Internationalization and increasing border-crossing mobility are among the key characteristics of the last decades. It is a matter of fact that increasing internationalization leads to cultures and languages in contact with each other more than ever before in the history of human kind.
The Internet can be considered as the most emblematic symbol of the internationalization process:
one of the key advantages of the World Wide Web is indeed its global accessibility. It permits information exchange and service offerings worldwide. It also allows an increasing number of people with different socio-economic, educational, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds to participate in this worldwide information and service market.
Yet one cannot ignore that barriers to accessing information on the Internet exist. Studies show how the distribution of the Internet differed and still significantly differs between countries, genders, or people of different educational backgrounds (Sims, et al., 2005). A number of reasons explaining these divergences have been identified, in particular those of a financial and technological nature.
Yet, financial and technological development can only partly explain Internet adoption and use.
Given certain country-specific Internet usage patterns that did not fit the patterns of Internet adoption based on economic and technological development (e.g. Japan – see Hermeking, 2004), (see also Kralisch, 2003), researchers started to look into the roles of culture and language. The impacts of culture and language have been receiving increasing attention over the last few years, mirrored by the growing number of publications and conferences in this field. In view of the myriad of websites and (other) information systems that target an international audience, the question of what the consequences of different cultural and linguistic backgrounds are needs to be raised. How do language and culture affect the access of information, how do they influence the use of information systems, and what is their impact on the users’ attitudes towards a website and their resulting satisfaction with it?
Besides these application-oriented questions, insight into the impact of culture and language may also contribute to the advancement of Information Systems from a theoretical point of view.
Cross-cultural and cross-linguistic research helps to determine the extent to which (previous)
findings can be generalized. For instance, to which extent are privacy concerns universal? To which extent are they equally applicable to the U.S. and Europe? (see also Davison, et al., 2003). Cross-cultural and cross-linguistic research may also discover patterns where differences have been so far predominantly considered on the individual level. For example: Does culture lead to systematic differences between individuals in risk perception? (e.g. Weber, et al., 1998).
From a practical perspective, insight into these subjects is useful from a commercial point of view, since it enhances customer acquisition and services. The study of cultural and linguistic differences in this context can be interpreted as a form of marketing research that examines the adoption and user satisfaction of information systems. The study of language and culture is equally helpful from an ethical point of view: understanding the role of language and culture helps in making information and services available online for people with linguistic and cultural backgrounds that are so far underrepresented on the Internet. The goal of studying language and culture is to contribute to the decrease of the digital divide.
The research topic furthermore finds justification in the fact that adaptation of information systems to all cultural and linguistic groups is infeasible, for economic as well as technological reasons.
Besides, such adaptations may represent important investment decisions, with ramifications that need decision support. Consequently it is important to determine aspects of language and culture that have a crucial impact on behavioural as well as attitudinal outcomes. It is important to discover which adaptations are necessary and which are less important; which user groups need to have separated information or service offers and which groups can be assembled into one cluster. In Section 2.4.1, for instance, we infer an assignement of culturally determined website preferences to two main groups from our results.
It is obvious that this thesis cannot give an extensive answer to the vast and complex role of language and culture in the use of information systems in general and websites in particular.
Nevertheless, it provides another piece to the puzzle, and contributes towards obtaining a complete picture. This thesis focuses on the impact of culture and language on website access and website usage behaviour, valuation of features and (language) services, as well as attitudes towards data disclosure.
Culture is a rather recent subject in the context of Information Systems. As in other disciplines, analyses of culture within the field of Information Systems are challenged by a problematic conceptualization of the research object. What is culture? What are typical characteristics of a certain cultural group? How should a cultural group be defined? Is it possible that a person has
more in common with a foreign colleague who lives far away than with their neighbour, the postman, or the director of the local bank? Is this due to culture? Does cultural background have an effect on behaviour and attitudes? An analysis of the impact of culture requires a thorough theoretical discussion of the conceptual framework that precedes the empirical section in this thesis. As a first working definition, culture is defined as values, beliefs, and thinking patterns that are shared within a group. We elaborate more on this definition in section 1.3.3.1 in chapter 1.
Since our empirical research is based on Hofstede’s model, cultural groups are mostly defined on the national level. Sections 1.1.3.2, 1.1.3.3, 1.1.3.4, and 1.3.3.1 discuss this problem in more detail and suggest further units. Cross-cultural studies in Information Systems are additionally challenged by the fact that the cultural research paradigm that was originally developed in social sciences needs to comply with the requirements of a strongly application-oriented and quantitative research field.
This needs to be taken into account when evaluating and interpreting cross-cultural research designs and results.
Language appears to be a less controversial subject. Yet, its role is multifaceted, and with regard to the Internet subject to contradictory impressions. It seems to be common sense that Internet users prefer websites in their native languages, especially among users with a lower proficiency level in English or other non-native languages. Nevertheless, it doesn’t exclude that in certain situations non-native language skills are completely sufficient for understanding and navigating on websites.
Especially during the beginning of the Internet, the use of English for offering information and services was widespread and widely accepted. Differences in users’ language proficiency levels and their effects are examined when language is approached from a cognitive perspective. The cognitive approach to language regards mental processes, in particular in terms of information processing that is determined or affected by language. However, the use of language also triggers attitudinal patterns. Language attitudes are a classic research field in sociolinguistics. The attitudinal approach emphasizes affective responses towards the use of a particular language.
Since a comprehensive linguistic adaptation is not possible, the question as to which extent the use of (a) particular language(s) leads to noteworthy cognitive, attitudinal, and eventually behavioural differences regarding access of information and use of specific features is raised. Hence, examinations are needed to gain insight into divergences between speakers of different native languages and their attitudes towards native and non-native language offerings. As argued later on, the answer to this question is closely related to the extent to which language constitutes a barrier to the flow of information on the Internet. Given the decreasing impact of legal and logistical borders on the Internet, insight into the role of language with regard to this aspect seems to be of utmost
importance. Indeed, increasingly facilitated international trade and minimized communication borders will make more and more political and geographical borders disappear. It can be assumed that especially with regard to the Internet, linguistic borders are therefore going to play a much more important role in the future – as a market determinant from a commercial perspective or as a barrier to information access from a societal point of view.
To sum up, this thesis aims to contribute towards answering questions concerning the impact of language and culture on the use of the Internet and its services. Our investigations test the role of culture and language with respect to a number of behavioural and attitudinal aspects of website access, website use, and website evaluation. Analyses embrace several website features and services and potential implications for website design.
Studies are based on investigations of user behaviour on Ehealth-websites. Health websites represent an appropriate type of website since they encompass both societal and commercial goals:
as part of their public information task, they aim to provide information to as many people as possible worldwide, regardless of their cultural and linguistic background. Moreover, they often aim in particular at people with an increased need for health education - usually the result of a lack of access to information. At the same time – due to increasing financial restrictions in the Health sector – remunerated services are becoming more and more mandatory for online health information providers. Customer services are therefore also evaluated under the aspects of their potential commercial benefit.