The global ecology of differentiation between us and them

Humans distinguish between we-groups and they-groups, such as relatives versus strangers and higher-ups versus lowerdowns, thereby creating crucial preconditions for favouring their own groups while discriminating against others. Reported here is the finding that the extent of differentiation between us and them varies along latitude rather than longitude. In geographically isolated preindustrial societies, intergroup differentiation already peaked at the equator and tapered off towards the poles, while being negligibly related to longitude (observation study 1). Contemporary societies have evolved even stronger latitudinal gradients of intergroup differentiation (survey study 2 around 1970) and discrimination (mixed-method study 3 around 2010). The geography of contemporary differentiation and discrimination can be partially predicted by tropical climate stress (warm winters, hot summers and irregular rainfall), largely mediated by the interplay of pathogen stress and Agricultural subsistence (explanatory study 4). The findings accumulate into an index of intergroup discrimination by inhabitants of 222 countries (integrative study 5)

Apple iPhone: A Market Case Study

Founded in 1976, Apple inc. quickly became one of the biggest companies in the world. Throughout the years, Apple has been apart of the technology market where there has been an exponential amount of opportunities and threats. This market case study aims to determine how Apple can target such opportunities to help predict future trends and influences over the market. To identify these trends and market influences, I have first conducted an environmental scan of Apple’s current and future market(s). Then I described Apple’s fundamental psychological and sociocultural consumer behaviors. And finally, I identified Apple’s target market, how they have chosen to segment and the demographics and geographics within Apple’s largest target segments. As a result of successfully identifying trends in the past, Apple continues to impress with its globally known brand name and customer base/market. However, Apple must continue to identify future opportunities to stay relevant in the ever-advancing technological market. This analysis of the marketing context suggests Apple may need to re-position its iPhones to maintain its leading position in the marketplace

Cultural Orientations of Northerners and Southerners

A growing group of psychologists recognizes that many collective mindsets and practices are functionally linked to natural habitats, which predominantly differ from north to south. Notably, cultural collectivism, power distance and aggression increase from the South Pole toward the Equator but decrease from the Equator toward the North Pole; conversely, cultural creativity, gender equality and life satisfaction decrease from the South Pole toward the Equator but increase from the Equator toward the North Pole. None of these cultural orientations varies considerably in east-west direction. Both theoretically and empirically, the most plausible explanation is that societies at higher latitudes adopt greater internal flexibility in response to greater habitat variability, consisting of daylength variability, climatic variability (cold, heat, dryness, wetness) and biotic variability in plants and animals. This variability explanation has deep historical roots as evidenced by the predictability of current geographical differences in culture on the basis of north-south differences in vertical collectivism and gender equality across mutually isolated pre-industrial societies

Creating cultures between arctics and deserts

Climato-economic theorizing explains why and how inhabitants adapt culturallyto their habitat. In demandingly cold or hot habitats with poor monetaryresources, inhabitants create threat appraisals, survival goals, ingroup agency,and autocracy, converging into a cultural threat syndrome. In demandingly coldor hot habitats with rich monetary resources, inhabitants create challengeappraisals, self-expression goals, individual agency, and democracy, converginginto a cultural challenge syndrome. In between, in undemandingly temperateclimates, inhabitants create comfort appraisals, easygoing goals, convenientagency, and laissez-faire outcomes, converging into a cultural comfort syndrome.This review culminates with a regression equation that accounts for 56% of thevariation in threat-based versus challenge-based cultural syndromes across 129countries. On the basis of that regression equation and data from theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a plan is sketched to forecastworldwide changes in culture

Cold, heat, wealth, and culture

This chapter entertains the question of how, or rather, why fundamental freedoms are unevenly distributed around the globe. We propose an explanation in terms of climatic cold and heat ranging from undemanding to demanding, and economic wealth ranging from poor to rich. Fundamental freedoms appear to increase in a stepwise manner in populations faced with threatening (demanding, poor) to unthreatening (undemanding, poor) to unchallenging (undemanding, rich) to challenging (demanding, rich) places of residence. This ecological regularity applies to freedom from ingroup-outgroup discrimination, freedom from hierarchical discrimination, freedom from corruption, freedom from aggression, freedom to trust, and freedom to be creative. As an additional discovery, we find increases in cultural expressions of freedom away from the threatening places of residence around the equator toward the challenging places of residence at higher latitudes in both hemispheres. The observed ecological and latitudinal trends are generalizable across cultural freedoms, across space, and across time.   Many civilizations have worshipped the Sun or the Earth—and for good reasons. If the Sun would shine from farther away or closer up, humankind would freeze to death in the cold or burn to death in the heat. If the Earth would not spin around the Sun and around its own tilted axis, its inhabitants would freeze to death in the one hemisphere with eternal winter or burn to death in the opposite hemisphere with eternal summer. Indeed, the Sun’s radiation and the Earth’s rotation support life. Conversely, all living species on our planet must carefully navigate between climatic cold and heat. These adaptations are particularly relevant to humans, who feed on plants and animals. As a notable consequence, few of our ancestors have migrated to arctic or desert regions, where livability is highly problematic. Elsewhere, our ancestors have created lots of practices and artefacts, including money, to meet basic needs during cold winters or hot summers. So pervasive are these adaptations that we have come to disconnect them from ambient temperatures. This chapter concentrates on population-level connections between thermal climate and societal culture—the shared system of needs and stresses, and embedded behavioral goals, means, and outcomes at the place of residence (Van de Vliert, 2013a). We first describe Hofstede’s (1980) early discovery of some mysterious connections between a country’s distance from the equator and the national culture of its inhabitants. Hofstede speculated that the latitudinal gradient of average temperatures might be ultimately accountable for the latitudinal gradients of cultural individualism and power differences (see also Chapter 3 by Peter Smith for a review of Hofstede’s work). Inspired by recent work (Van Lange, Rinderu, & Bushman, 2017a), we refine that early climate-culture speculation by addressing the broader puzzle of latitudinality. The remaining sections then review and generalize latitude-related evidence of climato-economic pressures on cultural individualism and political democracy as components of freedom, and on four other cultural characteristics with sufficient sample sizes in both latitudinal hemispheres: corruption and aggression as antisocial characteristics; trust and creativity as prosocial characteristics

Who is more prone to depression at higher latitudes? Islanders or mainlanders?

Across 195 countries, rates of depressive disorders in women and men are higher among islanders (relative to mainlanders) at more northern locations in the Northern Hemisphere and at more southern locations in the Southern Hemisphere. Our explanatory analyses show that the three-way interaction of greater daylength variability, being more of an islander, and adopting a more individualistic culture accounts for higher rates of depression in both genders. Differences in longitude, photoperiod, phase shift, disaster risk, economic poverty, income inequality, and urbanization level do not appear to account for the oppositely sloping north-south gradients of depression above and below the equator

Climate and creativity:Cold and heat trigger invention and innovation in richer populations

Nobel laureates, technological pioneers, and innovative entrepreneurs are unequally distributed across the globe. Their density increases in regions toward the North Pole, toward the South Pole, and very close to the Equator. This geographic anomaly led us to explore whether stressful demands of climatic cold and climatic heat (imposed necessities) interact with economic wealth resources (available opportunities) in modulating creative culture—defined here as including both inventive idea generation and innovative idea implementation. Controlling for societal intellectualization, industrialization, and urbanization, results indicated that higher thermal demands, primarily cold stress and secondarily heat stress, hinder creativity in poorer populations but promote creativity in richer populations. Complementing their direct wealth-dependent effects, colder and hotter temperatures also exert indirect wealth-dependent effects on creative culture through lower prevalence of human-to-human transmitted parasitic diseases. Across 155 countries, the resulting ecotheory of creativity accounts for 79% of the variation in creative culture. The findings open up valuable perspectives on the creativity-related consequences of thermal climate—and climate change—in poor and rich populations