When two cultures come into contact, they do not exchange every cultural item. If that were the case, there would be no cultural differences in the world today. Instead, only a small number of cultural elements ever spread from one culture to another. Which cultural item is accepted depends largely on the item’s use and compatibility with already existing cultural traits. For example, it is not likely that men’s hair dyes designed to “get out the gray” will spread into parts of rural Africa where a person’s status is elevated with advancing years. Even when a(n) __________ is consistent with a society’s needs, there is still no guarantee that it will be accepted. For example, most people in the United States using US customary units (e.g., inch, foot, yard, mile, etc.) have resisted adopting the metric system even though making such a change would enable US citizens to interface with the rest of the world more efficiently. [3점]

* metric system: 미터법