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1) tough values - achievements, ambitions, power and self-confidence.
2) these values are preferred over other values.
3) gender roles are generally distinct.
4) men are expected to be tough and focus on material success
5) women are expected to be modest and tender, focus on improving the quality of life for the family

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Hofstede's cultural dimensions can help to explain why certain behaviors are more or less common in different cultures

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Hofstede's cultural dimensions can help to explain why certain behaviors are more or less common in different cultures

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MEXICO
JAPAN
AUSTRALIA

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FEMINE CULTURE
1) gender roles are flexible: men and women do not have separate roles
2) main values are quality of life, service, nurturing others
3) such tender values are embraced by both men and women in the society

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SCANDINAVIAN COUNTRIES

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In Georgia masculine culture is really developed. Man is considered to be the head of the family and the traditions are very patriarchal. Definitely, it influences the way of living and behaving of Georgians.
For example, I am not allowed to sit in the main seat at the table, because according to Georgian culture, my father or grandfather should sit there. Also I m not allowed to sit near my dad, because my mum should be sitting there.

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Individualistic societies are expected to care for themselves and their immediate families only.

Collectivist cultures, people view themselves as members of larger groups, including their extended family members and are expected to take responsibility for caring for each other.

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✔︎ High
✔︎ Low

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Collectivist societies (ex. Latin America, Africa, Asia, Middle East).
- emphasise obligations they have toward their in-group members.
- willing to sacrifice their individual needs and desires for benefiting the group.
- value sense of belonging - fit in.
- self control

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In this cultural dimension there are two types of power distance - high and low.
High power is an integral part of society. Hierarchy and power inequality are considered appropriate and beneficial. It's about totalitarian society and full control of person's thoughts and actions. It exists in Latin American countries, most African and Asian and countries of Mediterranean sea
In low power distance, people have a right to speak and to express their thoughts. It's about humans' freedom. people value equality and seek to minimize or eliminate various kinds of social and class inequalities. they value democracy, and juniors and subordinates are free to question authority

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Among INDULGENT countries are Australia, Canada, the US, Argentina, Chile, and several African countries. Cultures with high degree of indulgence enjoy life and behave in accordance with basic human drives. Therefore, having fun and fulfilling desires is considered natural. People behave and act in ways which lead them to gratification. Countries with moderate level of indulgence include Iran, Finland, Sweden, Turkey, and Algeria. In these countries indulgence and attention to duty is considered equally important.

Naturally, the more basic needs are met, the more fulfilled and happy people feel. However, too much focus on having fun and meeting basic needs may become harmful to the development of character and society. It may also prevent people from focusing on long-term goals and postponing pleasure to achieve more important goals.

RESTRAINT indicates that society suppresses gratification of needs and regulates it through social norms.

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✔︎ Hierarchy and power inequality are considered appropriate and beneficial.
✔︎ Superiors take care of subordinates.
✔︎ Subordinates show proper respect to superiors.
✔︎ Most high power distance societies are collectivist societies.

Examples: Latin American, African and Asian countries.

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✔︎ People value democracy.
✔︎ Juniors and subordinates are free to question and challenge authority.
✔︎ Most low power distance cultures are individualistic societies.

Examples: Israel, Denmark, Ireland.

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Short-term orientation focuses on the present or past, prioritizing these over the future. Short-term oriented individuals value tradition, social hierarchy and fulfilling duties. Immediate gratification takes precedence over long-term goals and achievements.
Societies with a short-term orientation, or way of thinking, foster more present- or past-oriented virtues such as stability, respect for tradition, and exchanging greetings, favors, and gifts. Countries with a short-term orientation include Norway, the United Kingdom, and Kenya.

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Long-term orientation looks at how a society considers respect for tradition and fulfilling social obligations and how one views the future, such as the value of thrift (saving and being careful with money).
Based on the teachings of Confucius, long-term orientation deals with a society's search for strengths. Societies with a long-term orientation, such as most East Asian societies, embrace future-oriented qualities such as thrift and effort, ordering relationships by status, and feeling a sense of shame for falling short of expectations.

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High power distance vs low power distance

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High power distance vs low power distance

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People from high uncertainty avoidance cultures tend to have greater need for formal rules. Deviation is considered disruptive and undesirable. They also avoid conflict and try take fewer risks. (many Latin America cultures, Mediterranean cultures, and some European and Asian cultures)
People from low uncertainty avoidance cultures are more comfortable with unstructured situations. They value creativity and individual choice, and are free to take risks.
(China, Jamaica, the UK)

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Individualistic societies:

Italy

France

Belgium

Ireland

Switzerland

Germany

South Africa

Luxembourg)

"I" identity.

Promotes individual goals, initiative and achievement.

Individual rights are seen as being the most important. Rules attempt to ensure self-importance and individualism.

Independence is valued; there is much less of a drive to help other citizens or communities than in collectivism.

Relying or being dependent on others is frequently seen as shameful.

People are encouraged to do things on their own; to rely on themselves

People strive for their own successes

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From my personal experience, I had a chance to be surrounded by both cultures, so I could expirience both cultures and their affect on me. People(teenagers) from a Chinese (collectivistic) background were more supporting, friendly and had the ability to help me in my problems more than other teenagers from countries like the USA, Germany, Italy (individualistic) were more independent and never asked for help in any aspects of out school-life.

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I can really say that since since my childhood I've always been affected by musculine culture, because my family is musculine. My father does business, earns money. My mom is household keeper. My point is, that despite the fact that Russia is considered by Hofstede as a femine culture, I follow the masculine culture.

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1) Russians seem to avoid uncertainty  in their life more then Georgians
2) Talking about frameworks and hierarchy, power holders are very distant in Russian society. In Georgia people are not really dedicated subordinates.
3) Masculine and patriarchal culture is an integral part of Georgian society. We can not say so about Russia
4) Russians are long term oriented. The acquisition of plans is a kind of our value
5) Individualism culture seem to be almost the same in both countries: The idea of cohesion is refraining

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Hofstede's research considers Russia to be a country with high uncertainty avoidance rate. I can't but agree with that. I usually feel bad when I face unexpected actions and usually try to develop a specific plan. If I face a conflict, I usually try to solve it looking for workarounds.

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I can't say that I follow high power distance. As for me, democracy and freedom are very important and I do really appreciate these values. I think that we should pay respect to elder people, but we also should have right to express our opinion too.

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I can say that I follow individualism culture. Yes, society is important for me and I can't just abstract from it. Nevertheless, I think in terms of "I", but not "WE" and for me my personal privacy and freedom is a matter of high importance.

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I suppose that I'm a person with long-term orientation. I have a lot of future plans, I've already thought over several scenarios. Yes, I fully support the idea that our future cannot exist without our past. Nevertheless, I think that we should remember about our past, but focus on our future and do our best to improve the mistakes of the past.

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I can't say that I fully belong to either indulgent or restraint culture. On the one hand, my parents have always been very kind to me and managed to provide a happy childhood without any doubts. On the other hand, I also faced the real world, which is not so bright and cheerful. Sometimes, we need to deal and cope with other peoples' behaviour and actions. And all my negative experience restrained me. My point is, that I'm balanced and equally indulgenced and restrained.

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As I grew up, I began to show more and more masculinity traits in my character. It seems to me that these traits were imposed on me by mass culture and parenting. I began to feel a strong social obligation to society. As it seems to me, I’ve started to change my dominant values. For example, I have been started to pay much more attention to my own self-realisation and some social etiquette. All in all, I think I’m really like such changes in my character.

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As I grew up, I began to show more and more masculinity traits in my character. It seems to me that these traits were imposed on me by mass culture and parenting. I began to feel a strong social obligation to society. As it seems to me, I’ve started to change my dominant values. For example, I have been started to pay much more attention to my own self-realisation and some social etiquette. All in all, I think I’m really like such changes in my character.

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People are often faced with the problem of whether to choose short-term pleasure now or benefit in the future. This problem is actual between teenagers too. Some of us decide to live relaxing and do whatever they want while others decide to study a lot (for example on IB program) aiming to better future life. They think in long-run.

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Yes, since I live in Moscow, my parents have a good income, but he is very different from the income in a small Russian city

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Yes, we have little developed individualism. I feel it, maybe it's remnants of the USSR. But we always say we. Even at work, people don't have their "I"

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1. Russia and China are two countries with quite different traditions and cultures. However, there are both similarities and differences in the cultural dimensions of these countries.

2. High power distance is appropriate for both countries. Since I belong to both societies, and I know people’s behaviour there, and I agree with the results. There is only one thing that I disagree with: in my opinion, the power distance is higher in China than in Russia. It seem to me that subordinates are much more polite and obedient towards seniors in China. Juniors refrain from freely expressing their thoughts, opinion and emotions, since they need to act depending on superiors’ favour.

3. China and Russia are both collectivist societies, as people are more comfortable with teamwork and helping each other. They prefer to be in touch with other people and feel like a part of a group.

4. The most different cultural dimension for China and Russia is uncertainty avoidance. Chinese people do not avoid vaguenesses, they feel comfortable to face them, since there are many ambiguity in the Chinese culture, for example, in the language. But as for Russia, uncertainty avoidance is extremely high. Russians feel very much threatened by ambiguous situations, and they always prefer to have context and background information to make the situation specific.

5. Masculinity is much higher in China, and I agree with this. As we know, there is high competition in China, that is why achievements and success are main values in the society.

Liu Funing

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Surprisingly, I can agree with this, maybe this is also the Soviet past, where everyone, regardless of gender, worked. But on the example of my mother, who worked and earned very well, before the birth of children.

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I remember to get an extract from our probabushka. Mom went to 5 different places

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Russians are more likely to look to the future, Russians care very much about their future family, so they live now depending on how they will provide for it.

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Russia and the UK has huge differences (at least 30 points) in each cultural dimensions.

1. Power distance is really high in Russia while the UK has a low power distance.

2. Russia is a collectivistic society mostly because of heritability of the USSR while the UK is highly individualistic country.

3. Masculinity is the closest cultural dimension between the UK and Russia, although it also has huge differences too. Masculinity is bigger in the UK than in Russia.

4. Russia has high uncertainty avoidance while the UK has opposite scenario.

5. Long-term orientation is an integral part of Russian culture while in the UK people are less likely to look in long-term and plan their life.

6. The UK is a restraint country while in Russia people prefer to enjoy their life and have fulfilment.

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Cultural differences between the USA and Russia

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Cultural differences between the USA and Russia

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1) According to Hofstede's researches, in Russia the distance between government and ordinary people is extremly big, much bigger than in the US
2) In Russia people usually think in terms of "WE". Our society is collectivistic, and we usually act in the way, that we hope would not affect and disturb the others.
3) United States is the world's number one in terms of freedom, human rights and justice. American culture is also built on success, business and capitalism. All this in general makes the US one of the world's highest individualistic countries.
4) It is striking, but the level of musculinity in Russia is low. If we look more closely on Russian culture, we can understand why is it. Corruption, bureaucracy, laziness and stupidity were always the main topics in works of Russian classics. Russian tend to be lazy and usually want to earn a lot of  money without making an effort or just to live a peaceful and quiet life. For this reason Russia is a true femine culture.
5) The US society is completely different. As I mentioned before, it is very motivated on success and high achievements. These, capitalistic values are the most important in the US, making this country very musculine.

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1) Status matters much more in Russia,a nation where power holders are very distant in society, what we can say about USA, that a society’s inequality is endorsed by the followers as much as by the leaders.

2)If Russians plan to go out with their friends they would literally say “We with friends” instead of “I and my friends”, if they talk about brothers and sisters it may well be cousins ,this is determined by the high level of friendliness and family values in Russia, I believe that this is the most important quality of our country and the reason for victories in wars,all Russians are like the one big family, while in the USA there is no such family values as Russians despite the fact that many different religions and nationalities live in Russia.

3)Russian people are more modest, they do not speak openly about their successes, while Americans believe that there is always one winner and roughly speaking, they like to brag about their successes, but still Russian scientists and artists have made much more discoveries than American ones, Russians are modest.  For example, Wassily Kandinsky was a brilliant Russian artist, but the French and the world believe that he was French, although he simply moved to France as an adult, the Russians did not argue with the opinion of the world, because they are modest.

4)Russians prefer to have context and background information. As long as Russians interact with people considered to be strangers they appear very formal and distant while Americans tend to be more tolerant of ideas or opinions from anyone and allow the freedom of expression.

5)5)Russia is definitely a country with a pragmatic mindset. In societies with a pragmatic orientation, people believe that truth depends very much on situation, context and time. They show an ability to adapt traditions easily to changed conditions, a strong propensity to save and invest. thriftiness and perseverance in achieving results while Americans are prone to analysis new information to check whether it is true. Thus, the culture doesn’t make most Americans pragmatic, but this should not be confused with the fact that Americans are very practical,many Americans have very strong ideas about what is “good” and “evil”, this may concern issues such as abortion or use of drugs.

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Good morning, guys!

Hope that everyone is doing well in these uncertain times that we are living in.

Recently, my friends and I wished to gain more experience and knowledge, as all of us are going to a university and be spread up around the whole world. Therefore, we decided to sign up for a camping weekend that our school organised.

The weekend was full of different activities which taught me many lessons, that I still use them until know in my daily life. At the start of our trip, we had to walk up a mountain for around 5 hours straight, afterwards we had to set up a tent, that was the first time I ever did such a thing. For the night, we had to sleep outside in quite a cold temperature, even though we had our sleeping bags, and we were dressed is huge coats and sweaters, we were still cold. To get a little warmer, we had to set up a fire. Only one of my friends knew and could set up a fire, so we all had to work in a team. The night was quite taught, as one of the girls was struggling with insomnia (when someone finds it hard to fall asleep), so we decided to help her. All of us shared different funny stories, that could help us all to relax and all of us eventually fell asleep. The next day, we had to prepare a breakfast, although we faced a huge problem of not having enough food supplies. Then we had to all share all our food between everyone, to make sure, that everyone had some food and not hungry for the day.

This experience taught us many skills and we gained a lot of knowledge from our trip. Throughout the weekend, we gained skills of leadership (when we followed our friend in building a tent), we gained skills of teamwork (when sharing our food between each other), and many more. I would never forget this weekend in my life.

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Hey guys! Welcome back to the Internet!

Another week has passed and it’s time to post smth here. Today I want to share with you a life-changing moment in my life.

For the past few months all you have been talking and hearing everywhere about the war in Ukraine. Peace that we hold so dear has been damaged in one second. That influenced on our lives in a huge way. After the beginning of the operation I felt fervour and unease. Shortly afterwards I had an epiphany moment and abandoned my faith in Russia. I realised that I want to move abroad as soon as possible. So I came to crossroads and started to peak out of searching for different ways to do that and I found about the IB program. I discussed that with my parents and we came to the conclusion that IB seems to be the perfect option so I started preparing for exams.

I also was bemused about choosing country in which I want to move to. I understood that people in the USA has to different cultural values from mine and it would be hard to reconcile with that. Moreover, the USA is too far from Russia. To move to Europe I would have to learn another language which is to challenging for me. Finally, I came to consider England and understood that it has a lot of advantages. Firstly, I now English well enough not to have problems with living, studying and communicating in it. Secondly, I have close friends who live there and would be able to help me if needs arises. Thirdly, I have been in England a few years before and I felt in love with their lifestyle. And last but not least, there are a lot of great universities such as Cambridge, Oxford or LSE. So, my family and I decided that studying in England is the best opportunity in current situation.

After successfully passing my exams for Moscow Economic School my new life began. The new school, new community, new environment, new friends and teachers and, of course, new challenges. Studying on IB program proved to be quite difficult and time-consuming but at the same time fascinating.

Let me tell you about features in studying on IB. It has a completely different approach to learning. In each subject you have to not only memorise, but also to think and make up something. Discussing and looking at problems from different perspectives and points of view definitely broadens horizons. For example, we discussed religion on English lessons for more than a month. On the first glance, this theme seems to be boring and useless. What is striking is that it proved to be so impressive! I leant a lot about spirituality and beliefs and understood that it is normal to discuss this theme with people.

Moreover, I met here a lot of interesting and intelligent peers with their own different interests and hobbies and it’s so cool to discuss all of that in breaks.

To sum up, war in Ukraine unavoidably affected all of us a lot in a sad way. Nevertheless, everything has its pluses and I have a positive experience of studying on IB due to this situation.

Don’t forget to like, comment and come back. Next time you’ll find smth interesting again!

Until next time! - Arina

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Hello my dear audience! Welcome back to my blog!

This time I want to share with you with some my life-changing experiences that gave me a new way of looking at the world.

Everyone here knows that I’ve moved to Moscow not a long time ago and I want to go to this topic much deeper than just say that this has changed my life. This changes have given me new points of view on different things. I have started to think much deeper on some topics that I have never thought about before. I have met new people who I started to trust after some period of time.

This time I will write some examples of the most interesting and important cases that gave me a new path to go through

1.      New school

My first Moscow experience was my transition to a new, second school. I met with new people. At the beginning I was rather nervous and was too shy to start communicating with others. One girl decided to get acquainted with me, she showed me the whole school and explained how everything worked there. After several months I got used to this change and started to be more open in keeping in touch with my new classmates. When I realized that they understand me, I started to be more confident. This was a huge change in my personality as I have always been an extremely shy girl who didn’t like to take part in school life.

2.      Turkey journey

That was another experience which is connected with my confidence. When me and my parents came to our hotel, first of all I found a teenagers’ club there. As usual I was rather shy at the beginning and was afraid that everything could go in a wrong way, so I wouldn’t get along with them. But I was mistaken, every day I spent almost the whole day with them, we went swimming, played games and took part in some competition battles. With some of them I could walk almost the whole night. I was full of the joys of spring because I have never spent so much time with a group of teenagers, it could be maximum 3 people that was my close friends. When I returned to Russia, I understood that I was not afraid of my peers anymore.

Frankly, I don’t have a lot of examples but these are the most visible ones that left a huge mark on my identity that I show to everyone these days. It was and it still is a difficult way to my future personality.

To sum up my today’s blog I want to write that I’m glad that I can go ahead with all the difficulties and changes in my life. When I received more and more life practices, my personality changed in a more beautiful way.

Thank you so much for reading, don’t forget to like and stay your comment.

See you later! – Vika

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Good morning, guys!

How are you all doing today? I hope everything is great.

Today I wanted to discuss a very important topic. It is spirituality, life after death and epiphany!

Have you ever thought about life after death?

That is the question that changed my whole life. Let me tell you my story.

Once I was driving to the countryside with my brother and thinking about God. «Does he or she exist? Will I have to pay for my sins? Who invented the world?». Then I heard a loud sound: Nika, lay down!

We got in the car accident. My whole life flashed before my eyes. I heard «BAM!» and the last thing that I saw was the forest.

My eyes closed and I started to hear some voices. It was the dialog:

- She has so many sins.. During her life she didn’t convert to any religion, she didn’t pray and she felt the uncomfortable chair during rituals and meditation.
- Well, don’t forget that she has an atheist father and agnostic father.
- Of course, but she left the nest 5 years ago! She could find God during this time.
- I still stand for giving her another chance.
- Okay, this time I will agree with you.

I felt unavoidable horror. Am I dead? It was a stretch too far for me. It seemed that I was drowning in the depths.
- Nika, wake up. It’s okay.

I opened my eyes. I was lying on the bed in a hospital. I was alive.

That was an epiphany moment. This story became a crucial factor of my religiosity. After some time I stopped arguing against religion, rediscovered faith and converted to Buddhism. I had no doubts at all and I did not come to crossroads. This car accident taught me that there is something above the humanity. My philosophy and ideologies had changed completely. It has been the most inconceivable and unimaginable situation that I have ever experienced in my life.

Evaluating this experience and talking about its advantages, I can say, that it effected me so much. I started having a capacity to reach out beyond oneself. Now I discover and make meaning of experience through broadened perspectives and behaviour. Much to my surprise and pleasure, all spheres of my life got better!

There are no other sides of this fascinating experience. I gained a lot of knowledge through this car accident and I am grateful to God for the opportunity to "touch" him so closely.

So, that’s my exciting story! Guys, if some of you have such experience, share it with me! I would be really happy to discuss your situations.

Hope to hear from you soon!

Lots of love,
Nika