Yamagishi, T.（山岸俊男） (2014). From a measurement model to a dynamic causal model: Commentary on Schwartz. 測定モデルから因果モデルへ：Schwartzへのコメント Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 45(1), 30-36. doi: 10.1177/0022022113513105
Schwartz (2013) uses the measurement model of latent aptitudes to explain why the large variance in individuals’ values does not pose a problem for the use of the country mean as a proxy of the societal culture as a macro property. I propose that the multi-level causal model provides a more appropriate view of societal culture as a macro property, according to which individuals in each country are like students in a class who are taught by an instructor. The instructor’s teaching effectiveness is a macro property, affecting all students’ learning levels and the average test score. Within-class variance in students’ test scores generated by factors independent of the instructor’s teaching qualities is irrelevant to the assessment of the instructor’s teaching effectiveness. Social institutions such as democratic legal systems affect all individuals under the institutions and would generate between-institution differences in people’s behavior indendeptly of factors ideosyncratic to individuals.