How people respond to the same situation can – at least in part – be explained by their cultural background. An often used framework to understand cross-cultural differences in how people feel, think and behave in social situations is that of individualism-collectivism (IC). Sylvia Huwaë shows in her PhD thesis that people’s responses depend also upon how close they were with those who were present or involved. The IC framework is not as absolute as it is sometimes thought to be. The defense is on the 11th of October.