-Mamta Dey, Subject matter expert, Edumarz
Solution: let us compare the western culture with Indian culture with which we are quite familiar with.
Indian culture is an agricultural society where people believe in the notion of collectivism. Each individual is dependent on the other. In a collectivistic society, the boundaries between the self and the group are quite flexible and people interfere in each other’s life. Indian culture is a traditional society that follows normative principles.
Whereas Western culture is a technologically advanced society where people follow the individualistic principle. The people here prefer to live an individualistic life where no one is dependent on each other. The boundaries between the self and the group are rigid. This society is a modern society that is based on urbanization and westernization.
Ethnocentrism refers to when someone believes that their culture, values, norms, and thinking are superior to everyone else. It means to apply one’s own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge others’ cultural practices and principles. Ethnocentrism leads to the development of ingroup bias where people believe that the group norms are always right . It is not difficult to reduce ethnocentrism. By reducing it one can minimize the opportunity of learning prejudices, changing negative attitudes.