Culture in Human Behavior Essay Example

Culture is the soul and heart of our society. It is what differentiates one’s beliefs from another. Culture is what makes a person view something as good or bad from a very young age. Most importantly, it is what impacts our behavior towards one another. Culture influences our behavior by affecting our values, impacting our decision-making, and shaping our view of ourselves and others.

Values are things that each individual or a group of people contains. Whether we are aware of them or not, they are essential and meaningful. These values are what make us different from anyone else. Where do we get these values from? While we adapt a lot from our surroundings, culture gives us these unique traits from a very young age. For example, in the book Born to Crime, Trever Noah talks about how culture during his childhood has impacted him in many ways. I personally am someone whose many values are based on my culture. Even though I proudly live in the United States, most of my values are influenced by culture. For example, patriotism. My love for my country is everlasting mainly because of how it was taught to me by my culture at a very young age. Culture can impact an individual’s behavior by shaping its value; however, culture can also affect one’s decision-making ability in various ways.

Each culture is unique. It has its own characteristics and its own beliefs. As a result, it can also impact one's decision-making based on their credence, for example, medical interactions.(Author, Do cultural differences influence care decisions, lakeparkretirement.org) Culture can impact one's decision on how a patient wants its treatment to be done. Based on their cultural beliefs, they might want to be given care by a specific gender and not take certain medications. Based on this article(Bussey-Jones, Impact of culture on health care, ncbi.nlm.nih.gov), more and more cultural beliefs are impacting the medical field. My culture has also impacted my decision-making many times, which then influences my behavior. For example, when I first moved to the United States, I was exposed to a community where ethics was not prioritized. At the dinner table, one of my cousins was eating rapidly without proper ethics. Proper Etictics was very important to me as it was taught to me by my culture. That repugnance act made me furious, which caused me to slap my hand across his face with intense force. Our behavior is very fragile; it can be influenced by many things that we never anticipate, such as decision-making ability. Not only does our culture impact our decisions, but it also affects how we view ourselves and others.

Culture defines an individual's beliefs. Every culture differs from one another. Some agree on some things while others disagree. But it's clear that every culture shapes our view about ourselves and others. Many studies have shown that different cultural beliefs have different perspectives on a topic; for example, a study between Americans and Japanese was conducted to show the difference between cultures. (Author,The culture-cognition connection,www.apa.org) Some students of both cultures were shown an animated large fish swimming under the water with smaller fishes in the background. When they were asked to describe the scene, the Americans focused on the larger fish, as the Japanese focused more on the background's smaller details. This showed the visuals difference between both cultures. The disagreement between views can then lead to conflicts, which then results in a behavior change. That's how major world conflicts are created, for example, the conflict between Israel and Palestine(Lawrence J. Haas,Cultural obstacles are the real barriers to Israel-Palestine peace,thehill.com). Culture is a mighty force; its beliefs can shape an individual's behavior towards themselves and others. Our behavior is a roller coaster ride, sometimes it is at its peak, but sometimes it erupts when it's down. 

Yes, culture can influence our behavior negatively, which can lead to oppression; however, it can also lead to diversity, respect for one another, and love. While it is true that every culture has different beliefs, that doesn’t mean it always has to be a negative thing. Diversity in culture can give each one of us a new perspective of the world, from which we all can learn. “Strength lies in differences, not in similarities.”This quote by Stephen R. Convey is a perfect example of how much strength lies in culture. Of course, culture impacts our behavior, but I hope we start moving it in a way where we all can see what beautiful characteristics lie in every single one of us.