Here.

The article is sort of funny. The findings of the study aren't particularly flattering, of course. Basically researchers found that Americans aren't very good at understanding other points of view. So the headings in the article are: "simple study" and "gross oversimplification."

Even when we understand other points of view, we don't like them.

Headings aside, the sample was small, and the experiment was indeed simple:

Keysar and his colleagues arranged two blocks on a table so participants could see both. However, a piece of cardboard obstructed the view of one block so a "director," sitting across from the participant, could only see one block.

When the director asked 20 American participants (none of Asian descent) to move a block, most were confused as to which block to move and did not take into account the director's perspective. Even though they could have deduced that, from the director's seat, only one block was on the table.

Most of the 20 Chinese participants, however, were not confused by the hidden block and knew exactly which block the director was referring to. While following directions was relatively simple for the Chinese, it took Americans twice as long to move a block.

The study seems to conclude that "collectivist" cultures, like in China, cultivate better communication skills.  There may be something to that. Some researchers contend that Asians move in "a more socially complicated world" than we do.

I don't know.

I think a social world which lacks a strong consensus across the board as to etiquette can be pretty complicated, too. We also have highly specific competing tribalisms, each with their own set of secret codes to distinguish the initiates from the uninitiated.

But the idea we have of ourselves is that we pick and choose which rules of etiquette we're going to follow, and when. Americans strive for the "authentic" gesture, the expression of the "real me." And while that's well and good, it's only worthwhile in a small number of cases, where the "me" in question is sufficiently developed to transcend the "me."

In most cases, "the real me" is merely a sloppily assembled combination of pop-culture memes.  A walking billboard spouting slogans.

For some reason I'm reminded of an old song Suzanne Vega wrote for Philip Glass years ago, called "Freezing":

If you had no name
If you had no history
If you have no books
If you had no family

If it were only you
Naked on the grass
Who would you be then?

This is what he asked
And I said I wasn't really sure
But I would probably be
Cold

And now I'm freezing
Freezing

And what the article flatteringly calls "rugged American individualism" might better be described these days as garden variety self-centeredness. "Rugged individualism" has a rather heroic ring to it, I know, but when you're defined by your haircut and ipod I don't see what's so rugged about your "individualism."

Grr. Someone woke up on the wrong side of postmodernism today, didn't they?