Cultural Psychology Robyn M. Holmes - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Cultural Psychology

Robyn M. Holmes

Chapter 2: History of Cultural Psychology

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Chapter 2 Outline

Central Themes and Types of Historical Approaches

Ancient Greek Contributions

Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Wilhelm Wundt

Sociology and Anthropology: Early Contributions

Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky

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Chapter 2 Outline

Anthropology’s Contributions to Cultural Psychology

Franz Boas

D. Price-Williams

Cross-Cultural Psychology

Marshall

Segall

Geert Hofstede and Harris

Triandis

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Chapter 2 Outline

Cultural Psychology

Richard

Shweder

Culture across Disciplines – Richard

Shweder

Jerome Bruner

Michael Cole

Indigenous Psychologies

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Chapter 2 Learning Goals

Compare different approaches to study the history of a discipline

Explain how ancient Greek philosophers addressed central themes in the development of cultural psychology

Discuss Wilhelm Wundt’s major contributions and explain how they influenced the future subfield cultural psychology

Identify the contributions individuals from different disciplines made to the emergence of cultural psychology

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Chapter 2 Learning Goals

Explain Franz Boas’ and Margaret Mead’s role in the development of cultural psychology

Compare and contrast the influence Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s theories had on the development of cultural psychology

Evaluate contributions from cross-cultural psychology including those of key figures

Discuss historical and contemporary empirical studies that contributed to the emergence of cultural psychology

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Chapter 2 Learning Goals

Compare and contrast the major contributions Cole, Bruner, and

Shweder

made to cultural psychology

Discuss the contributions indigenous psychology has made to cultural psychology

Compare and contrast the differences between indigenous psychology and cultural psychology

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Engaging with Culture

The Torres Strait Expedition (1901/1903)

Interdisciplinary collaboration between anthropology and psychology

What was the purpose of the Torres Strait Expedition?

To test cultural variability in intelligence and sensation and perception including visual acuity, visual illusions, and color vision

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The Torres Strait Expedition (1901/1903)

The researchers hypothesized:

that ‘savages’ had lower mental abilities but better visual skills than Europeans

Why did they have this disparaging perception of non-Western peoples?

Ethnocentric attitudes

The notion of cultural evolution popular during this time

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The Torres Strait Expedition (1901/1903)

How did the research team test their hypotheses?

Ethnography

Standardized psychological measures and stimuli

Triangulation

Tested participants outdoors and not in a laboratory

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The Torres Strait Expedition (1901/1903)

Outcomes:

Europeans outperformed the Torres Islanders on several visual illusions including the Müller-

Lyer

illusion

A ground breaking cross-cultural study for its time

Inspired later 20

th

century cross-cultural psychologists

Introduced still photography use in research to capture everyday social interactions

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The Ancient Greeks

What is the nature of knowledge?

Aristotle (384-322 BCE)

The empiricist

Deductive reasoning

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The Ancient Greeks

What is the nature of knowledge?

Plato (428-347 BCE)

The rationalist

Inductive reasoning

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Central themes and Types of Historical Approaches

The position of culture in the social sciences

Mainstream psychology's emphasis upon experimental methods, scientific rigor, and precision

Focus upon finding universal patterns and processing mechanisms that don’t acknowledge the role of culture in mind

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Approaches to Documenting

the History of Cultural Psychology

“

Zeitgeist

” - when you focus upon environmental, political, economic, or other external forces

Can you think of an example of a world event that helped shaped psychological research?

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Approaches to Documenting

the History of Cultural Psychology

"

Great-person approach

" - when you emphasize the contributions that particular individuals have made rather than concentrating on historical forces

Can you think of any individuals who helped shape the discipline of psychology?

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Approaches to Documenting

the History of Cultural Psychology

Historical development approach” -

you combine the features of both the Zeitgeist and the great-person approach

Acknowledges the contributions of individuals and historical forces to explain the history of cultural psychology

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Ancient Greek contributions

Aristotle (384-322 BCE)

De Anima –

biological classification

Studied intelligence, perception, dreams, recall, and memory

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Ancient Greek contributions

Herodotus (485-425 BCE)

Collected ethnographic material on the groups he visited

Explored issues such as intelligence, language, rituals, science, and history

Cultural relativism was present in Herodotus' writings

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Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Johan Herbart (1776-1841 CE)

Advocated for studying individuals from non-Western cultures

Focused upon the nature of mental activity

"Culture is individual psychology“ - a forerunner to cross-cultural psychology

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Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Adolf Bastian

Acknowledged both the similarities and differences among the different people he studied

Focused upon what Wundt termed the

higher mental processes (myth, customs, and religious systems)

Higher mental processes would eventually become the preview of anthropology; psychology would settle upon memory, consciousness, and perception

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Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Wilhelm Wundt

Studied topics from anthropology and contemporary cognitive psychology

Some researchers suggest the study of mind in culture began with Wundt

Founder of experimental psychology

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Wilhelm Wundt

Believed higher mental processes (language, memory, and reasoning) should be studied using the techniques of anthropologists and folklorists

Believed higher mental functions were culturally meditated and only historical and developmental methods could reveal their true nature

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Wilhelm Wundt’s

Volkerpsychologie

Ethnographic accounts of language, customs, and myth

Involved the relationship between culture and mind

The last volume exemplifies contemporary cultural

psychology’s goals

Culturally meditated experience should not be

conceived of as an independent variable

Culture guides the development of higher mental

processes

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Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Sociology and Anthropology's Early Contributions

Emile Durkheim (1897) focused upon the ill effects of society on individual behavior-

Le suicide

Bronislaw Malinowski challenged Sigmund Freud's notion of the oedipal complex in non-Western cultural settings

Edward Tylor introduced the first definition of culture

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Late 19th and Early 20th Century Thinkers

Jean Piaget

Focused upon how children adapt to their environment

Focused upon qualitative changes or shifts between stages in children's cognitive development

Concluded that most Western children pass through a series of invariant stages in their cognitive development

Focused primarily upon biological maturation while acknowledging social experience and experience with the physical environment

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Piaget's Cognitive Theory of Development

Provides opportunities for cross-cultural investigations

Acknowledged the role of culture in shaping developmental outcomes

Highlighted children's ability to adapt to their environments which would vary with those settings and social experience

Understood the importance of using culturally relevant methods

Drew attention to developmental differences that arise both within and between cultures

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Piaget's Cognitive Theory of Development

Lancy

(1983) tested the applicability of Piagetian theory in non-Western cultural settings

Argued New Guinean children do not develop cognitively according to Western timetables and constructs

Their cognitive development is culturally mediated by their experiences and cultural practices

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Piaget's Cognitive Theory of Development

Maynard and Greenfield (2003)

Explored how parental beliefs and cultural practices help shape children's cognitive abilities

Suggested formal abstract thought may not be the final cognitive outcome in other cultures

Connected how parental belief systems, cultural values, and cultural practices mediate cognitive outcomes

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Piaget’s Contributions to Cultural Psychology

His work created an incredible cross-cultural literature base on children's cognitive development

Drew attention to cross-cultural differences in cognitive development

Was an inspiration for cultural psychology

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Lev Vygotsky

In explaining cognitive development, emphasized the relationship between development and culture

Emphasized the role of social contexts in shaping how individuals acquire knowledge

Focused upon individual development but also acknowledged the role of culture in development

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Lev Vygotsky

Highlighted how cultural tools and artifacts influence how individuals mentally construct their view of their world

Believed culture makes it possible for individuals to think in different ways

One of the first researchers to blend natural and cultural lines in development

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Lev Vygotsky

Focused upon studying the higher mental processes through collaborative learning in social contexts

Children become skilled at using these cognitive tools through their social interactions with more knowledgeable members

Individual mentalities shape cultural processes as members collaborate in activities that involve modifying, expanding, or adapting the cultures cognitive tools

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Lev

Vygotsky

Zone of proximal development

The distance between where a person can complete a task or solve a problem with and without assistance

Example: when a child is learning to tie his shoe with assistance and then is able to complete the task alone

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Lev

Vygotsky

Guided participation

The process by children actively scaffold and model

adults or more knowledgeable partners to acquire

skills and abilities they will need to become

successful adults

Can you think of additional examples of the zone of proximal development and guided participation?

Slide36

Lev Vygotsky

Culture mediates experience and every day social interactions

Distinguished between cross-cultural and cultural psychology

His emphasis upon cognitive tools would influence individuals such as Michael Cole

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Anthropology's Contributions to Cultural Psychology

Franz Boas

Contributed to linguistics, ethnographic methodology,

folklore, and physical anthropology

Challenged many of the views psychologists held

at the time that were unconditionally accepted

Began a relationship between anthropology and

psychology that would inspire future anthropologists

to question the role of culture in psychological processes

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Franz Boas

Promoted cultural relativism

Emphasized cultural relativism and ethnography and gave attention to historical forces in cultural development; critical to the development of cultural psychology

Surfaces in Coles’ view of cultural psychology

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Boas’ Students

Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Edward Sapir investigated the relationship between culture and various psychological theories and concepts

Mead and Benedict are affiliated with the culture and personality school in anthropology

Mead's work would occupy a central position in integrating culture into developmental psychology

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Boas’ Students

Mead was the first anthropologist to assess the applicability of Western theories of childhood in non-Western settings using qualitative approaches

Freud's view of adolescence was neither relevant nor applicable to Samoan adolescents

Questioned how culturally mediated experiences

guide a developmental outcomes

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Boas’ Students

George Murdock was instrumental in promoting cross-cultural research the Institute of human relations at Yale University

The Human Relation Area Files (

HRAF

)

the world’s largest and most

comprehensive ethnographic database

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Douglas Price-Williams

Concerned about the applicability of Western measures and norms in non-Western communities

Emphasized the importance of cultural context in explaining and interpreting human nature

His view of the role of culture in the human experience

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Douglas Price-Williams

Advocated that psychology attend to cultural context and ecological variables such as cultural practices and social experience in explaining psychological phenomena

Considered culture a context that shapes psychological processing

Do you think Boas, Mead, and Price-Williams

are candidates for the great person approach?

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Cross-Cultural Psychology

Cross-Cultural studies emerged in the late 1960’s due to:

Demographic changes in the United States

Congress enacted the Civil Rights Act

Attention to diversity led academic departments to

offer courses in cross-cultural psychology

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Cross-Cultural Psychology

Cross-Cultural studies emerged in the late 1960’s due to:

Funding from cross- cultural projects became available

The cognitive revolution was gaining momentum –

this perspective compared the human mind to a

computer and the information processing

perspective emerged

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Cross-Cultural Studies -

Segall

et al. (1966)

Their cross-cultural investigation of perceptual processing:

Focused upon visual illusions and revisited testing performed by the Torres Strait Expedition

Tested the

carpentered world hypothesis -

how environment influences the way people perceive visual stimuli

Concluded European and American participants succumbed to the Müller-

Lyer

and the Sander parallelogram illusions

Slide47

Cross-Cultural Studies -

Segall

et al. (1966)

Their cross-cultural investigation of perceptual processing:

Produced findings that paralleled the Torres Strait Expedition findings

Concluded experience shapes our perceptions

Suggested cultural variability reflected different perceptual habits

Slide48

Geert Hofstede

While working for IBM accumulated a wealth of information on employee morale worldwide

Averaged participant responses from a country and treated a nation as a single unit termed this a nation-level study

Devised dimensions to compare values across nations:

1. Power distance 2. Uncertainty avoidance

3. Individualism-collectivism 4. Masculinity-femininity

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Hofstede’s Comparative Dimensions

Power distance

- the difference between a boss’ and subordinate’s ability to predict each other’s behavior

Uncertainty avoidance

– relates to the unknown and a society’s ability to deal with novel and unfamiliar situations and future events

Slide50

Hofstede’s Comparative dimensions

Individualism-collectivism

relates to an individual’s

place in society

The independent self (associated with individualism) is separate, bounded, and unique

The interdependent self (associated with collectivism) is fluid, unbounded, and situationally defined

Masculinity-femininity

- the extent to which a nation

values nurturing and care

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Harry

Triandis

Cross-cultural social psychologist

Interested in the study of attitudes, roles, and norms and how these varied by culture

Applied the individualism-collectivism construct that assists cross-cultural researchers in comparing

construals

of self and cultural ideology

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Cultural Psychology

Attends to contextual factors and the fact that culture is lived and performed

A more interpretive, substantive understanding of mind in culture

Raises the visibility of mind in culture and culture and mental life

Slide53

Cultural Psychology

An interdisciplinary field

Movement away from culture as an independent variable that could be manipulated in a scientific study; necessary for cultural psychology's emergence

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Richard

Shweder

One of the founders of cultural psychology

"A discipline is emerging called "cultural psychology.” It is not general psychology.

It is not cross-cultural psychology... It is cultural

psychology. And its time may have arrived, once

again.”

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Richard

Shweder

Emphasized how culture shapes psychological processes

Emphasized the bidirectional nature of culture and symbolic meaning

Moved for an approach to study culture in mind

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Richard

Shweder

The person (mind) and cultural (context) are independent and not distinct, separate entities

Cultural pluralism; cultural collisions

Do you think cultural psychology would exist without the contributions of Richard

Shweder

?

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Jerome Bruner

Suggested cultural psychology focus upon how people organize meaning-making processes in their everyday experiences and local contexts

Believed culturally mediated experiences shape psychological processes

Focused upon the narratives or scripts that guide peoples meaning-making processes in their everyday experiences

Slide58

Michael Cole

Emphasized a developmental approach to

understanding culture in mind

Focused upon studying activities in everyday life

Viewed humans as active agents in their own life experiences in which mind and culture are co-constructed

Slide59

Michael Cole

Culture and mind are not interdependent; rather they are mutually embedded or co-created

Both interpretative and objective methods were important to understand how behavior is culturally mediated and culturally mediated behavior influences experience

Slide60

Michael Cole

Context is the focal concept in cultural psychology

Draws upon Vygotsky's use of tools to explain cognitive development

Focused upon how tools shape culturally mediated experiences as they surface in everyday activities

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Indigenous Psychologies

Arose in response to difficulties in using

Western thinking, concepts, measures, and

norms in non-Western cultural settings

Culturally relevant concepts and constructs became the focal point of research

Emphasizes cultural relativism

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Indigenous Psychologies

Shares common ground with cultural psychology but they are not interchangeable

Links to research conducted by native researchers who employ local cultural concepts to benefit the people they study