Innovation & Culture: How are they Connected?
I love statistics. There’s just something about making sense of things with numbers that has always pulled me in.
Back when I was an undergrad studying global economics, I did a lot of correlations to discover if any relationship existed between different sets of variables - GDP and women’s education rates, foreign direct investment and economic growth, etc. If it could be measured, it could be correlated. I liked economics, but it was the correlation part that I loved most. Of course, correlation does not indicate causality, but that was the exciting part - thinking about the relationship and coming up with theories as to why and how the variables may be related.
In the early 2000’s, Steven Levitt & Stephen Dubner published two books on economics - Freakonomics and Super Freakonomics. Both books combined what I loved most about economics - stats, correlations, and the theories behind the numbers. They melded economics with pop culture and wrote on corruption in sumo wrestling, why drug dealers still live with their moms, and if the name you choose for your child can can influence his or her life.
I’ve always wanted to take my love of correlations and apply it to the intercultural field. This is the first of what I hope will be many correlations marrying the two.
“Could there be any correlation between innovation and cultural dimensions?”
I was recently reading an article that talked about the Global Innovation Index (GII), a measure of a country’s innovation performance. The GII was created in collaboration with INSEAD, Cornell University, and WIPO and can be found here: https://knowledge.insead.edu/entrepreneurship/the-worlds-most-innovative-countries-2017-6381. The link will provide you with more details on the results and data collection.
The article got me thinking... Could there be any correlation between innovation and culture, and if so, how could this be measured? I decided to look at cultural dimensions since they are the most prevelant means of comparing cultures that we have.
For those of you unfamiliar with cultural dimensions, they are used to illustrate what a culture (or person) values and how those values affect behavior. Geert Hofstede began to develop these dimensions in the late 1960’s to help illustrate differences in cultures from country to country. Those 6 dimensions are:
Power Distance Index (PDI) - The extent to which the less powerful members of organizations and institutions accept and expect that power is distributed unequally.
Individualism vs. Collectivism (IDV) - The degree to which people in a society are integrated into groups.
Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) - A society's tolerance for ambiguity in which people embrace or avert the unexpected and unknown.
Masculinity vs. Femininity (MAS) - A preference in society for achievement, heroism, assertiveness, and material rewards for success.
Long-term Orientation vs. Short-term Orientation (LTO) - The degree to which people in a society maintain links with their own past while dealing with the challenges of the present and future.
Indulgence vs. Restraint (IND) - The extent to which people try to control their desires and impulses, based on the way they were raised.
I wanted to know if any of these dimensions would be significantly correlated with the GII’s ranking of the top 10 most innovative countries(2017). Those countries, in order (#1 being the most innovative) are:
Switzerland
Sweden
Netherlands
United States
United Kingdom
Denmark
Singapore
Finland
Germany
Ireland
What I discovered is quite interesting...but first let me explain correlations a bit. Correlation by itself is defined as “a mutual relationship or the connection between two or more things.” However, in statistics, there are mathematical formulas to determine how correlated different variables may be. The “correlation coefficient,” or “Pearson´s r”, is the measure of strength and direction of variables (and is what I used here). A person´s age and their vocabulary, for example, are positively correlated. The older a person gets, the more likely their vocabulary grows. They both grow together. A negative correlation, on the other hand, indicates that while one variable increases, the other decreases.
A correlation of 0 means that there isn´t any linear relationship
A correlation of +1 means there is a perfectly positive relationship
A correlation of -1 means there is a perfectly negative relationship
+0.30 means a weak positive relationship
+0.50 means a medium positive relationship
When I correlated the top 10 most innovative countries in the world to all 6 of Hofstede´s cultural dimensions, I found the following:
Power Distance Index (PDI) & Innovation: +0.08
Individualism vs. Collectivism (IDV) & Innovation: +0.27
Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) & Innovation: + 0.27
Masculinity vs. Femininity (MAS) & Innovation: -0.92
Long-term Orientation vs. Short-term Orientation (LTO) & Innovation: +0.34
Indulgence vs. Restraint (IND) & Innovation: +0.50
What this tells us is that there are very weak positive correlations between a country’s innovation level and Power Distance, Individualism, Uncertainty Avoidance, and Long-term Orientation. Basically, they do not correlate. Indulgence has a slightly stronger relationship to innovation, showing a medium positive correlation.
The most interesting part is that there is an almost perfect negative correlation between innovation levels and Masculinity. A negative correlation means that as one goes up, the other goes down. So, the more innovative the country, the less masculine. Or, the more masculine a country, the less innovative they are.
As a reminder, Hofstede defines Masculinity as a preference for achievement, success, and competition, where people want to win and be the best. When I was thinking about the possible outcomes of this analysis, I must admit I had assumed that there would be a strong positive correlation here (between Masculinity and innovation). Wouldn’t those who constantly strive for success and want to win be more innovative? “Their desire to be the best would surely make them innovate,” I thought to myself. But my hypothesis was wrong. In actuality, several of the most innovative countries in the GII are actually what Hofstede calls Feminine. Feminine cultures are those that value caring for others and quality of life. I guess that’s not surprising, since Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and the Netherlands happen to also be among the top 10 countries with the highest quality of life (see Social Progress Index, https://www.socialprogressindex.com) and are among the more feminine countries on our list of innovators.
This could be why tons of articles are written on how empathy drives innovation. It’s not just data and the analytical process that matters in innovation; it’s the human element as well (the feminine side of things). Perhaps the feminine countries on the list already figured that out.
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I realize that reading about statistics is most likely positively correlated with yawning, but I hope you enjoyed and made it to the end! 🤓
Contact me at hello@nicolebarile.com if you’d like to learn more or visit me here. #futureofglobalwork