Australia Mini Country Culture of Society Research Paper

Australia Mini Country Culture of Society - Research Paper Example The way this affects communication and the media is that the media can have more freedom to say what they think is the truth. Australia falls in the midrange in the power distance index, falling lower than that other developed countries such as the United States of America. For instance, Australia scores 36 on the power distance index as compared to the United States of America which scores 40 on the same scale. This is a much lower score, as compared to other countries, especially Arab countries such as Malaysia, Egypt and Philippines which score over 90 on the power distance index scale. According to Nisbett & Miyamoto (467-473) Asians and seem to engage in cultural practices in a different way than westerns who regard issues in a context-independent manner. The main reason why the power distance in Australia is low may be the fact that there is equality in wealth distribution in comparison with other states like the United States where the wealth gap in continually increasing, leaving a thin middle class and a large part of the population being poor while a small percentage owns much of the wealth. Australia also scores a 90 for individualism and a 61 for masculinity. As Ihator (38) says, this kind of individualism is most likely to be seen in first world countries like America and not in countries in Africa. Masculinity, as measured in the Hofstede’s Power Distance Index, is a measure of the factors that are considered to be masculine such as power, materialism, assertiveness, etc. According to Kimmel (90) society with a high masculinity score on the Hofstede’s Power Distance Index is an indication that males in that country are more likely to be more assertive on their rights and are more likely to have their own choices and not be dominated. These are people who are not easily affected by public opinion and are not likely to accept power roles are meted for them.