Cultural Differences in Inhibitory Control: An ALE Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Culture greatly influences our attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors, affecting how we communicate and make decisions. There is an ongoing debate regarding the belief that people from Eastern cultures possess greater self-control abilities when compared to people from Western cultures. In this study, we conducted a meta-analysis using the Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) algorithm to compare 30 studies (719 subjects, 373 foci) that used fMRI to investigate the performance in Go-Nogo and Stop Signal Tasks of participants from Western and/or Eastern countries. Our meta-analysis found differences between the networks activated in Eastern and Western culture participants. The right prefrontal cortex showed distinct patterns, with the Inferior Frontal gyrus more active in the Eastern group and the middle and superior frontal gyri more active in the Western group. Our findings suggest that Eastern culture subjects have a higher tendency to activate brain regions involved in proactive inhibitory control, while Western culture subjects rely more on reactive inhibitory brain regions during cognitive control tasks. This implies that proactive inhibition may play a crucial role in promoting the collective and interdependent behavior typical of Eastern cultures, while reactive inhibition may be more important for efficient cognitive control in subjects of Western cultures that prioritize individualism and independence.

Keywords: Eastern culture; Western culture; cultural differences; culture; inhibitory control; meta-analysis; right prefrontal cortex.

Figure 1

PRISMA flow chart.

Figure 2

ALE meta-analysis map for the Western and Eastern groups of our data selection. The algorithm converged for the Western group (in yellow-red) on left precentral gyrus (l-PCG), and was bilateral on medial frontal gyrus (mFG), right superior/middle frontal gyrus (r-S/MFG), and right and left insula (r-INS, l-INS). The algorithm converged for Eastern group (in white-blue) on bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), right inferior frontal gyrus (r-IFG), left striatum nucleus extended to the insula (l-INS), right inferior frontal gyrus (r-IFG) and right superior/middle frontal gyrus (r-S/MFG). The algorithm converged for the conjunction analysis of the two groups (in white-green) bilaterally on medial frontal gyrus (mFG), right inferior parietal lobule (r-IPL), right superior parietal lobule (r-SPL), right superior/middle frontal gyrus (r-S/MFG), bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), right inferior frontal gyrus (r-IFG), and right (r-INS) and left striatum extended to the insula (l-INS)—p < 0.05 cluster-level corrected inference using p < 0.005 uncorrected at voxel-level as the cluster-forming threshold.

Figure 3

Contrast analysis between Western and Eastern groups. The scale bar in red represents z-values from 1 to 2.5 revealed by the Western > Eastern contrast analysis: left pre-central gyrus (l-PCG), right middle frontal gyrus (r-MFG), right insula (r-INS), right superior frontal gyrus (r-S/MFG). The scale bar in blue represents z-values from 1 to 2.5 revealed by the Eastern > Western contrast analysis: right middle frontal gyrus (r-MFG) and the inferior frontal gyrus (r-IFG), right lentiform nucleus (r-LN).