Social Influence Strategies Among Japanese and American College Women

Abstract

Social influence strategies of 40 Japanese and 41 American college women were compared. With the use of a free-response format, respondents were asked to describe how they get their way with their mother, father, male teacher/boss, female teacher/boss, male friends, and female friends. Contrary to expectations, content analysis indicated that Japanese women reported using strong and neutral strategies more frequently and weak strategies less frequently than American women. American women used manipulation (especially sexual manipulation) more frequently and reasoning less frequently than Japanese women. Analyses by target of influence indicated that these differences were not found when the target was a female friend but were demonstrated across most of the other targets.