Since my cultural experience was on the Japanese culture, I decided I would continue on with that interest and write my paper about the Japanese culture therefor giving me a chance to do more research about the culture. The Japanese culture is really rich and diverse, there is a particular hierarchy or structure to the Japanese culture, Denison (2002) stated that “Japanese culture is structured around black and white norms for acceptable group behavior. People who do not function by there norms are viewed as outsiders who lack legitimate status. Black and white expectations of behavior produce equally clear cut conformity, resulting in high harmony and certainly of outcome, trust is early through continuous conformity”.This is a huge and really important aspect of their culture because it governs their social standing, interacting with others and the way they are seen, and when it comes to your social standing in the culture, the way you are seen and respected by those around you is very important.
Denison (2002) stated that “Japanese strive to meet the expectations of others, especially those in power. As well as Behavioral skills in the work place are more important to success than analytical skills” Another good example of how you are seen by your peers, co workers, or anyone with a position of power is important because It effects their standing and it helps their important sense of conformity. I personally find the culture interesting because it is all so different from my own culture, as well as what I've learned from my acculturation to the american culture.
With this paper I wanted to focus on psychological aspects that had to do with a different side of the culture. There are three key aspect of information from the culture that I would like to explore; Gender-role expectations, individualism-collectivism, and how mental illness is seen within the culture, this are aspect I would like to talk about because in Japanese culture this topics seemed to be quite interconnected with one another. The first aspect I would like to explore is Gender-role expectations; Kincaid (2013) stated in his article that “Japan was a fairly matriarchal society until Confucian Ideas immigrated from China. After World War II this ideas shifted to a patriarchal system. Men were expected to be loyal to their lords; woman were to be loyal to their family and husbands. They could inherit property and family positions in feudal Japan. They were expected to control the house budget and household decisions to allow the men to focus on serving their lords”. In traditional times men and women roles were easily defined men were supposed to work, serve their lords or masters. They had provide for their families, while women were supposed stay home to be the caretakers, take care of the kids since its was their patriotic duty to have children, take care of the house, the chores and all the household decisions that had to do with being a wife. Therefor leaving men the...
