Midterm 1 PDF

Chp. 1&2 - We are quite similar - Less genetic variability among different populations of humans than there is among different populations of chimpanzees - Humans share a common genetic (universal) - General psychology: focuses on the idea that human beings are the s...

Chp. 1&2 - We are quite similar - Less genetic variability among different populations of humans than there is among different populations of chimpanzees - Humans share a common genetic (universal) - General psychology: focuses on the idea that human beings are the same - General psychology overemphasizes human universal - Shweder states this point Assumption of General Psychology - Shweder criticizes general psychologist theories - He maintains that GA’s treat the human mind as if they are investigative CPU - Argues that the main goal of psychology is to reveal the underlying, and universal, Central Processing Unit (CPU) - General psychology uses the metaphor of a computer - Information is seen as independent from the computer and that the computer can process - Interested in the function of the mind - Not paying attention to contextual concepts - Reduce the noise “external factors” and allow us to detect a clear signal - Avoid studying multiple cultures as this increases the noise - Real cultural variations can not exist from their point of view - The real mind is CPU, which is universal Shweder - Cultural psychology maintains that the mind cannot be separated from content or content - Mind and culture are mutually constituted - Mind arises from participating in a culture (activities, challenges, practices, and scripts inherent within it) - Culture arises from the participation of the minds within it Self-esteem - Socially shaped construct - By sharing the idea with other members of the society we are motivated to get things done - Live in the world by using a shared construct - Social reality - based on social reality ou direct your feeling or emotions - Socially constructed/created Self - Most cultures have a concept of self - Some societies might use the word “embarrassment” or “shyness” - Other cultures put more emphasis on self-control or self-adjustment in situations Gen. Psychologists - Believe that below all the culture and "Noise", there are base processes that make us human. - Gen. psychologists are looking for the basic, underlying system that they believe is the same universally, and then culture/context is just additional noise on top of them, not something that intrinsically changes the basic processes Platonism - Reality is a reflection of a higher truth - Noises obscure your view from seeing the truth - The truth is underneath all of the noise - Western scholars believe that this is a good way of understanding the world Platonism is everywhere in Western philosophy - Science: test the object in the vacuum - Enlightenment: lumen naturale - Romanticism: pure being - Rousseau believed that people in society are highly contaminated by social constraints, idealized the ancient people - Evolutionary Theories: emphasis on innate and injector factors of the human mind - They do not focus on if something is learned because they purely want to see if something is inherent in our mind - Psychology: CPU - General psychology uses the central processing unit to get rid of noisy sociocultural factors to purely investigate the human mind Platonism = General Psychology - Abstract - Real truth is abstract - CPU not a concrete phenomena - Human behaviour is abstract - Invisible - Human mind and higher truth = invisible - Target of research is invisible - Universal - Higher truth is universal - General psychology see CPU as universally seen in all human beings - Inherent - General psychologist feel that people have an “it” they are born with  - Psychic unity - Share the idea of a “psychic unity” - People are unified by the preprogramed characteristics Psychological Universals from the Cultural Perspective - Cultural psychologists believe that there is many layers of human universal Four Different Levels of Universality Accessibility Universal - A given psychological process: - Exists in all culture - Used to solve the same problem in all cultures - Accessible to the same degree across cultures - Theory of Mind refers to the ability: - To attribute mental states - beliefes, inents, desires, pretengin, knowledge etc. - to oneself and others - To understand that others have beliefs, desires, and intentions that are different from one’s own - Develops around age 4-5 across diverse cultural groups - Sally Anne Test Functional Universal - Psychological process exists in multiple cultures, it is used to solve the same problem across cultures, YET, it is more accessible to people from some cultures than others - Studies have contrasted whether people would apply logical rules in situations where rules and exemplars conflicted - In general, Westerners are more likely than East Asians to apply logical rules when in conflict with exemplar Study: - Dr. Norazayan - Accessible vs Functional - How much you are exposed to Aristotle’s way of formal logic - North America – puts emphasis on the formal logic, so if you logically discuss something you pay attention to logical space - East Asian – contextual factor rather than logical space, if asked to pay attention to logical space only they tend to make mistake Intuitive vs. Counter-Intuitive Syllogism - Westerners are familiar with applying logical rules - Participants are presented with 3 sentences - Intuitive: understandable structures - Counter intuitive: some participants get confused if Obama is president - The key to getting a high score is to ignore reality and context and focus on what is going on in the logical space - East Asians due poorley in the counter intuitive task because they focus on the logical space and do not pay attention to the concrete real things - East Asians have lowe error rate in the intuitive syllogism - FUNCTIONAL UNIVERSAL - Performance level or their accessibility to master this thinking style is different from culture to culture Existential Universal - Psychological process is said to exist in multiple cultures, although the process is not necessarily used to solve the same problem, nor is it equally accessible across cultures Americans vs Japanse - Persistence was explored on two tasks - First received either success feedback or failure feedback on one task - Experimenter than times how long people persisted on a task - Engaged in information association task - Experimental manipulation - sucess vs failure feedback - Experimenter tells them he they will have to do another task, while waiting for me you can continue the task or just wait - He wanted to see how much they are willing to engage in the task when they got a negative vs positive feedback - Studied the amount of time they spent onf the task - direct motivation - 2 by 2 design = 4 points on the graph Canadian participants who got the failure feedback - Engage in the task but not that much Canadian participants who got the positive feedback - Feel good and continue to engage in the task Candians are less likely to engage in the task if they receive the failure feedback East Asians who got the failure feedback - Engage in the the task more and become more motivated - Feel they are not sufficient enough so they are highly motivated to overcome the weakness and improve themselves East Asian who got the positive feedback - Less likely to engage in the task because they feel they are good enough and no not need to do further work - Based on their values and beliefs This is called EXISTENTIAL UNIVERSAL - The amount of information is different and their reactio is different from culture to culture Non-Universal - Psychological processes of one given culture do no exist in another culture - Eg. people who learn to use an abacus for calculations make different kinds of errors in their mental arithmetic than do people who did not know how to use an abacus - They stood on a treadmill and had to do a basic competition - Participant who is good at abacus can mentally imagine but he performs bad because abacus is moving while running - Culture specifc phenomena WEIRD People Psychological Universal & Variability - As a Canadian who lives in a multicultural society, you must be able to accept the previous definition. In our daily life, we are surrounded by people with a variety of ethnic backgrounds. - But, as I told you at the beginning of the course, we have to take into account both cultural variations and cultural universals of human behavior. Now, let’s think about human universals as well. First of all, we are homo sapiens. We are same species. Psychological Database is largely Western - 92% of papers published in JPSP were conducted by authors at North American Institutions - 99% of papers published in the journal were conducted by authors at Western Institutions WEIRD - Means exceptional  - WESTERN - EDUCATED - INDUSTRIALIZED - RICH - DEMOCRATIC SOCIETIES - People from these societies are highly exceptional in many aspects of their psychology - Majority of the data is coming from “weird” society Evidence of WEIRD thinking We show this evidence by a series of telescoping contrasts: - Idustrialized vs non industrialized societies - Western industrialized vs non-western industrialized societies - Americans vs other westernes - University educated americans vs other americans Origin of Cultural Psychology - Volkerpsychologie “Folk Psychology” (Wilhelm Wundt) - Addressed the importance of culture, he is the founder of experimental psychology - Wrote essays in folk psychology - Russian Cultural-Historical School (Vigotsky, Luria, Cole, Rogoff) - Psychological Anthropology (Benedict) - Social Psychology (Asch, Sherif, etc Movement of Anthropology - Clifford Geertz (1973) “The Interpretation of Culture” - From shallow description to thick description - From behaviour to acts - The concept of culture […] is an essentially semiotic one. Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun. I take  culture to be those webs, and the analyses of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning (Geertz, 1973, p.5) Movement of Psychology - Jerome Bruner (1990) “Cultural Psychology” - Cognitive Revolution = from Behaviorism to Cognitivism - But it is not good enough - From Cognitivism to world of ​meaning - Act of Meaning Behaviourism to Cognitivism - Behvaioursim focuses on stimulus and response - The cognitive revolution as originally conceived virtually requriies that psychology join forces with anthrophology, linguistics, philosophy, history and even with the discipline of law Cultural Psychology - Human Psychology - Philosophy - Culture - History - Society - Ideas, beliefs, and expectations - Psychology as a meaning constituitve phenomena Culture affects us everyday that is why we find it so natural, unless you compare your culture to another culture you will not be able to notice it “Without Men, No Culture, and without Culture, no Men” In order to understand the human mind you need to contextualize it to understand. - Cultural psychologist share this belief Objectives of Cultural Psychology - Discover systematic ​cultural patterns​ in more than one society - Characterizing various ​cultural meanings​ and bundles of practices that associate with the meanings - Describe the way in which culture and psychology ​mutually make each other up. Chp. 3 Culture and Evolution Japanese Macaque’s “Potato Washing” - Assessed if the macaques would accept new food or not - One monkey named Emo decided to approach the shore when they got a potato - After a couple of months Emo;s mother and some other macaque’s imitated her behaviour and started to approach the shore each time they got potato’s - Dr. K reported that the potato washing culture is primitive but based on the observation other monkeys learn what is the best way to enjoy potato’s - Panasese Macaque’s “Hot Spring” - Macaques imitated human behaviour and started to approach the natural spa - In the winter other group mates began to imitate this behaviour Chimps - In Tanzanian chimpanzees use tolols different (bark) from each other and there is cultural variation with the chimpanzees - Culture variations in termite fishin behaviour - In senegal they use a chip Imitative Learning: - The learning style in which learners focus on the model’s ​intention​, and internalizes something of the model’s goals and behavioural strategies. - Infer why this person or human goes to do this behaviour so they pay attention to intention and what happens after something Emulative Learning: - The learning style in which learners focus only on what the model ​appear ​to be doing, and engage in ​trial​ and ​error​ to change the situation (e.g. get bananas) - Based on what happens, if something good happens they will be motivated to do it more but they do not pay attention to intention Study: Nagel et al. - Chimps vs 2 year old children - Subjects watched a target use a rake to retrieve a desired object that they could not otherwise reach - Half of the subjects saw the target use the rake in the most effect way “teeth up” - Half of the subjects saw the target use the rake in the less effective way “teeth down” Results: - Children use the rake in the same way that the target did  - Chimps used the rake in the more effective “teeth up” position -regardless of the way the target used it - Children demonstrated imitative learning - Chimps demonstrated emulative learning - Children are able to imitate the adult model behaviour and they are not doing trial and error - Their attention goes to the intention model “why dos this aduly want to do this” - When chimps receive the rake they forget about what the model was doing and they speed a lot of time doing trial and error, when they figure out teeth up is a good way to get the reward they continue to do this - Chimps are more successful at figuring out the best method - Emulative learning - they play with the legs and identify the best way to get food - Emutative learning helps you identify the best way to do something but it requires a lot of energy and you are not paying attention to the goal - Imiatitve learning is more advantageous in the long run Key Benefit of Imitative learning - Allows for faithful and high-fidelity reproduction of the target behaviour - Once skill is mastered you can change or adjust it - New cultural information cannot only be accurately reproduces - it can also be improved - Add new knowledge on top of existing knowledge - This allows for cultural accumulation = RATCHET EFFECT Animals can not accumulate knowledge due to emulative learning Why Primates have such Big Brains? - Many species of primates eat fruit, and a fruit diet requires remembering where you found fruit teers so you can return when they are ripe - Eat nutritious foods that is difficult to extract, like termites and nuts - Many species of primates live in large social networks which require one to keep track of social relationships, and to learn from each other Primate brain evolution appears to be largely drive by their highly social lifestyle 150 - human brain functions with a group of 150 people, it if exceeds this it is too much Robin Danbar proposes hypothesis of the magic number of 150 Humans are ultra social - Live in larger groups than other primates - More interested in each others activities than other primates - Engage in more cultural learning than do other primates Why are Humans Adept at Cultural Learning? - Humans have less muscle mass than primate relatives  - Humans have shorter intestines, due to eating cooked food Where does cultural variation come from? - Ancestors need to adjust - Human spead across the globe Different physical ecology affects - Peoples diet - Foraging behaviour - Gender roles Small differences can have large effects - Minor geographical differences in the availability of easy to domesticate animals and plants - All the position of eurasia allow people to develop complex societies - Diamon believes that people in Eurasia have lived close to domesticated animals and this led to many diseases so the survivor from these diseases have developed resistance Position of Eurasia - Sedentary lifestyle in Eurasia because people can easily spread cultural tradition because the continent runs south east to west - The climate seems similar across the entire continent America - Difference in primates and climate so you can not easily spread or develop operation of society - Difference not due to the fact that europe is smarter but due to geography, climate, animals, and crops Evoked Culture - All people, regardless of where they are from, have certain biologically-encoded behavioural ​repertoires​ that are potentially accessible to them, and these repertoires are engaged when the appropriate situational conditions are present (Tooby & Cosmides) - Ecological and geographical factors directly affect humans - If you live in environment A you need to show your innate patterns of behaviour for A environment – based on the evoked culture - ”Tool Box” in our heads - Show the tool to accommodate to specific environment - Main message for evoked culture - If you are born in Japan your brain is able to use this tool “chopsticks” - In another society you have another way to use utensil - They believe that all of the tools are already engrained in out head - Evolutionary psychologist like this type of explanation  - An Example of Evoked Culture: - People’s sense of physical attractiveness (symmetrical faces, blemish free skins, less anomaly faces) is highly dependent on the environment. - Such indicators tell you that how much the person is physically healthy = it increases the chance to have healthy offspring - If you are in a society that has parasite you need to be good at choosing a healthy mate - If you are in a society that does not have parasite you do not have to worry as much about physical features - Emphasis on attractiveness Environment with may parasites = attractiveness important Environment with less parasites = attractiveness is NOT important Transmitted Culture​: - People come to learn about particular cultural practices through ​social learning ​or by modeling others​ who live near them (Richerson & Boyd, 2005) - How does the set of information ​spread​? - How is ​an invention​ ​transmitted from the original generation to the next generation? - Not focused on innate aspect but rather more social questions - Cultural psychologist will put more emphasis on this type of research - The transmission process occurs from caregivers to babies, from teachers to students, from the masters to their disciples. - Transmitted culture can ​travel with people ​even if the environment of the new place is different from that of the initial set of geographic conditions. Process of Cultural Evolution - Meme - Culture as a small unit of information - Dawkins maintains that there are some important unit of cultural information known as meme - Epidemiology of ideas - Cultural knowledge is like a virus Meme - Smallest units of cultural information that can be faithfully transmitted to others and the next generations - Like genes, the longevity, fidelity, and fecundity are high - Scientific theory is a type of meme - Unlike genesis, memes do not have - 1. Tangible entities  - 2. Randomly copying errors (mutations) - 3. Sometimes be maladaptive - Memes can disappear - No changes between Generation 1, 2, and 3 - THE SAME IDEA CARRIES ON Epidemiology of ideas - (1) an individual who comes up with an idea (AKA an ​inventor​) has a mental representation of this idea in his/her mind. - (2) another individual (AKA an ​imitator​) learns about this idea from the inventor. - But, it is ​not​ a simple give and take relationship. - Minor changes in idea form person to person - You generate your own idea 1 that is imitation but somewhat different - Eg. som learn from him but not imitating behaviour - This metaphor better explains the cultural transition and knowledge - Epidemiology theory puts emphasis on virus like culture The Messenger Game - In China, 1084 elder people attended the message game. - The first message “the red pepper is afraid of Szechuan people” ended up transmitted to “The red pepper is good for your health” - Elderly people care about their health and it is easy to collect health and food - By playing telephone we can identify the shell concerns or common topics in a society among the people - This depicts the characteristics of culturally shared ideas - Communication allows sharing of knowledge Communicable ideas Spead - Ideas usually need to be communicated in order to spread. They spread within social networks, so some ideas vary across groups. - Dynamic Social Impact Theory​: People influence each other, which leads to clusters of like-minded people that are separated by geography (e.g. cultures, languages). - If you share the same language it is easy to communicate with others - Influence each other based on how often they interact with each other - Restricted access to the group means you only access limited amounts of information Dynamic Social Impact Theory - Study by Cullum and Harton, 2007 - Explored how students’ attitudes changed while living in residence halls. - The students were randomly assigned to the different halls, so their living arrangements made for a nice natural experiment.  - The students completed surveys that assessed their attitudes on a variety of issues after spending 2 weeks and 13 weeks in the residences. - Beginning and end of semester fill in questionnaire - Investigated the similarity of their opinions - They also indicated how important each attitude was. - They assessed how much more students attitudes were clustered together (i.e., their own attitudes more ​similar​ to hallmates, while the average attitude of people in residence halls ​differed​ from each other), in the second time period compared with the first. - All attitudes showed an increase in clustering over the term. - This was especially true for the attitudes that were rated as more important - these attitudes were discussed more. - New subcultures were formed on the basis of the ideas that people regularly communicated. - The more important the topic the more clustering Emotional ideas spead - Study investigated how much the emotional intensity of a story predicted whether people would relay that story to others (Heath et al., 2001). - The researchers created 12 stories and made three different versions of each story, that varied in emotional intensity. - In this particular study researchers put focus on how emotion can change their views towards a target topic - Emotionally arousing events can be easily spread - Study showed how much emotional intensity would relay the story to others - 12 stories and 3 different versions of each story - They manipulated the degree of emotional intensity of each sentence - Mild Degree of Emotion - “Before he drank anything he saw that there was a dead rat inside.” - Moderate Degree of Emotion - “About halfway through he saw that there was a dead rat inside.” - Strong Degree of Emotion - “He swallowed something lumpy and saw that there was a dead rat inside.” - Participants read only one version of each of the 12 stories. - They were asked to indicate how likely they would be to pass this story along to a friend - Participants were more likely to pass along stories that elicited strong emotions Minimally Counterintuitive ideas spread - Study by Norenzayan et al., 2006.  - Participants received a list of 18 items to read. - Some of these items were intuitive and some were counter-intuitive. - Participants were divided into four conditions that varied in the percent of counter-intuitive items. - Entirely Intuitive (100% intuitive) - Minimally Counterintuitive (72% intuitive, 28% counterintuitive) - Equal Frequencies (50/50 Split) - Maximally Counterintuitive (28% intuitive, 72% counterintuitive) 3 minutes​ after reading the items, participants were asked to recall them - ​Intuitive item ​were easier to recall One week later​, participants were again asked to recall the items - Minimally counterintuitive​ they did better Implication of Norenzayan et al. 2006 study: - Over time, narratives that include a few, but not too many, counterintuitive items are recalled better. - This is true of most religions, myths, and successful folk tales. Number of Counterintuitive Elements in Successful and Unsuccessful Folktales from the Grimm Brothers (determined by Google hits; also in Norenzayan et al., 2006) How has Culture been changing? Bowling Alone - Our culture is changing. - Some examples from the US (see Putnam, 2000) - Before 1960 the America’s were more socially active - Americans are becoming more individualistic - Prioritizing their own personal goals - Many other cultures follow this path - Analyzed data and found that many other countries are following this path Some changes in life styles - People are Participating Less in Civic Affairs. - People are Attending Church Less - People are less likely to entertain at Home. - Families Eat Together Less Often - People are socializing less. - People are Becoming Less Trusting Some Causes - Increased time pressures from families with dual incomes (~ 10% of change). - Suburban lifestyles (~ 10% change). - Electronic Entertainment (~25%) - Generational Difference (living through WW2~50%) Flynn effect - People in many cultures are becoming more intelligent - A review of changes in IQ scores in 14 nations revealed that the average increase in IQ was between 5 and 25 % - The tendency is observable in different Standardized Tests that are said to measure one’s stable intelligence Some Causes - The scores of Raven`s Matrices have increased over time - Education - Percentage of 25 year old with Bachelor degree has increased - Educational system facilitate people to go to higher level of education which makes IQ higher - Popular Culture - Majority of poplar drama the stories have become more complicated - Their cognitive capacity is getting well trianed - Game - Game culture makes you process information faster In the face of change, how does culture persist - Adaptations are constrained by previously existing structures. - Cultures do not emerge out of a vacuum. - Early conditions have disproportionate influence on cultural evolution. Northern Italy vs. Southern Italy - Social InstitutionNorthern Italy vs. Southern Italy - For example, the Social Institution in Northern Italy is highly egalitarian based on the pre-existing social structure from the medieval era. The guild system and the neighbourhood associations are some of them. In contrast, - Social institutions in Southern Italy are highly influenced by the culture of Norman kingdoms. Even though Italy become a single country in 1870, such regional differences still remain American Immigrants and People in the Original Culture - Well-Being & Happiness - Asians tend to be quiet realistic but Scandinavian’s constantly say their life is good American vs. Japanese - Sports - In north America the game season is spring and summer - Japanese force children to practice everyday and every week Chp 4: Methods for Studyng Culture and Psychology Case Study: Culture of Honor in the US South Culture of honor: - A culture that is defined by strong concerns about one’s own and others’ reputations, leading to sensitivity to sights and insults and a willingness to use violents to avenge any perceived wrong or insult History of Culture of Honor: - Since the early 18th century, a number of observers have commented on the greater violence in the US South than the North. - This has been evident in a greater frequency of feuds, duels, homicides, lynching, sniper attacks, violent pastimes, and greater support for corporal punishment, gun ownership, and war.  - Since the early 18th century, a number of observers have commented on the greater violence in the U.S. South than the North. - This has been evident in a greater frequency of feuds, duels, homicides, lynching, sniper attacks, violent pastimes, and greater support for corporal punishment, gun ownership, and war. - Honor: (1) nobility of soul, magnanimity, and a scorn of meanness, (2) a man’s strength and power to enforce his will on others Herders and a culture of honor - Herders live a precarious existence as their wealth is portable. Others can steal your herds. - The problem is made worse because herding is usually done on marginal lands which are sparsely populated, and thus difficult to police - People will be more likely to protect their herds if they can develop a reputation as someone who would respond to threats with violence. - Lex Talionis “ the rule of relatilation” The system of retributive Justice Culture of Honor: Child Rearing Styles - “From an early age, small boys were taught to think much of their own honor and to be active in its defense. Honor in this society meant a pride of manhood in masculine courage, physical strength, and warrior virtue. Male children were trained to defend their honor without a moments’ hesitation-lashing out against their challengers with savage violence.” Evidence of Culture of Honor Account - Explored how various kinds of indices of violence varied across regions of the US. Archival Data Analysis US South had a longer history of slavery. - Scholars attempted to explain why south is more violent than north - The main reason is that the US south had a longer history of slavery - Because of this reason people become more violent US South is hotter than the North. - Frustration aggression theory US South is poorer than the North - Crime rate increase and more homicide Nisbett and Cohen’s account: The South was settled largely by herders, whereas the North was largely settled by farmers. This led to the development of a “Culture of Honor” in the US South. - Income = rich or poor - Nisvess talk about economic resources Research on Homicide Rate - Focus on secondary data of homicide rate in US – how often homicide happen in particular area in US - Contrasted North vs South The Economy is a good predictor - The murder rate is higher in the areas where herding is more commonly practiced than it is in the areas where farming is practiced. The Income is not a good predictor - People in the farming areas make slightly more than those in the herding areas. - This difference in wealth is much smaller than the difference in violence rates between the two areas, so this argues against the poverty account. The Temperatue is not a good predictor - If anything, the farming areas are hotter (and considerably more humid) than the herding areas, yet the violence rates are higher in the herding areas. - This goes against the temperature account of these differences. The Slavery tradition is not a good predictor - Slaves had been far more common in farming regions than in herding regions, yet the violence rate is higher in the herding regions. - This goes against the slavery account. The South doesn’t differ from the North in just any kind of violence. The difference is most pronounced for argument-related murders, where one’s honor is at stake. The regional differences are more pronounced in less urban areas. In urban areas there is less influence from traditional herding cultures. This data challenges a temperature account of the regional differences, as both the urban and rural areas should have similar climates. - Culture of honor is related to argument related murders or conflict regarding property - Data shows that in the city the crime is higher - Agrument related matter happens more in the south and southwest west - In the city it gets weaker because there is less herding in those areas Survey Research  - Participants in various regions of the U.S. were called at home by a survey company and posed questions to them about how they would respond in certain situations. - Compared to Northerners, Southerners are more likely to accept the endorsement of violence - In this survey, participants were also asked to answer how they evaluate a person’s behavior. - They ranged in severity from imagining that someone had insulted a man named Fred, to imagining that someone had raped Fred’s daughter. - The Southerners were more likely than Northerners to view violence as an appropriate solution to the threats to Fred’s honor. - Most extreme difference for the scenario where Fred’s daughter was raped. 47% of Southerners but only 28%of Northerners felt that Fred would be extremely justified to shoot the man who had raped his daughter. Experimental Research (Physiological & Behavioral) - These studies contrasted white male students at the University of Michigan who had either grown up in the North or in the South. - In one study, following the insult, the experimenters assessed changes in the participants’ cortisol and testosterone levels, as these increase when people are feeling aggressive. - Half of them were assigned to an “insult” condition where a confederate insulted them. - The other half were in the control condition where everything was identical except for the insult. Control – dependent variable is the difference in cortisol and testosterone levels Experiment – provide saliva with no negative experiment... half way they are asked to go to a diff room and they meet a rude assistant - After having negative experience they come back to the room - Southerners are more likely to have increase in cortisol and testosterone - Northern subjects showed little physiological arousal to the insult. - Southern subjects showed a strong physiological response. They were quite angry Behaviour study - In a subsequent study, after participants had been insulted they were instructed to go to another lab room. On the way, they encountered another confederate who was in a direct collision course with them. - CHICKEN GAME: The dependent measure was the point at which participants yielded to the oncoming confederate. - In the absence of the insult, Southerners yielded way at a greater distance than Northerners. - The Northerners were relatively unaffected by the insult.  - Southerners responded to the insult by challenging the second confederate. Field Research Field Experiment 1 - Researchers sent letters requesting job applications to large national companies with branches in the US North and South - The letters mentioned that the applicant was a convicted felon. In a control condition he describes how he had been convicted of stealing a car. In an “honor letter” condition he describes how he had been convicted of manslaughter for killing a man in defense of his honor. - Key dependent measure was the tone of the letter that was received in response from the potential employer. - For those companies receiving the control letter, there were no regional differences in terms of how warm the response from the employer was. - For companies receiving the honor letter, Southern employers were significantly warmer in their response compared with Northen employers. - Southern employers were more likely to give them a chance Chp 6: Self and Personality Self-Concept - How we perceive ourselves, and understand our identity plays a crucial role in how we think about many things. - The self-concept is implicated in directing what information we should attend to, it shapes the kinds of meaning that we draw from events, it influences the kinds of relationships that we have, it affects our emotions, and it influences what we will be motivated to work towards. It is central to our psychology. Independent vs Interdependent views of self - Seminal paper by Markus and Kitayama (1991). - Argued that much of what is known in social psychology, has been studied with people who share a primarily distinct view of self - an independent self. - In much of the non-Western world, in contrast, an interdependent self is more common. Independent view of self - Identity is experienced as largely independent from others. - Important aspects of identity are personal characteristics - Identity remains largely constant across roles and situations. - Considerable fluidity between ingroups and outgroups. Interdependent view of self - Individual’s identity is importantly interdependent with others. - Key aspects of identity include roles, relationships and memberships. - As roles change across situations, identity is also somewhat fluid across situations. - Clear distinction between ingroups and outgroups - Dotted line means that across situations you can be a good father, good professor, etc. Self Represenation and Culture - Do East Asians really merge others (and Others’ view) into their self-representation? - A Neuro-Imaging Study is conducted at Beijing University-- Zhu, Zhang, Fan, & Han (2007). - Participants (Chinese & Americans ) were presented with a variety of personality traits, and asked to judge how much each trait was applicable to them. - In addition to the target trait words, an additional word was presented Americans: Chinese: Myself Myself My mother My mother Bill Clinton Zhū Róngjī (朱鎔基) Results of fMRI study - For Chinese, MPFC (related to the self representation) were activated when the word self and my mother were presented. - Shows that their mom is somehow part of them, indirect evidence of interdependent chinese - For Americans, MPFC was activated only when the word self appeared. - Medial prefrontal cortex - Americans – me vs others is critical difference - Chinese – show that some similarity between you and your mom - Variety Facets of Interdependent vs. Independent Self Construals - Cognition - Self-Description - Self-Awareness - Self-Consistency - Motivation and Emotion Self-description  “Who am I?” - People are asked to describe themselves with a number of statements that begin with “I am _BLANK_.” - The kinds of statements that they list are then counted and analyzed. - People from some different cultural groups often provide different kinds of statements. - Twenty Statement Test “I am ____” - Personal Characteristics were dominant responses among American Undergrad Students. - Urban Kenyans’ responses were similar to these of American Undergrad Students. - Roles of memberships were dominant responses among Tribal Kenyans’ responses - Researchers assume that this sense of interdependence is related to social roles and memberships - Independence is highly based on your description on your focus on personal characteristics Results of Cousin: American and Japanese data Contextualized vs. Context Free – Responses - Condition 1: Participants described themselves without any context - Condition 2: Participants described themselves at home, at school, and with close friends Twenty Statment Test “I am” Contextualized Repose “At school” Coding scheme was fourfold Physical – height, age, gender etc Social – group membership, or socially defined status Attributive – abstract traits such as friendly, moody, etc Global – larger categories such as human being or an organic form. - Original social task for Japanese they are likely to defer from self - Pure attribute – highest among Americans - Japanese think that in the abstract setting – social category, but when context is clear you say who you are right now in the particular context - If the context is clear and concrete Americans do not rely on the social category Self-Awareness - Independent Individual = subjective self awareness = 1st person perspective - Interdependent individual = objective self awareness= 3rd person perspective - Think back to your high school graduation, when you stood on stage and received your diploma. - Is your mental imagery about this event more from the 1st person perspective (what you saw from the stage) or from the 3rd person perspective (how people saw you from the audience)? Perspective Taking Task by Cohen and Gunz (2002) - In that study participants indicated whether their memories contained 1st person or 3rd person imagery for a variety of events. - In some of the events they were the center of attention (e.g., your birthday party) and some they were not the center of attention (e.g., watching a movie with friends). Implications - This study suggests that East Asians are attending to the perspective of an audience so much more than are Westerners that this perspective leaks into and distorts the visual imagery in their memories. - Being a member of an interdependent group makes it more important for one to understand how others are viewing them. It is others’ opinions about one that especially matter for one to be successful. In many ways, in interdependent contexts, how an individual feels about themselves is less important than how others feel about oneself. - If East Asians tend to habitually consider themselves from the perspective of others, they may tend to view themselves more often in a state of objective self-awareness. - Are we able to change this cognitive bias? - Objective self-awareness is often manipulated by putting people in front of mirrors, where they can see themselves as the world sees them Mirros and Self-Discrepancies - In a study of ours, we had Japanese and Americans evaluate themselves with a measure of actual-ideal self-discrepancies. A larger discrepancy indicates a more self-critical view. - Half completed the questionnaire in front of a mirror. The other half did not. Results of Heine et al (2008) - Americans had larger self-discrepancies (i.e., are more self-critical) when in front of a mirror than when not.  - When Americans were in front of a mirror they seemed to think of themselves in ways more similar to that of the Japanese. - Japanese were unaffected by the mirror. Self-Consistency - The interdependent self should be more contextually variable than the independent self. - When people are in different situations they are often in different roles - if the identity of the interdependent self is importantly grounded in roles, than across situations, identity should vary. Kanagawa et al. 2001 - In one study, Japanese and American students completed the Twenty Statements Test in different situations (Kanagawa et al., 2001). - There were 4 test-taking situations: alone, with peers, in a professor’s office, and in a large class. American data: - American self-descriptions were highly similar across different situations. - Their self-descriptions were also uniformly positive. Japanese data: - Japanese self-descriptions varied significantly across different situations. - They were more positive when alone and most critical when with their professor. - Their self-descriptions were also less positive than the Americans. - Note that the East Asian tendency to be less consistent across situations does not mean that they are unpredictable. - East Asians are also consistent but it’s a different kind of consistency than found among Westerners. - Rather it appears that they do show much consistency across time within each kind of relationship. - That is, although East Asians may feel differently about themselves when they’re with their family than when they’re with their friends, they are quite consistent across time within each of these relationships. The family self remains constant, and the friend self remains constant (see English & Chen, 2007). Why do cultures vary in consistency? - Often it’s a useful starting point to assume that cultural tendencies are functional - people do things the ways that they do because they derive benefits from doing so.  - Although there are often exceptions to this (maladaptive cultural tendencies can persist), in the case of consistency it appears that Westerners benefit more than East Asians from being consistent. Cultural Variations in Consistency & Well-Being - Study compared how consistently Koreans and Americans described themselves across roles (Suh, 2002). - A consistency score was calculated for each participant. - Americans described themselves more consistently than did Koreans. - These consistency scores were then correlated with some other variables. Benefit of Consistency - For Americans, there were clear positive correlations between consistency and each of measures of well-being, social skills, and likeability - For Koreans, the correlations were far weaker - In sum, Americans benefit more from being consistent across roles than do Koreans.