Conditional Process Analysis in Cross Cultural Research

Abstract

National culture or different national culture is known to affect organizational and management practices since managers as cultural bearers who embody specific culture translate their assumptions and values into these practices when designing them. These managers’ assumptions and values are closely associated with national culture and represent an important aspect of national culture. Thus, organizations and management practices are bound by national culture and these practices are likely to diverge across different societal cultures. Cross cultural researchers have explored the two different roles national culture can play. On the one hand, they have described national culture as an independent variable and explored its effect on organizational and management practices. On the other hand, they have captured national culture as a moderator variable and explored whether it can moderate the relations between management practices and individual or organizational outcomes. In this research I will attempt to integrate the prior cross cultural studies by exploring national culture’s these different roles together. More specifically, I will try to estimate the direct effect of national culture on management practices; the conditional effect of management practices on performance by different cultures; and the conditional indirect effect of national culture on performance via management practices that is dependent on different national culture. In order to estimate these effects, I will conduct conditional process analysis that integrates the mediation model and the moderation model by using data from Japanese and the US manufacturing teams. I have found the effect of national culture on management practices across different models. Although I have found conditional effect by national culture and national culture’s indirect effects, all models have not consistently yielded these results. Notwithstanding those results, my research would contribute to cross cultural research in that I integrated the two streams of cross cultural studies; I then attempted to estimate the direct, conditional, and indirect effects regarding national culture by conducting conditional process analysis.