Impact of Cultural Dimensions to Individualism, and Collectivism Dimension

Globalization is growing and barriers seem to be dwindling. Therefore, trade barriers are eliminated, communication channels are simplifying business processes and the world appears to be shrinking to a village (Werlen, 2000, p. 23). The internalization of firms is a strategically planned result that has been motivated by major considerations, and one main factor for decision-making is the conception of psychic distance. Psychic distance is based on the cognitions of other cultures and influences the internationalization processes. Dow (2008, p. 1) revealed six main influencing factors: cultural differences, language, religion, level of education, industrial development and political system. Culture is a ambiguous construct and understanding how culture relates to psychological phenomena is essential to analyze the determining dimensions such as the individualism and collectivism dimension. There exists a broad vision of cultural dimensions and a controversial discussion is ongoing. The focus of these discussions is the differentiation between cultural values