Forestry

Rice farming

Agriculture

Biology

Cash crop

China

Archaeology

Psychology

Geography

Agronomy

Sociology

Herding

Subsistence agriculture

Interdependence

Social science

Current Opinion in Psychology

Roughly four billion people live in cultures with a legacy of rice farm. Recent studies find that rice cultures are more interdependent than herding cultures and wheat-farming cultures. In China, people from rice-farming areas think more holistically and show less implicit individualism than people from wheat-farming areas. These differences are mirrored in micro-level comparisons of neighboring counties differ in rice versus wheat. Research has also found evidence of cultural differences based on rice farming within Japan and around the world. However, we know little about the mechanism of how rice culture is transmitted in the modern world. More research is needed on the mechanisms, as well as other subsistence styles, such as corn farming and cash crops like sugar.

Emerging evidence of cultural differences linked to rice versus wheat agriculture