• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.343-359
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• 2014

This study investigates how cultural differences between countries affect bilateral trade volumes, using Hofstede's cultural index that reflects nations' cultural characteristics. Empirical analyses of the impacts of Hofstede's five cultural characteristics on bilateral trade volumes are conducted either in each separate equation or simultaneously. Bilateral trade data of OECD countries plus China as of year 2010 is used for regression analysis on gravity model. Regression results from individual equation for each cultural index variable show tthe smaller the index gaps of power distances and uncertainty avoidance among countries, the larger bilateral trade volumes. On the contrary, the larger the index gaps of long-term orientation among countries, the larger bilateral trade volumes. If five Hofstede cultural indexes are regressed in a single equation, however, only variables of power distance and long-term orientation are significant. The analysis largely confirms that bilateral trade among countries with similar culture have much potrential to grow. It implies that policy actions for cultural proximity are very important for furthering bilateral trade.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.14 no.9
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• pp.73-87
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to investigate the cultural difference between eastern and western culture in the online community in view of Hofstede dimensions of national culture through social network analysis. And this study tries to interpret the cultural dimensions by using social network indexes. The results show every cultural dimension offered conflicting results except uncertainty avoidance. The eastern culture shows individualism, and low power distance compared to western culture in the online community. Moreover the communication speed of eastern culture is faster than western culture. But eastern culture shows high uncertainty avoidance in the online community similar to an offline culture. This results of this study show that because of certain differences between the offline and online culture, the typical framework we use to analyze offline culture should not be applied to analyze online culture. Therefore we believe that the most important contribution of this study should be related with the finding that we need very different approach to be able to correctly understand the prevalent culture in the online community than the one that we use in the offline community.