Cross-Cultural Organizational Behavior

Catalog description

This course focuses on multilevel perspectives on culture and organizational behavior. The first part of the semester reviewing fundamental issues in the theory and measurement of the study of culture. We will examine the historical context of culture research in psychology and related disciplines, theoretical perspectives linking culture to behavior, methodological issues in conducting cross-cultural research, as well as recent research on the ways in which cultures vary and change. We will then examine how culture affects basic psychological processes, including cognition, emotion, and motivation, followed by how culture affects organizational phenomena. In the last five weeks of the class, we will examine how culture affects topics in organizational behavior, which will be chosen by the class. This class will increase your knowledge about other cultures, and will enable you to critically examine the cultural assumptions embedded in existing organizational theories. It will also provide tools for you to be able to develop and test your own theories in other cultures. This class will also encourage you to critically examine your own psychological processes and behaviors as they are influenced by the cultural contexts in which you are embedded.