In this chapter, we review cultural differences in people’s attitudes about competition, why cultures differ in competition, and how they compete in different ways. Researchers have long associated collectivistic culture with harmony and cooperation. However, the bulk of the evidence suggests...

Using two nationally representative surveys, we find that people in China's historically rice-farming areas are less happy than people in wheat areas. This is a puzzle because the rice area is more interdependent, and relationships are an important predictor of happiness. We explore how the...

Wealthy nations led health preparedness rankings in 2019, yet many poor nations controlled COVID-19 better. We argue that a history of rice farming explains why some societies did better. We outline how traditional rice farming led to tight social norms and low-mobility social networks. These...

In the early days of the coronavirus outbreak, we observed mask use in public among 1,330 people across China. People in regions with a history of farming rice wore masks more often than people in wheat regions. Cultural differences persisted after taking into account objective risk factors such...

Cross-cultural psychologists have mostly contrasted East Asia with the West. However, this study shows that there are psychological differences within China almost as large as differences between East and West. We propose that a history of farming rice makes cultures more interdependent, while...

Abstract: Biologists and social scientists have long tried to understand why some societies have more fluid and open interpersonal relationships, and how those differences influence culture. This study measures relational mobility, a socioecological variable quantifying voluntary (high...

Previous studies have found that high-status people are more individualistic and think more analytically than people of lower social status. We find new evidence that this is not always the case. We tested a large sample (N = 1,418) of people across China on analytic thought and the friend-...

Data recently published in PNAS mapped out regional differences in the tightness of social norms across China. Norms were tighter in developed, urbanized areas and weaker in rural areas. We tested whether historical paddy rice farming has left a legacy on social norms in modern China. Pre-modern...

Why are megachurches (at least 2,000 attendees in weekend services) and Meetup groups (www.meetup.com) more popular in some cities or states than others? Our answer: residential mobility (when people move a lot, they like groups that are easy to join and easy to leave; they might move again soon,...

Roughly 4 billion people live in cultures with a legacy of rice farm. Recent studies find that rice cultures are more interdependent than herding cultures and wheat-farming cultures. In China, people from rice-farming areas think more holistically and show less implicit individualism than people...