Individualism: the opposite of collectivism. Individualist societies are those in which the interests of the individual prevail over the interests of the group, and in which people are expected to look after themselves and their immediate families.

Collectivism: the opposite of individualism. Collectivist societies are those in which the interests of the group prevail over the interests of the individual, and in which people from birth onward are integrated into strong, cohesive in-groups, which throughout their lifetimes offer them security in exchange for unquestioning loyalty.

"Context has to do with how much you have to know before effective communication can occur, how much shared knowledge is taken for granted by those in conversation with each other, how much reference there is to tacit common ground. Cultures with high context [...] believe that strangers must be 'filled in' before business can be properly discussed. Cultures with low context [...] believe that each stranger should share in rule-making, and the fewer initial structures there are the better" (Trompenaars / Hampden-Turner, p.92).

In polychronic cultures, multiple tasks are handled at the same time, and time is subordinate to interpersonal relations. Plans change frequently to adjust to the current situation. Time is not quantified.

In monochronic cultures, events are scheduled as seperated items. "One thing at a time" and "time is money" are important concepts – and interpersonal relations are subordinate to time. Deadlines and schedules are taken seriously and time is quantified in that it is earned, spent, saved and wasted.

Long-term orientation means a focus on future, possibly quite distant, rewards, to be achieved by carefulness, thrift and perseverance.

Short-term orientation means a focus on the here and now, or at most the near future, with a lack of patience and an unwillingness to defer gratification or wait too long for results.

"A society is called masculine when emotional gender roles are clearly distinct: men are supposed to be assertive, tough, and focused on material success, whereas women are supposed to be more modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life.

A society is called feminine when emotional gender roles overlap: both men and women are supposed to be modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life" (Hofstede / Hofstede, p.120).

Masculinity/femininity is especially about interactive style and competitiveness – how assertive or modest people tend to be within a particular society.

Power distance is about the way in which people in different societies handle inequality. It "can [...] be defined as the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally" (Hofstede / Hofstede, p.46).

Proxemics is concerned with the human perception and use of space and distance. It makes a distinction between public and private space, and identifies the distance zones in human interaction.

This dimension focuses on how humans view their own nature. The two extreme positions are, on the one hand, the conviction that humans are basically good and deserving of trust and, on the other, the belief that mankind is flawed and needs to be controlled and monitored.

The two extreme positions with regard to man's relationship to the environment are: the conviction that mankind can and should control nature, and the belief that man is a part of nature and should defer to nature's laws.

Being: The focus of your existence, and how you define yourself, centres on what kind of person you feel yourself to be, and what particular human qualities you have.

Doing: The focus of your existence, and how you define yourself, centres on the things that you do, and especially your education and your profession, and what you have achieved in them.

"What is the nature of the goals we seek in our interactions with others? Are our interactions a means to another goal (instrumental), or are our interactions an end in and of themselves (expressive)? In the expressive orientation interactions are valued because they are important, not because they will lead to anything else. Instrumental interactions, in contrast, are valued only because they help the person reach another goal" (Gudykunst / Kim, pp.52-53).

"Uncertainty avoidance can [...] be defined as the extent to which the members of a culture feel threatened by ambiguous or unknown situations" (Hofstede / Hofstede, p.167).

At the centre of person-oriented cultures are people, human relationships, and the family. "Family takes precedence over everything else, close friends come next." Preferential treatment is given to them. Customers or businesses can be disrupted, and the more important they are, the more reassured the person for whom things were pushed aside will feel.

The opposite is true of task-oriented cultures, in which people are oriented to tasks, schedules, and procedures. Not sticking to scheduled appointments without a good excuse is considered impolite. Individuals are supposed to be treated equally and judged according to what they do to serve the task in hand regardless of their relationship to one another.

All societies accord higher status to some of their members and in this way draw greater attention to them than to others.

Some societies accord status to people on the basis of their achievements, of what they did – this is achieved status; other societies accord status to people on the basis of their age, class membership, sex, or education – this status is connected with who one is and is called ascribed status.

In specific cultures, the different areas of life and levels of personality (e.g. professional and personal identities) tend to be kept separate, people are direct and precise, and establishing contacts has a specific goal.

In diffuse cultures, all aspects of life and all personality levels have a tendency to penetrate one another, people speak in a general and tactful way, and established relationships are not connected with any concrete matter.

Universalism means behaving according to the rules, laws, norms and abstract values accepted within a given society, and not adjusting, "bending" or suspending these to meet the requirements of a specific situation.

Particularism means considering each case with regard to the particular situation, and especially the human context and the relationships with the people involved.

Formality refers to the importance of and adherence to rules for acceptable business and social behaviour.

"Frontstage culture includes the standard, normal, proper ways of doing things that insiders are willing to share with outsiders. A newcomer to the society can acquire frontstage cultural knowledge relatively easily" (Terpstra / David, p.9).

"Backstage culture refers to knowledge that insiders define as standard ways of doing things that they are not willing to share with outsiders" for various reasons, for example because the activity/behavior is regarded as illegal, illicit or shameful or simply as a private matter (that might give competitive advantage to those who know it) (Terpstra / David, p.10).

Cultures differ in the degree to which their members show or hide their emotions.

Members of affective cultures tend to display their emotions fairly openly; in neutral cultures, people tend not to disclose their emotions, but control and smother them, in this way hiding what they are feeling or thinking.

Economic development tends to push societies in a common direction, but rather than converging, they seem to move on parallel trajectories shaped by their cultural heritages.

The fact that a society was historically shaped by Protestantism or Confucianism or Islam leaves a cultural heritage with enduring effects that influence subsequent development.

Traditionalism refers to the persistence of traditional value systems in a society despite economic and political changes (under the influence of modernisation).