Collectivistic individualism: Transcending a traditional opposition

Abstract

Individualism is typically separated from its counterpart—collectivism. It is regarded as one of the most important characteristics of American people, comparing to collectivism of Eastern Asian people. However, such a simple dichotomy as individualism vs. collectivism is unproductive for psychology. An ethnographic study was performed at some schools in the United States from Japanese point of view. The result suggested that the dichotomy was too simple to understand American practices to socialize individualistic orientations. The study also fails to help in understanding cultural peculiarities of both the United States and Japan. The “American individualism” seemed to be salient in terms of guiding children to be selectively independent from peers, but not from parents—in contrast to the Japanese ways. Collectivistic aspects were also found in specific forms of social organization within schools in the United States. The “American collectivism” seemed to be salient in terms of promoting upward social mobility of the individualistic actor, and not viewed as a downward social trajectory or a repressive act against the individual.