Arguing in Mexico: How Uniquely Mexican Is It?

ABSTRACT In legal and educational circles, the quality of arguments has become a growing national concern in Mexico. We examined the motivations, understandings, and private reactions to arguing among Mexican college students, and compare these to data from the United States. Mexican men were more aggressive than women, which is not the case in all nations studied to this point. Mexicans were very substantially more oriented to civility than U.S. respondents, more sophisticated in their understandings of interpersonal arguing, and far less inclined to take conflicts personally. Power distance was a substantial predictor for many of the measures used here.