Why do we need to take culture and individual differences into ...

[serike]

Why do we need to take culture and individual differences into account when we try to understand people's behaviors?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

When Gutierrez, Osman, Kopper, Barrios, and Batte (2000) used factor analysis to predict suicide ideation, what latent variables did they find best predicted such ideation? What measured variables were associated with the latent variables?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

[duke02]

Answer to Question 1

We need to take culture and individual differences into account when understanding people's behaviors because we don't always know what motivates others. We tend to attribute behaviors of our own and those of different people to different underlying causes (e.g., the actor-observer effect). In addition, people interpret the same situation or the same question differently depending on their individual and cultural points of view, which may be different from ours.

Answer to Question 2

In the Gutierrez et al. (2000) research, they found two factors associated with the presence or absence of suicide ideation. The first factor was associated with negative themes, like repulsion by life, hopelessness, low survival and coping beliefs, and negative self-evaluation. Higher levels on these dimensions were associated with greater thoughts of suicide.
A second factor was associated with less risk of suicide. It included variables like fear of social disapproval, fear of suicide, and a sense of responsibility to the family.
These two factors led to the best prediction of thoughts of suicide in the students they studied.