Research Papers
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Culture & Psychology
I was trained under the guidance of Harry Triandis and am interested in understanding what makes human groups similar and different in order to broaden psychological science, as well as to inform policy. My early work focused on the distinction of vertical and horizontal individualism and collectivism (see the scale here). Our team has recently begun to systematically investigate the strength of norms across cultures, or what is referred to as cultural tightness-looseness (TL). Teaming up with partners around the world and from different disciplines, we are doing research on the ecological and historical factors that promote TL at both the national and state level, the neurobiological and genetic underpinnings of TL, the evolutionary basis of TL, and the implications of TL for organizations, expatriates, and for societal well-being. I also research subjective culture (e.g., honor, wasta, fatalism) in the Middle East. We use laboratory, field, computational, EEG, and fRMI to examine our research questions.
I also edit the series Advances in Cultural Psychology which summarizes important research programs in the emerging field of Cultural Psychology.
See papers in this area below.
King, S. K., Heckelsmiller, C., Ember, C. R., Jones, E. C., Gaouette, S. W., Droe, A. L., … Gelfand, M. (2026). From local knowledge to global patterns: a cross-cultural study of the dimensions of hazards and adaptive capacity. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 132, 105950.
Gavrilets, S., Karl, J., & Gelfand, M. J. (2026). The cultural evolution of pluralistic ignorance. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 123(7).
Du, Y. Y. L., Gelfand, M. J., & Drasgow, F. (2025). Sexual orientation and vocational interests across 48 countries: The Moderating effect of cultural tightness-looseness. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 72(2), 136–147.
Webber, D., Molinario, E., Jasko, K., Gelfand, M. J., & Kruglanski, A. W. (2025). The way they see us: Examining the content, accuracy, and bias of metaperceptions held by Syrian refugees about the communities that host them. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 51(3), 423-438.
Choi, H., Gelfand, M. J., Hong, Y.Y., Oishi, S., Rentfrow, J., Saucier, G., & Benet-Martinez, V. (2025) Culture and personality: Five expert visions. Personality Science, 6.
Dimant, E., Gelfand, M., Hochleitner, A., & Sonderegger, S. (2025). Strategic behavior with tight, loose, and polarized norms. Management Science, 71(3), 2245-2263.
Salvador, C. E., Lam, K. T., Karasawa, M., King, A., Rajaram, N., Gelfand, M. J., & Kitayama, S. (2025). Genes, culture, and neural sensitivity to norm violations: a DRD4× culture interaction study. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 20(1).
Gelfand, M. J., Gavrilets, S., & Nunn, N. (2024). Norm dynamics: Interdisciplinary perspectives on social norm emergence, persistence, and change. Annual Review of Psychology, 75(1), 341-378.
Pan, X., Hsiao, V., Nau, D. S., & Gelfand, M. J. (2024). Explaining the evolution of gossip. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121(9).
Andrighetto, G., Szekely, A., Guido, A., Gelfand, M., Abernathy, J., Arikan, G., Aycan, Z., Bankar, S., Barrera, D., Basnight-Brown, D., Belaus, A., Berezina, E., Blumen, S., Boski, P., Bui, H. T., Cárdenas, J. C., Čekrlija, Đ., de Barra, M., de Zoysa, P., … Eriksson, K. (2024). Changes in social norms during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic across 43 countries. Nature Communications, 15(1).
Pan, X., Hsiao, V., Nau, D. S., & Gelfand, M. J. (2024). Explaining the evolution of gossip. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121(9).
Gelfand, M. J., Gavrilets, S., & Nunn, N. (2024). Norm Dynamics: Interdisciplinary perspectives on social norm emergence, persistence, and change. Annual Review of Psychology, 75(1).
Stamkou, E., Dunham, R., Pelowski, M., Lin, Y., & Gelfand, M. J. (2024). When rule breaking in art falls flat: Cultural tightness deflates deviant artists’ impact. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 18(1), 14–30.
Ruggeri, K., Stock, F., Haslam, S. A., Capraro, V., Boggio, P., Ellemers, N., Cichocka, A., Douglas, K. M., Rand, D. G., van der Linden, S., Cikara, M., Finkel, E. J., Druckman, J. N., Wohl, M. J., Petty, R. E., Tucker, J. A., Shariff, A., Gelfand, M., Packer, D., … Willer, R. (2024). A synthesis of evidence for policy from behavioural science during COVID-19. Nature, 625(7993), 134–147.
Wilson, D. S., Madhavan, G., Gelfand, M. J., Hayes, S. C., Atkins, P. W., & Colwell, R. R. (2023). Multilevel cultural evolution: From new theory to practical applications. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(16), e2218222120.
Webber, D., Molinario, E., Jasko, K., Gelfand, M. J., & Kruglanski, A. W. (2023). The Way They See Us: Examining the Content, Accuracy, and Bias of Metaperceptions Held by Syrian Refugees About the Communities That Host Them. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 0(0).
Bicchieri, C., Dimant, E., Gelfand, M., & Sonderegger, S. (2023). Social norms and behavior change: The Interdisciplinary Research Frontier. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 205.
Azevedo, F., Pavlović, T., Rêgo, G. G., Ay, F. C., Gjoneska, B., Etienne, T. W., Ross, R. M., Schönegger, P., Riaño-Moreno, J. C., Cichocka, A., Capraro, V., Cian, L., Longoni, C., Chan, H. F., Van Bavel, J. J., Sjåstad, H., Nezlek, J. B., Alfano, M., Gelfand, M. J., … Sampaio, W. M. (2023). Social and moral psychology of covid-19 across 69 countries. Scientific Data, 10(1).
Wilson, D. S., Madhavan, G., Gelfand, M. J., Hayes, S. C., Atkins, P. W., & Colwell, R. R. (2023). Multilevel cultural evolution: From new theory to practical applications. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(16), e2218222120.
Azevedo, F., Pavlović, T., Rêgo, G. G., Ay, F. C., Gjoneska, B., Etienne, T. W., ... & Huang, G. (2023). Social and moral psychology of COVID-19 across 69 countries. Scientific Data, 10(1), 272.
Pitesa, M., & Gelfand, M. J. (2023). Going beyond western, educated, industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (weird) samples and problems in Organizational Research. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 174, 104212.
Lin, Y., Caluori, N., Öztürk, E. B., & Gelfand, M. J. (2022). From virility to virtue: the psychology of apology in honor cultures. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 119(41), e2210324119.
Stamkou, E., Homan, A.C., van Kleef, G.A., Gelfand, M.J. (2022). The spatial representation of leadership depends on ecological threat: A replication and extension of Menon et al. (2010). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Hernandez, I., Cohen, D., Gruschow, K., Nowak, A., Gelfand, M.J., Borkowski, W. (2022). The importance of being unearnest: Opportunists and the making of culture. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Schumpe, B. M., Van Lissa, C. J., Bélanger, J. J., Ruggeri, K., Mierau, J., Nisa, C. F., ... & Leander, N. P. (2022). Predictors of adherence to public health behaviors for fighting COVID-19 derived from longitudinal data. Scientific reports
Li, C., Gelfand, M.J. (2022). The influence of cultural tightness-looseness on cross-border acquisition performance. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
Choi, V.K., Shrestha, S., Gelfand, M.J. (2022). When danger strikes: A linguistic tool for tracking America’s collective response to threats. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Pavlović, T., Azevedo, F., De, K., Riaño-Moreno, J. C., Maglić, M., & Papp, Z. (2022). Predicting attitudinal and behavioral responses to COVID-19 pandemic using machine learning. PNAS NEXUS
Santo, D.D., Gelfand, M.J., Baldner, C., Pierro, A. (2022). The Moral Foundations of Desired Cultural Tightness. Frontiers in Psychology
Mula, S., Di Santo, D., Resta, E., Bakhtiari, F., Baldner, C., Molinario, E., ... & Leander, N. P. (2022). Concern with COVID-19 pandemic threat and attitudes towards immigrants: The mediating effect of the desire for tightness. Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology