Culture and religion are inevitably intertwined.
Today, we’ll discuss some studies that demonstrate this exchange.
Our first study comes out of America and Canada, in which researchers analyzed whether culture or religion more greatly influenced drinking behaviors.
Canadian Versus American Drinking Behaviors
Past studies had shown that drinking patterns amongst college students differed across countries.
The difference in behaviors suggests that anything from a country’s public policies to their politics, values, or economy influences alcohol consumption levels and produces different alcohol-related problems within each country.
For example, one study showed that while more Canadian students drink alcohol than American students, heavy alcohol use (5+ drinks in a row for men / 4+ for women) was much more prevalent amongst Americans than Canadians in both past-year and past-week stats.
41% of American students had drunk heavily within the past year versus 35% of Canadian students, and 54% of American students had drunk heavily within the past week compared to 42% of their Canadian counterparts.
One reason for this may be the drinking age disparity. In Canada, 18 (in some provinces) and 19 are legal drinking ages, while in the U.S., drinking is legal at 21.
The study concluded that a student’s place of residence may also influence the difference in drinking behaviors:
“In our sample, 52% of Canadian college respondents lived off-campus with parents while only 15% of the US college respondents did so. Our study suggests that students who live off-campus with their parents are less likely to use alcohol and to be heavy alcohol drinkers in both countries.”
While this study identified different cultural drinking habits, researchers in the ‘90s wanted to delve into religious influence on those same habits.
Religious Influence on Drinking Habits
The drinking behaviors of non-abstinent Catholics, moderately abstinent Protestants, and abstinent Jews in both America and Canada were put under the microscope.
Researchers discovered that the absence or presence of conflicting values between the country’s culture and the religion’s drinking norms predicted the drinking habits of each group.
For instance, the drinking habits of non-abstinent Catholics generally aligned with those of the country’s culture; however, the drinking habits between abstinent Canadian Jews and American Jews were the same, as most follow the religion’s strict law in lieu of the broader cultural drinking norms.
The study concludes:
“Among this sample it was concluded that religious norms have a greater influence in cohesive religious groups while cultural norms are more influential among less cohesive groups. The results also support the Canadian ‘Mosaic’ and American ‘Melting Pot’ assumption.”
This indicates that the norms of religious-based sub-cultures are more adherent to the group norms than national ones.
When Religious Norms Become National Culture
Religious norms regarding alcohol consumption can, at times, even imbed into the national culture.
It’s not unusual to see a glass of wine or pint of beer drank with lunch in a Catholic country, while abstinence from such habits would be the norm in a Protestant country.
In fact, in the “Bible Belt” of America, which is predominantly Protestant, you may even see alcohol norms written into law. A number of counties in this region are “dry.”
In some parts of the world, drinking norms are legally bound, nationwide. For instance, some Islamic countries follow strict drinking norms (abstaining from alcohol) and expect outsiders to, as well. In countries like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, there are laws enforcing such norms.
In such cases, adapting or adopting as an outsider is required, in order to avoid legal issues or imprisonment.
All of this is to say that a country’s dominant religion(s) influence the culture’s norms and values, whether an individual is a believer or not.
In order to understand the culture of a country, therefore, you must get to know the ideology and rules/laws of its religion(s).
We’ll discuss how religion may imprint on business next week.
Success Across Cultures 