Fairness perceptions in China (vs. North America) and cultural elements in decision making

This dissertation examines Chinese fairness perceptions and related decision patterns. It studies the similarities and discrepancies between Chinese and North Americans relative to this culturally rich concept. It also investigates whether and how Western-born decision analysis can be used in the "Eastern" country of China.; The approach of this research is descriptive. Data was collected through written surveys, telephone surveys, face-to-face interviews, and a case study. Some survey subjects were asked to give their fairness opinions, while others' decision choices were elicited to investigate the role of fairness perceptions in decision making. Comparisons were made between Chinese and North Americans on those questions that were previously given to American or Canadian subjects. In the interviews, five Chinese decision makers revealed their fairness perceptions, and described their decision processes in problems that involved fairness considerations. The case study investigated the development of a service quality control program in a Chinese city which illustrated the Chinese decision process from another angle.; The results show that, in situations involving health and safety related risks, Chinese and Americans both believe that it is fair to distribute these risks equally among the people. However, Americans generally follow their fairness opinions in their decisions, while the Chinese sometimes don't. In the market place, Canadians of the 80's seemed to care a lot about how ethically the companies acted, while the Chinese of the 90's appear to be quite flexible and willing to accept whatever results from the market evolution. The Chinese fairness perceptions also indicates that they are quite adaptive to a market economy.; This research project also found that the Chinese generally do break down a problem into smaller components and then aggregate the positive or negative effects of the decision on these components to arrive at a decision. Based on this, a framework to incorporate cultural factors into decision analysis models is proposed. In this framework, the breaking down process is uniform across cultures. There exist levels of cultural differences in the perfection and style of the breaking down process, the evaluation process, and the aggregation process.; Chapters 2 to 5 are written as stand-alone entities, complete with references. They are prepared in this style since each of them is being submitted as separately for journal publication.