Culture and stereotype communication : are people from Eastern cultures more stereotypical in communication?

Past research demonstrated that when transmitting stereotype-relevant information, people of European descent sometimes shows a bias toward communicating stereotype-inconsistent (SI) information in an initial transmission. We argue that people of Asian descent, however, should be more inclined to communicate stereotype-consistent (SC) information in the initial transmission. In studies 1 and 2, we asked Australians of European and Asian descent to communicate a story about a fictitious individual who performed SC and SI behaviors. We found that European-Australians communicated more SI information, while Asian-Australians more SC information. In two follow-up studies, we examined the underlying mechanism for the cultural differences. Results suggested that an SC bias among Asian-Australians maybe because they regard SC information about a target as more informative in reflecting the true characteristics of the target as a member of the group.