Applied Cross-Cultural Research Today: Rethinking Research Across Borders and Nations

This book explores how culture quietly shapes our lives, influencing everything from the way we speak and lead to the way we grieve and resolve conflicts. Culture is often overlooked because it’s invisible, yet it influences everything we do. This book reveals that hidden force, demonstrating how cultural codes affect behavior, emotion, and decision-making in various settings.

Through real-world examples ranging from refugee camps to boardrooms, the book argues that understanding culture is no longer optional. It’s essential. With a focus on application, this book equips scholars, researchers, practitioners, and leaders to engage with culture thoughtfully and effectively. Whether they are studying psychology, managing teams, or working in global contexts, readers will find the tools they need to navigate cultural complexity with clarity and respect.

Adebowale Akande is internationally known as a leading scholar in cross-cultural research, management, and globalism. His work, in collaboration with distinguished experts like Bernard M. Bass, Susan T. Fiske, Peter B. Smith, Mark Peterson, David Watkins, Douglas Kellner, Peter Glick, Richard Boyatzis, Albert Bandura, Phil Zimbardo, CGM Bakare, James Georgas, David M. Buss, Amos Alao, Shalom H. Schwartz, Julius Akinboye, Burrhus F. Skinner, Robert House, and others, investigates the complexities of effective leadership, interpersonal work dynamics, and the varied cultural values that shape contemporary societies. Akande's extensive research ranges from analyzing learning patterns to probing the cultural foundations of leadership expectations and the crucial alignment of CEO behaviors with these expectations for maximum leadership effectiveness. His insights also encompass understanding social perceptions and biases, scrutinizing the formation of stereotypes and prejudices, and the impact of social dynamics, such as cooperation, competition, politics, and power structures, on reinforcing or counteracting these biases.

He is a foundational member of the 2004 [GLOBE] study, the most extensive and renowned study of its kind within the social sciences. Akande has been honored with numerous awards, including the Commonwealth Academic Fellowship in 1992, the IUPSYS International Award in 1996, and the Frank Andrew Award from the University of Michigan in 1996. Additionally, he has received the ISP Award in 2000, a Taiwan Government International Scholar Fellowship in 2005, a Nippon Foundation of Japan Fellowship in 2008, a Fellowship of Schloss Leopoldskron, Austria in 2008, a Certificate of Honor from the Indian Institute of Planning and Management in 2008, and the IAGT Award in 2018. He was a co-recipient of the 2007 Ursula Gielen Global Book Award and the Gordon W. Allport Prize in 2005 for his research on ambivalent sexism and global family relations. Renowned for popularizing cross-cultural studies, he currently holds the position of international director for IR GLOBE in Vancouver and serves as a guest professor at several Canadian universities in British Columbia, Canada.