ESS/EVS-based Indicators of Cultural Dimensions

These indicators were created in Kaasa, A.; Vadi, M.; Varblane, U. (2014) Regional Cultural Differences Within European Countries: Evidence from Multi-Country Surveys. Management International Review, 54(6): 825 - 852.

When using material and data on this webpage, please cite the article.

This dataset provides up-to-date indicators describing Hofstede’s cultural dimensions combining the European Social Survey (ESS) and the European Values Study (EVS) as data sources.

(The dataset providing measures of cultural distance can be found here.)

Conceptually the data are based on the widely-used original model of Hofstede (1980), which argued that many of the most important cultural differences can be captured by four cultural dimensions: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism-collectivism, and masculinity-femininity.

Power distance (PDI) describes the extent to which hierarchical relations and unequal distribution of power in organisations and societal institutions are accepted in a culture. Uncertainty avoidance (UAI) measures the degree to which a society's members feel comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity. Masculinity (MAS) (as opposed to femininity) reveals to what degree traditionally masculine societal values, such as orientation towards achievement and success, prevail over values such as modesty, solidarity or tolerance. Individualism (IND) (as opposed to collectivism) reflects the extent to which people prefer to act as individuals rather than as members of groups. More information can be found here.

This study uses data for 2008 from two surveys: the European Social Survey (ESS) and the European Values Study (EVS), providing a more up-to-date view than the original scores of Hofstede. Also, the initial data represent the demographic structure of the whole population of a country or a region. As data are available in both the ESS and EVS at the regional level as well, the ESS/EVS-based indicators of cultural dimensions enable also to shed some light on within-country differences. More information about the data used is provided here.

The indicators describing these four cultural dimensions were created from the initial data available in the ESS and EVS with the help of confirmatory factor analysis using theory-based rather than an empirically-driven approach. More information about the methodology used can be found here.

The dataset covers 28 countries. ESS/EVS-based indicators of cultural dimensions reveal a wide diversity of regional cultural variability among the observed countries. For example there are countries where within-country cultural variability is larger (Spain, Portugal, France) than cross-national variability, but also those where within-country cultural variability is smaller (Finland, Sweden, Norway) than cross-national variability. Also, in many countries a more detailed regional division (more and smaller regions) brought out larger differences, but this again cannot be taken as a rule. In addition, patterns along regions differ across cultural dimensions, making grouping regions difficult, when aiming to take all dimensions into account at the same time.

More information can be found in the article.