What is it about?
Calls for culture change abound. Headlines regularly feature calls to change the “broken” or “toxic” cultures of the police, the workplace, U.S. politics, and more, and norms and practices across society are hotly debated. The proposed fix is “culture change.” But what is culture change? How does it work? And can it be effective? This article presents a new social psychological framework for intentional culture change, with a focus on behavioral change and addressing societal disparities in the United States. Synthesizing insights from research and application, this new, science-backed framework consists of seven core principles: Principle 1: People are culturally shaped shapers, so they can be culture changers; Principle 2: Identifying, mapping, and evaluating the key levels of culture helps locate where to target change; Principle 3: Culture change happens in both top-down and bottom-up ways and is more effective when the levels are in alignment; Principle 4: Culture change can be easier when it leverages existing core values and harder when it challenges deep-seated defaults and biases; Principle 5: Culture change typically involves power struggles and identity threats; Principle 6: Cultures interact with one another and change can cause backlash, resistance, and clashes; and Principle 7: Timing and readiness matter.
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Why is it important?
Although examples of wholly successful, large-scale intentional culture change are few and far between, the insights, evidence, and illustrations offered throughout this article suggest this complex and often daunting process can be mapped out, systematized, and, at least for a time, accomplished. These seven principles suggest that psychological science can offer valuable strategies and tools as people work through the challenges of intentional culture change to address systemic inequality in the United States. There is hope to be found in the science.
Perspectives
As social psychologists of culture, race, and inequality who work together at a “do tank” called Stanford SPARQ, we collaborate with public and private sector changemakers to put research-driven strategies to the test. We have found that, while there is a lot to learn and much to be done, psychological science has many useful insights and tools to offer about the power of culture and how to harness it for social change. In this paper, we propose a framework of seven principles for intentional culture change, integrating multiple literatures and drawing on our shared work. While this work is certainly complex and challenging, and there is much to be done, in this time of widespread global and societal crises, there is an urgent need to marshal the evidence and respond to calls from the public.
MarYam Hamedani
Stanford University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: We built this culture (so we can change it): Seven principles for intentional culture change., American Psychologist, November 2023, American Psychological Association (APA),
DOI: 10.1037/amp0001209.
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Resources
Masculine Defaults: Identifying and Mitigating Hidden Cultural Biases
Understanding and remedying women’s underrepresentation in majority-male fields and occupations require the recognition of a lesser-known form of cultural bias called masculine defaults. Masculine defaults exist when aspects of a culture value, reward, or regard as standard, normal, neutral, or necessary characteristics or behaviors associated with the male gender role. Although feminist theorists have previously described and analyzed masculine defaults (e.g., Bem, 1984; de Beauvoir, 1953; Gilligan, 1982; Warren, 1977), here we define masculine defaults in more detail, distinguish them from more well-researched forms of bias, and describe how they contribute to women’s underrepresentation. We additionally discuss how to counteract masculine defaults and possible challenges to addressing them. Efforts to increase women’s participation in majority-male departments and companies would benefit from identifying and counteracting masculine defaults on multiple levels of organizational culture (i.e., ideas, institutional policies, interactions, individuals).
Health in the United States: Are Appeals to Choice and Personal Responsibility Making Americans Sick?
The United States suffers high rates of preventable lifestyle disease despite widespread calls for people to take responsibility for their health. The United States also stands out in its rejection of government action to guide industry practices and consumer choices. Why? We examine how deeply rooted cultural narratives about “free choice” and “personal responsibility” infuse policymaking, advertising, media, social norms, and individual attitudes about health in the United States. We argue that these narratives contribute to ill health in the United States: They encourage stress and worry over health, blame and stigmatization of the unhealthy, widened health disparities, and the failure to adopt policies that could save lives. Psychologists can play a major role in expanding narratives about health so that they include the role of personal choice and responsibility but also reflect current science about the physical, social, and cultural drivers of health. These broader narratives can be used to promote a more comprehensive understanding of health and to better inform the design, communication, and implementation of effective health-supportive policies.
Understanding Culture Clashes and Catalyzing Change: A Culture Cycle Approach
U.S. Americans repeatedly invoke the role of “culture” today as they struggle to make sense of their increasingly diverse and divided worlds. Given the demographic changes, cultural interactions and hybridizations, and shifting power dynamics that many U.S. Americans confront every day, we ask how psychological scientists can leverage insights from cultural psychology to shed light on these issues. We propose that the culture cycle—a tool that represents culture as a multilayered, interacting, dynamic system of ideas, institutions, interactions, and individuals—can be useful to researchers and practitioners by: (1) revealing and explaining the psychological dynamics that underlie today’s significant culture clashes and (2) identifying ways to change or improve cultural practices and institutions to foster a more inclusive, equal, and effective multicultural society.
Contributors
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