magazine issue 10 2009 / Issue 10

Culture and Health Psychology: Insights from a Socio-Cultural Perspective

• written by Ayse K. Uskul & David Sherman
• edited by Selin Kesebir

Culture and health communication. Studies testing the effectiveness of health communication targeting an audience of diverse cultural backgrounds have begun to incorporate messages congruent with the audience’s prevalent cultural frame. The underlying assumption is that if health communications match culturally salient characteristics, messages will feel more relevant and therefore will be more likely to influence judgments about appropriate behaviour. Indeed, research shows that messages are more persuasive when there is a match between the recipient’s cognitive (e.g., Petty, Wheeler, & Bizer, 2000) or motivational (e.g., Cesario, Grant, & Higgins, 2004; Sherman, Mann, & Updegraff, 2006) characteristics and the content or framing of the message. For example individuals with a tendency to be more responsive to cues of reward are more convinced when presented with messages framed in terms of benefits of flossing one’s teeth, whereas those with a tendency to be more responsive to cues of threat or punishment are more convinced when messages are framed in terms of the costs of failing to floss one’s teeth (Sherman et al., 2006).

Recent research suggests that matching health communications to motivational strategies adopted at varying levels by different cultural groups is a way to positively influence health behaviour change. Recent work by Uskul, Sherman, and Fitzgibbon (2009) on the use of dental floss tested the hypothesis that health messages will be more persuasive if they are congruent with the cultural patterns of motivational strategies predominant in Western (individualistic) and Eastern (collectivistic) cultures. They drew on the literature suggesting that people from individualistic cultures are more motivated to seek positive outcomes whereas those from more collectivistic cultures are more motivated to avoid negative outcomes (Lee et al., 2000). Individualistic white British participants (who were more focused on seeking positive opportunities) were more persuaded (i.e., had more positive attitudes and stronger intentions to floss) when they received the message framed in terms of the benefits of flossing (gain-frame) than when they received the message framed in terms costs of failing to floss (loss-frame). By contrast, the collectivistic East-Asian participants (who were more focused avoiding negative contingencies) were more persuaded when they received the loss-framed message than the gain-framed message. Thus, the interplay of individual difference factors (motivational orientation), socio-cultural factors (cultural background), and situational factors (message frame) influenced important factors related to health behavior change.

To examine the effect of matching message content to culturally shaped aspects of the self, Uskul and Oyserman (in press) have employed a culturally informed social cognition framework (see Oyserman & Lee, 2008) which suggests that what comes to mind at a given moment depends on the available cues in one’s environment, and momentary cues can increase salience of culturally shaped orientations in ways of information processing. Specifically, they tested the effectiveness of culturally matched health messages after making salient the dominant cultural orientation. Matching health messages to salient cultural orientation increased persuasiveness; further, culturally relevant messages were more persuasive if they come after being reminded of one’s dominant cultural orientation. Individualist European Americans primed to focus on individualism were more persuaded by health messages associating health behavior with negative physical consequences for the self, whereas collectivistic Asian Americans primed to focus on collectivism were more persuaded by health messages associating health behavior with negative social consequences. Thus, message effectiveness can be increased by reminding potential recipients of their dominant cultural orientation.