Impact of Culture on Perception and Behavior Essay

Impact of Culture on Perception and Behavior - Essay Example Perceptions are affected by many things rooted in culture because culture provides structure and guidelines deemed significant in understanding and interpreting behaviors. According to Burton (2007), emotions influence people’s perceptions differently depending on the surrounding society’s perception as explained by the two theories of social perception. The two theories are attribution theory that focuses on causes of action and social comparison theory that elucidates the notion of people comparing themselves with others (Thomas & Inkson, 2009). Another important issue to note is that there are cultural differences in social consequences and that cultural script determines how emotions should be experienced either positively or negatively (Burton, 2007). For instance, it is reported that the dominant social script in Western culture is to encourage positive emotions while the dominant cultural script in China is based on dialectical thinking and balancing positive and negative emotions. Culture vs. Interaction Culture has a great influence in how one interact with foreigners and the difference can be easily noticed when people meet for the first time. Culture can shape the way some people see the world because it sculptures the brain. In China, culture is more interdependent while the American culture tends to be independent. Chinese people spend most of their time monitoring the environment and others while Westerners concentrate on self and central objects.