Cross-cultural research has a long history in sociology (Armer and Grimshaw 1973; Kohn 1989; Miller-Loessi 1995). It most generally involves social research across societies or ethnic and subcultural groups within a society. Because a discussion of macro-level comparative historical research appears in another chapter of this encyclopedia, the focus here is primarily on cross-cultural analysis of social psychological processes. These include communicative and interactive processes within social institutions and more generally the relation between the individual and society and its institutions.

Although all sociological research is seen as comparative in nature, comparisons across subcultural or cultural groups have distinct advantages for generating and testing sociological theory. Specifically, cross-cultural research can help "distinguish between those regularities in social behavior that are system specific and those that are universal" (Grimshaw 1973, p. 5). In this way, sociologists can distinguish between generalizations that are true of all cultural groups and those that apply for...