Papers from the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology Conferences
Publication Date
11-1-2025
Abstract
The popular adage “There's no ‘I’ in team" aims to encourage Americans to place the team’s needs ahead of their individual goals, which research shows is essential to effective team functioning (Wageman et al., 2012). However, do Americans actually follow this recommendation in practice? Decades of research in cultural psychology has consistently shown that our cultural contexts (e.g., race, gender, and nation of origin) thoroughly influence the degree to which individuals hold independent (i.e., focus on one’s unique goals and preferences) and/or interdependent (i.e., focus on the needs of others and the environment) models of self and personhood (Markus & Connor, 2014). More recently, these cultural contexts have been found to influence our relationality (i.e., the interpersonal level of functioning) in important ways (Carey & Markus, 2017). While these cultural processes are theorized to influence our teamwork–an important element of interpersonal functioning–few studies have shown how cultural contexts like race and gender impact how individuals engage in teamwork. Thus, the present study tested whether the use of influencing (e.g., “influence others with your ideas”) and adjusting (e.g., “adjust your views to fit with others”) strategies might vary depending on one’s cultural contexts of race and gender. In a large, diverse sample of college students (N = 599), we found the predicted main effect of gender, such that women use adjusting strategies more and influencing strategies less than men. Contrary to our hypothesis, the predicted main effect of race was not significant, with White identifying participants endorsing influencing and adjusting strategies to the same degree as Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) participants. When asked to forecast their future teamwork strategies, we found that the majority of BIPOC women chose adjusting strategies (58%), while the majority of White women, BIPOC men and White men all chose influencing strategies in a forced choice scenario. These findings confirm our prediction that race and gender cultural contexts may drive some groups to act more independently by influencing others during teamwork, and other groups to act more interdependently by adjusting to others. Based on this study, only some racial and gender groups adhere to the popular adage “There is no ‘I’ in team.” In increasingly diverse workplaces, teams will consist of individuals with different values, practices, and expectations around teamwork–leading to potential culture clashes and team inefficiencies. Yet our findings also show that all groups used both influencing and adjusting strategies to some extent, suggesting these approaches are not mutually exclusive and can be cultivated across identity groups. By highlighting the presence of group differences in organizational settings, we aim to develop a set of practical, identity-specific strategies that lead to better teamwork outcomes for increasingly diverse classrooms and workplaces.
ScholarWorks Citation
Bencharit, L. Z., Creason, C. R., Cunningham, J. L., Gasparyan, I. V., Dhariwal, D., & Markus, H. R. (2025) Is There an “I” in Team?: Racial and Gender Differences in Interdependent Teamwork. In Okvitawanli, A., Friedlmeier, W., & Bhangaokar, R. (Eds.). Globalization in Context. Proceedings from the 27th Congress of the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology. https://doi.org/10.4087/TRVC9777
Acknowledgments
Lucy Bencharit shares first authorship with Cade Creason.