Cultural Psychology Book Notes

Cultural Psychology (Heine) Chapter 2: Cultural Evolution    

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Ecological and Geographical Variation Proximal Causes: those that have a direct and immediate relation with their effects Distal Causes: initial difference that lead to effects over long periods of time, and often through indirect relations Evoked Culture: notion that all people, regardless of where they are from, have a certain biologically encoded behavioral repertoires that are potentially accessible to them and those repertoires are engaged when the appropriate situational conditions are present o Tied to geography, when one moves to a new environment, new behavioral responses should be evoked Transmitted Culture: people learn about culture through social learning or modeling others who live near them Natural Selection: o 1. There is individual variability among members of a species on certain traits o 2. Those traits are associated with different survival rates o 3. Those traits have a hereditary basis o All 3 conditions must be present Sexual Selection: those who can attract the healthiest mate will be most likely to have surviving offspring o Ideas as replications o Genes longevity; fidelity: high to reduce errors for successful copying Fecundity: produce many copies, higher number = better Dawkin’s Memes: smallest units of cultural info that can be faithfully transmitted o Ex: catch phrases, tunes, table manners, I pods, etc. Epidemiology of Ideas o First and individual (the inventor) has mental representation in mind. Second another individual (the imitator) learns idea from first person and creates mental representation of idea in head. (Keeps central gist, but is re-created from the previous idea) o Communicable ideas spread through language Dynamic Social Impact Theory: Individuals come to influence each other, they do so by terms of how often the individuals interact, which ultimately leads to clusters of like minded people separated by culture o Norms develop among those who communicate regularly Contemporary Legends: fictional stories told in modern societies as though they are true o More likely to spread when they evoke a shared emotional reaction among people o

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Minimally Counter intuitive Ideas: statements that are surprising and unusual in that they violate our expectations but are not too outlandish Many cultures becoming interconnected through globalization o Many becoming more individualistic o People in many cultures becoming more intelligent, more education, college degrees o Steve Johnson: argues pop culture has become more progressively complex and challenging o Is this making us smarter? Subjective Well-being: feeling of how satisfied one is with one’s life Pluralistic Ignorance: tendency for people to collectively misinterpret thoughts that underlie other people’s behaviors o Leads to cultural persistence; college students believe there is large alcohol consumption on campus than there really is

Chapter 5: Self and Personality 

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Five Factor Model of Personality o 5 core traits overlap o 1. Openness to Experience: person’s intelligence and curiosity about the world o 2. Conscientiousness: how responsible and dependable o 3. Extraversion: how much individual is active or dominant o 4. Agreeableness: extent which a person tends to be warm and pleasant o 5. Neuroticism: degree of emotional instability or unpredictableness Twenty Statements Test (Kuhn & McPortland, 1954) o I am_____ o Culture provides ways we think about ourselves (content) o Think about self in abstract psych attributes or roles/relationships Independent view of self: self derives its identity from inner attributes. Attributes assumed to reflect essence of individual, viewed as stable across situations and lifespan. Unique and self contained attributes regulate behavior and individuals have obligation to advertise publically themselves in ways consistent with these attributes. Interdependent view of self: self as relational entity fundamentally connected to, sustained by a number of significant relationships. Behavior recognized as contingent upon perceptions of other’s thoughts, feelings, actions, part of a larger social unit. o Different behavior toward ingroup and outgroup members Across all cultures, slight trend in male stereotypical traits viewed as more admirable than female ones; more strength We rationalize decisions to reduce cognitive dissonance and keep consistency of self across contexts East Asians only rationalize when decisions are made for others o West: consistent with selves

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o East: consistent with others Subjective Self-Awareness: people’s concerns are with the world outside themselves and largely unaware of themselves as individuals o You are an audience member when your awareness is directed to the stage Objective Self-Awareness: concerns directed specifically at themselves. Consider how they appear to others, experiencing themselves as an object. o How are they faring by a set of standards East Asians show more habitual self-awareness Incremental Theory of Self: belief that we can easily change and are expected to change; belief a person’s abilities and attributes are malleable and can be improved Entity Theory of Self: abilities and traits largely fixed, innate features of the self Americans move a lot more so personality depends more on traits than stable network of relationships

Chapter 7: Morality 

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Universalism: the perspective that sees people from different cultures as largely the same, and any observed cultural variability exits only at a superficial level o Cultural variability only at superficial level, largely variables on closer inspection Relativism: cultural diversity in ways of thinking is not superficial, but reflects genuinely different psychological processes o Culture and thought mutually constituted o Default assumption that cultural practices reflect solution to challenges faced by a culture Evolutionism (a cultural psychologist perspective): cultural variability reflects genuine differences in psych processes, and there is any one way mind has evolved to think. Some ways of thinking more mature/advanced than others. o People of different cultures would think in same way once they reached part of development or participated in cultural context that allowed for full expression of the mind’s capabilities Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development o Level 1: Preconventional  Individuals understand cultural rules/labels and label good/bad. People interpret morality based on how better or worse off they would be for acting a certain way o Level 2: Conventional  People able to identify with particular group and show loyalty  Viewing actions as moral to extent they help maintain and facilitate social order o Level 3: Postconventional  Moral values/principles exist separated from authority of social groups

Abstract ethical principles of right and wrong Good behavior seen as consistent with set of universal ethical principles that emphasize justice and individuals rights o Universal pattern of moral development across the world, but doesn’t reflect levels different cultures reach o But postconventional level=western, urban bias Shweder’s 3 Codes of Ethics across the world o Ethic of Autonomy: morality in terms of individual freedom and rights violations o Ethic of Community: individuals have duties that confirm with their roles in community or social hierarch o Ethic of Divinity: concerned about sanctity and perceived “natural order” of things one is obligated to preserve standards mandated by transcendent authority Ethic of Community; German Sociologist Ferdinand Tonnies o 2 means individuals can relate in group o Gemeinschaft (community): bind people together; relationships viewed as real, organic and ends in themselves. People feel unity of spirit, relationships not instrumental terms  Obligations with one’s own relationships would take on weight of full moral obligations o Gesellschaft (association/society): more characteristic of modern western societies, treat relationships as imaginary, instrumental, and means to an end. \  Autonomy of individuals bound to each other by social convention  Lack of obligations toward others, formalized rules necessary to keep order Moral obligations = objective obligations: people believe that they have obligation to act, but no official rule or law that requires them to do so Moral Obligations = legitimately regulated; people should be prevented from engaging in moral violation or punished Emotions and Moral Violations o Do emotions guide morality? o Guilt and shame keep us in line, why we don’t commit crimes o Rozin: we attend to specific kind of moral violation we perceived  Different emotional reactions to 3 different code of ethics  Violation of Ethic of Autonomy: when people feel harm is caused or rights taken away, tend to respond with anger  Violation of ethic of community: people who witness those who don’t live up to duties toward a group or not doing their share have contempt  Violation of ethic of Divinity: someone violates sacred natural order of things feel disgust  

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Morality of thoughts o Protestants viewed thoughts as governed by moral concerns, Jews didn’t (focused on what people do not think) Culture and Distributive Justice o Principle of need: resources directed toward who need them the most o Principle of equality: resources shared equally o Principle of equity: resources distributed based on individual’s contributions o Meritocracy: earnings depend on effort o Seniority system: older/ more experienced more rewarded

Chapter 8: Emotions 

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James-Lange Theory of Emotions: emotions are physiological responses or bodily reverberations to stimuli, product of autonomic nervous system. o James: emotions are physical sensations that make us feel human Two Factor Theory of Emotions: emotions were interpretations of bodily responses James-Lange since physiological makes case for universality of emotional experience Appraisal: way we evaluate events in terms of relevance to our well-being Shweder Definition on emotion: the affective response to an appraisal Facial expressions universal 80-90% (Ekman & Friesen, 1971) Basic set of emotions (6): anger, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise, disgust Ekman’s theory of emotions: when encountering the same situation, people will have the same emotional response, which will be linked to corresponding facial muscles o Evolutionary advantage to conceal emotions o Facial expressions not reflexive, able to moderate expressions to express feelings we like to communicate with others Display Rules: culturally specific rules that govern which facial expressions are appropriate in given situation and how intensely they should be exhibited o Pain expression more pronounced among older patients than among younger patients Ritualized Displays: voluntary produced emotional expressions from cultural display rules Facial Feedback Hypothesis: one source of info we utilize when inferring our feelings is our facial expressions o Masking emotions in Japan may lead to Japanese experiencing fewer and less intense emotions than Americans o Schadenfreude: German term for feelings of pleasure that one gets when witnessing hard times befall another (example of various emotional states not agreed in one language) Linguistic Relativity: extent to which people think are influenced by words the use o Japanese feel good focusing on how emotions connect them to others, Americans feel good when emotions distinguish themselves from others

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Subjective Well-being: feeling of how satisfied one is with one’s life o People in individualistic societies far more likely than those in collectivistic societies to base life satisfaction on how many positive emotions they were experiencing o In collectivist cultures, life satisfaction based on giving up to cultural norms, being high respected by other for living up to standards o Americans seek out positive emotions high in arousal, East Asians prefer low arousal ones

Chapter 11: Interpersonal Attraction, Close Relationships, and Group 

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What is attractive? o Skin that looks free of blemishes, blotches, sores, rashes o Bilateral symmetry: shows developmental stability o Average faces  Facial features close to average size, configuration  Less likely to have genetic abnormalities  But bodies are attractive if they are different from average Propinquity Effect: people are more likely to become friends with people with whom they frequently interact o Those who stood next to whom influenced interactions more than personalities or background Mere Exposure Effect: more we are exposed to a stimulus, more we are attracted to it Similarity-Attraction Effect: people tend to be attracted to those who are most like themselves Close Relationships o Cultural differences: individualistic society more open to having less enemies o Collectivist don’t trust ingroups (neighbors, friends, relatives) o Americans view fundamentally disconnected from others, only reasons such people would form connections is because they would choose to do so o Relations only develop when people involved in them decide that forming a relationship would be to their advantage o Interdependent/collectivist: self is defined primarily on basis of close relationships  Relationships not chosen, but exist by default whether positive or negative o Western Psych view: relationships are entered into and maintained on a mutually voluntary basis. One can start or dissolve a relationship o Ghanainas view friendship as “A friend is someone who is ready to help you , whether it is financially or socially, where there is a need.” o Americans with al lot of friends are seen to have too many obligations o Parental love to keep children alive

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o Romantic love to keep parents together o Individualism generally appears to be related to emphasis on romantic love in marriages o Idealization of romantic partner less emphasized in collectivist cultures where individualized personal agency isn’t especially elaborated o In arranged marriages, one can learn to love the person Groups o People with independent selves shown to have rather permeable boundary between ingroups and outgroups o People with interdependent selves tended to have a more clear cut boundary distinguishing these groups o People with independent selves more willing to form new relationships, maintain networks or less distressed if relationships fade Actor-observer bias: tendency to see one’s own behavior as best explained by situational factors whereas behavior of others better explained by dispositional factors o the stronger the bonds are among members within a group, the weaker the ties between groups o Americans tend to have higher levels of general trust toward strangers than Japanese Entity Model of Ingroup Identity

Network Model of Ingroup identity

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Japanese view person in ingroup even if here is an indirect connection (friend of a friend) Fiske (1991, 1992) 4 Basic elements of Sociality

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o Communal Sharing: every person treated the same, have identical rights and privileges; resources pooled to belonging to the larger whole o Authority Ranking: people linearly ordered along a hierarchical social dimension; higher privileges for higher ranking, vice versa o Equality Matching: people keep track of what is exchanged and motivated to pay back what has been exchanged in equivalent turns; contributions and chances to earn are equal o Market Pricing: people expect to receive something equivalent, but exchange on both sides occur at once, and different kinds of good exchanged o All human relationships constructed out of one or more of these Working with Others o Social Facilitation: people perform well learned tasks better, poorly learned ones worse in the presence of others o Social loafing: when it is not clear how much any individual is contributing, people often don’t work as hard; if task is challenging, less loafing, if easier more loafing o Social Striving: working better when evaluated as a group than as individuals Negations o Confrontational: individualist o Compromise: collectivist