factors that enhance or inhibit the adaptation of organization and management practices across cultural boundaries (Adler 1983). Culture has been defined by Hofstede (1991) as “the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one category of people from those of another” (p. 5). Hofstede (1984) identified four constructs that have been the foundation of much cultural research: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism, and masculinity. Hall (1976) identified a communications context construct and, as did Hofstede and Bond (1988), identified a time perspective construct. These cultural variables are defined as follows: