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Lo RF, Sasaki JY. Lay Misperceptions of Culture as "Biological" and Suggestions for Reducing Them. PERSPECTIVES ON PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 2024; 19:295-311. [PMID: 37493140 PMCID: PMC10790513 DOI: 10.1177/17456916231181139] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/27/2023]
Abstract
Culture is typically studied as socialized and learned. Yet lay intuitions may hold that culture is associated with biology via perceptions of race, presenting a problem for those who study culture: There may be a mismatch between how psychologists study culture and how their research is interpreted by lay audiences. This article is a call to researchers to recognize this mismatch as a problem and to critically evaluate the way we study culture. We first describe evidence that laypeople tend to associate culture with notions of folk biology. Next, we propose three suggestions for researchers: explicitly address whether biological processes are, or are not, relevant for studying culture in their work; consider using multiple methods because different methods for studying culture may come with assumptions about culture as more tied to socialization or biology; and represent all people as cultural by studying multiple forms of culture and by contextualizing all psychological research. Last, we provide an example for how researchers can implement these suggestions to encourage more accurate interpretations of findings.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Joni Y. Sasaki
- Department of Psychology, University of Hawai‘i at Ma-noa
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Cognitive dimension of culture and social axioms: using methods of multidimensional analysis to research Ukrainian cultural beliefs about success and inequality. JOURNAL OF CULTURAL COGNITIVE SCIENCE 2022. [DOI: 10.1007/s41809-022-00096-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/19/2022]
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Abstract
Communication about child development between persons with different cultural preoccupations requires that author and audience agree without coercion on how to connect their perspectives. Western cultural hegemony persists in many international fora under the guise of “globalization,” giving rise to systematically distorted communication in ways that do epistemological violence to indigenous cultural models in Africa. The dominant paradigm of public basic schooling is sustained by institutionalized path dependency and construes educational success as extracting the learner from her community of origin. Consensus-building within a framework of mutually respectful communication involves bridging, coordination or fusion. Societal progress is a different kind of “development” than ontogenesis. A given cultural group’s developmental niche for its children is part of a chronosystem that changes over the course of history. An individual’s transactions with significant others are embedded in a complex and dynamic sociocultural system, to which programming of early childhood education should respond.
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Kashima Y. The cultural in the social: A reflection on sociocultural models approaches. ASIAN JOURNAL OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY 2020. [DOI: 10.1111/ajsp.12410] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Yoshihisa Kashima
- Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences University of Melbourne Parkville Victoria Australia
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Krieg A. A Contextual Behavioral Account of Culture: Example Implementation of a Functional Behavioral Approach to the Study of Cultural Differences in Social Anxiety. Front Psychol 2020; 11:418. [PMID: 32210900 PMCID: PMC7077519 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00418] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/10/2019] [Accepted: 02/24/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The current article proposes integrating a functional behavior approach to the study of culture. After describing culture from a contextual behavioral science framework, we outline a three-step process to perform a functional behavior analysis of culture: (1) identifying potential contingencies, (2) determining functional relationships, and (3) gathering supporting evidence. As an example, we present each of the three steps through a re-analysis of data related to cultural differences in social anxiety between Japanese and European Americans as well as describe a hypothetical experiment. The results demonstrate how implementing an alternative framework that focuses on the relationship between behavioral function and environmental adaptability leads to different conclusions compared to implementing frameworks that emphasize the form or degree of a behavior or belief in one group compared to another. For this particular example, in contrast to viewing social anxiety in Japanese as something stemming from innate beliefs about themselves and others (e.g., self-construal), the current study suggests that displaying social anxiety in some situations within a Japanese context is more functionally adaptive (e.g., more likely leads to desirable outcomes) than within a European American context.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexander Krieg
- Department of Global Communication, Kobe Gakuin University, Kobe, Japan
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Abstract
Emotion is critical for cultural dynamics, that is, for the formation, maintenance, and transformation of culture over time. We outline the component micro- and macro-level processes of cultural dynamics, and argue that emotion not only facilitates the transmission and retention of cultural information, but also is shaped and crafted by cultural dynamics. Central to this argument is our understanding of emotion as a complete information package that signals the adaptive significance of the information that the agent is processing. It captures an agent’s appraisal about the relationship between themself and the object of emotional focus, as well as action orientation and allostasis in context. We discuss implications of this perspective in the context of the changing natural and geopolitical environment, and future cultural dynamics into the 21st century.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yoshihisa Kashima
- Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Australia
| | | | | | - Vincent Yzerbyt
- Department of Psychology, Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium
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Ng S, Basu S. Global Identity and Preference for Environmentally Friendly Products: The Role of Personal Responsibility. JOURNAL OF CROSS-CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY 2019. [DOI: 10.1177/0022022119873432] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/15/2022]
Abstract
This research tests the idea that a salient global identity positively affects people’s willingness to pay for environmentally friendly products. Results from a large-scale multi-nation survey ( N = 75,934) as well as two studies ( N = 322) conducted in Singapore supported this prediction. We found that participants with a more (vs. less) dominant global identity indicated greater support for environmentally friendly products and exhibited increased pro-environmental behavior. We further show that the effect is driven by a stronger feeling of personal responsibility toward the environment among individuals who possess a dominant global identity. Findings from this research suggest that the formation of stronger global identity, a psychological consequence of increasing globalization, can have an important impact on people’s pro-environmental behavior.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sharon Ng
- Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
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Kashima Y, Bain PG, Perfors A. The Psychology of Cultural Dynamics: What Is It, What Do We Know, and What Is Yet to Be Known? Annu Rev Psychol 2019; 70:499-529. [PMID: 30609914 DOI: 10.1146/annurev-psych-010418-103112] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
The psychology of cultural dynamics is the psychological investigation of the formation, maintenance, and transformation of culture over time. This article maps out the terrain, reviews the existing literature, and points out potential future directions of this research. It is divided into three parts. The first part focuses on micro-cultural dynamics, which refers to the social and psychological processes that contribute to the dissemination and retention of cultural information. The second part, on micro-macro dynamics, investigates how micro-level processes give rise to macro-cultural dynamics. The third part focuses on macro-cultural dynamics, referring to the distribution and long-term trends involving cultural information in a population, which in turn enable and constrain the micro-level processes. We conclude the review with a consideration of future directions, suggesting behavior change research as translational research on cultural dynamics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yoshihisa Kashima
- Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3010, Australia;
| | - Paul G Bain
- Department of Psychology, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY, United Kingdom
| | - Amy Perfors
- Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3010, Australia;
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Weisbuch M, Lamer SA, Treinen E, Pauker K. Cultural snapshots: Theory and method. SOCIAL AND PERSONALITY PSYCHOLOGY COMPASS 2017. [DOI: 10.1111/spc3.12334] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Kashima Y. Height Psychology and challenges of the 21st century. ASIAN JOURNAL OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY 2017. [DOI: 10.1111/ajsp.12176] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Yoshihisa Kashima
- Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences The University of Melbourne Carlton Victoria Australia
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Gelfand MJ, Kashima Y. Editorial overview: Culture: Advances in the science of culture and psychology. Curr Opin Psychol 2015; 8:iv-x. [PMID: 29506812 DOI: 10.1016/j.copsyc.2015.12.011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
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Leong FTL. Mapping Cross-Cultural Psychology Models and Methods Onto Societal Challenges. JOURNAL OF CROSS-CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY 2015. [DOI: 10.1177/0022022115618026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
In response to Kashima’s article, this commentary uses the levels of analysis (LOAs) perspective to discuss how we may map cross-cultural psychology models and methods onto societal challenges. In our own LOA within psychology, it is pointed out that we have our own deficiencies such as the problem of WEIRD science where much of our so-called universal laws of human behavior have been built on a restricted sample from Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democracies. Besides the caveats regarding the challenges of using multiple levels of analyses, it is also argued that we should use the individual of analysis as our primary focus given our training as psychologists. This means focusing on psychological mechanisms to link them to societal problems. Several models for doing this mapping are presented such as Triandis’ recent work on self-deception as psychological mechanisms underlying extremism. Other examples include Leong and Kalibatseva’s disentangling approach, which seeks to resolve the “Black box problem” when we conflate demography with psychology. Demography is a poor proxy for psychology. Finally, it was proposed that we attend to the new emerging science of complexity, which focuses on large adaptive systems such as star systems, organizations, or even economies. However, we should apply this complexity model at the individual level and examine each person as a unique complex adaptive system (with the universal, the group, and the individual components).
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Saroglou V. Intergroup Conflict, Religious Fundamentalism, and Culture. JOURNAL OF CROSS-CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY 2015. [DOI: 10.1177/0022022115621174] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Kashima underlines the importance of considering religion as a major contemporary cultural source of intergroup conflict around the world. In this commentary, I first examine theory and psychological research either discrediting or crediting religion per se, including fundamentalism, as being a cultural cause of intergroup conflict and violence. The evidence is in favor of the latter. Second, I propose a model of cultural psychological diversity of religious fundamentalism, across monotheistic religions and denominations. I finally argue, following Kashima’s global perspective on the person-culture-nature interactions, that cultural differences in religious fundamentalism may be understood as reflections of longtime interactions between natural and cultural environments and human animals, which, by creating religious (sub)cultures, rebuild, even if frequently with negative consequences, their ecological niches.
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Van de Vliert E. Human Cultures as Niche Constructions Within the Solar System. JOURNAL OF CROSS-CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY 2015. [DOI: 10.1177/0022022115615963] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/15/2022]
Abstract
This commentary seeks to refine Kashima’s timely and topical but too general call for embedding culture within the planetary ecosystem. My starting point is that cultures are to an underestimated extent ongoing niche constructions within the merry-go-round of the Sun’s radiation, the Earth’s rotation around its axis, and the resulting cold and hot seasons. Among the downstream consequences are clear connections between warm-blooded life and culture; between winter cold, summer heat, and culture; and, conversely, between culture and global warming. Cultural inventions of monetary resources have come to influence further culture creation on the foundation of seasonal solar heat. The odds are that climato-economic engineering of culture is just around the corner.
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