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Culture and National Well-Being: Should Societies Emphasize Freedom or Constraint?

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  • Jesse R Harrington
  • Pawel Boski
  • Michele J Gelfand

Abstract

Throughout history and within numerous disciplines, there exists a perennial debate about how societies should best be organized. Should they emphasize individual freedom and autonomy or security and constraint? Contrary to proponents who tout the benefits of one over the other, we demonstrate across 32 nations that both freedom and constraint exhibit a curvilinear relationship with many indicators of societal well-being. Relative to moderate nations, very permissive and very constrained nations exhibit worse psychosocial outcomes (lower happiness, greater dysthymia, higher suicide rates), worse health outcomes (lower life expectancy, greater mortality rates from cardiovascular disease and diabetes) and poorer economic and political outcomes (lower gross domestic product per capita, greater risk for political instability). This supports the notion that a balance between freedom and constraint results in the best national outcomes. Accordingly, it is time to shift the debate away from either constraint or freedom and focus on both in moderation.

Suggested Citation

  • Jesse R Harrington & Pawel Boski & Michele J Gelfand, 2015. "Culture and National Well-Being: Should Societies Emphasize Freedom or Constraint?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(6), pages 1-14, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0127173
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0127173
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    Cited by:

    1. Federico Contu & Daniela Di Santo & Conrad Baldner & Antonio Pierro, 2023. "Examining the Interaction between Perceived Cultural Tightness and Prevention Regulatory Focus on Life Satisfaction in Italy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(3), pages 1-10, January.
    2. Richard A. Burns, 2019. "The Utility of Between-Nation Subjective Wellbeing Comparisons Amongst Nations Within the European Social Survey," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 683-705, March.
    3. Acerbi, Alberto & Sacco, Pier Luigi, 2021. "The self-control vs. self-indulgence dilemma: A culturomic analysis of 20th century trends," OSF Preprints xgqt5, Center for Open Science.
    4. Schram, Arthur & Zheng, Jin Di & Zhuravleva, Tatyana, 2022. "Corruption: A cross-country comparison of contagion and conformism," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 193(C), pages 497-518.
    5. Dimcea Andrei, 2023. "The Impact of Social Norms on Stock Liquidity," Studia Universitatis Babeș-Bolyai Oeconomica, Sciendo, vol. 68(1), pages 78-99, April.
    6. Len J. Treviño & Carolyn P. Egri & David A. Ralston & Irina Naoumova & Olivier Furrer & Yongjuan Li & Fidel León Darder & María Teresa Garza Carranza, 2021. "A multi-country, multi-sector replication challenge to the validity of the cultural tightness-looseness measure," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 735-764, June.
    7. Whelan, Jodie & Hingston, Sean T., 2022. "Pathogens, privilege, and purity: How pathogen threat and childhood socioeconomic status influence consumers’ condemnation of purity violations," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 636-647.
    8. Marco Marozzi, 2021. "Perceived Justifiability Towards Morally Debatable Behaviors Across Europe," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 153(2), pages 759-778, January.
    9. Acerbi, Alberto & Sacco, Pier Luigi, 2022. "The self-control vs. self-indulgence dilemma: A culturomic analysis of 20th century trends," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    10. Filipe R. Campante & Davin Chor, 2017. ""Just Do Your Job": Obedience, Routine Tasks, and the Pattern of Specialization," Working Papers DP-2016-35, Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA).

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