Final answer:
Cultural diffusion is selective because societies often adopt or reject aspects based on their alignment with existing cultural values, norms, and social structures. This selection can be driven by various factors including the desire to maintain cultural identities and accord with individual or collective preferences and biases.
Step-by-step explanation:
Cultural diffusion is a selective process because societies choose elements to embrace or reject based on compatibility with existing values, norms, and social structures. This selective nature is influenced by factors such as ethnic bias, environmental circumstances, and technology.
As we delve into understanding our own culture, engagement with other cultures through processes like cultural diffusion highlights the selective filtering that takes place. Societies may encourage the maintenance of distinct cultural identities, as seen in ethnic regions within cities or through selective migration, where individuals move to areas that resonate with their own cultural preferences or personality traits.
Furthermore, advances in technology and changes in global migration patterns challenge the traditional mechanisms of diffusion. Hence, the cultural elements that indeed spread through diffusion are often those that align with a region's psychological profile or meet the approval of the dominant societal norms, showing a complex interplay in the processes of cultural change.