Culture and Emotion Lecture 2024 PDF

S Culture and Emotion Magdalena Rychlowska 25.09.2024 1  Outline  Testing the universality hypothesis  Cross-cultural similarities  Cross-cultural differences  Cultural dimensions: Tools for explaining differences...

S Culture and Emotion Magdalena Rychlowska 25.09.2024 1  Outline  Testing the universality hypothesis  Cross-cultural similarities  Cross-cultural differences  Cultural dimensions: Tools for explaining differences 2  Looking for universal emotions  Would people all over the world recognise the same expressions as signifying the same emotion?  Studies of six basic emotions (e.g. Ekman, Sorenson, & Friesen, 1969)  Matching photographs of posed expressions with emotion labels  People label photographs accurately at rates greater than chance (see also Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002) 3  Looking for universal emotions Agreement across cultures in the facial expression that fit the situation or emotion label 4 Is there evidence of universal emotions? Yes, but… 5 Studies of natural emotion expressions  Induction of emotion states or observations of people experiencing emotion  Matsumoto & Willingham (2006) – Olympic athletes from 35 countries  Gold & bronze medal winners = genuine smiles  Silver medal winners = sadness or contempt  No cultural differences in facial 6 Blind and sighted athletes display same expressions No cultural differences Prototy pe 7 Self-reported bodily sensations Nummenmaa et al. (2014 8 Self-reported bodily sensations Nummenmaa et al. (2014 9  Self-reported bodily sensations Maps concordant across 101 cultures 10 Nummenmaa et al. (2014 11 Kama muta (Seibt et al., 2017)  Positive emotion of being moved  Warmth, teary eyes, goosebumps, chills  Induced by communal closeness (hugs, reunions, imagining loved ones)  Promotes social bonds and helping  Associated with similar perceptions and bodily feelings in the US, Norway, 12 China, Israel, and Portugal Cross-cultural differences 13 14 15 Display rules (Ekman, 1962; Friesen, 1972) Polish soup? How nice! 16 Display rules (Ekman, 1962; Friesen, 1972) Culturally prescribed rules that dictate the management and modification of the universal expressions, depending on social circumstances Describe how emotions should be expressed. Where and when the expression is appropriate  American and Japanese participants watching stressful movies alone or 17 with experimenter  Display rules (Ekman, 1962; Friesen, 1972) No differences when alone Japanese inhibit their emotion expressions in presence of the experimenter With Alone experiment er No emotion Negative emotion Japanese displayed expressions (e.g., disgust) Negative emotion Negative emotion American expressions (e.g., expressions (e.g., disgust) disgust) 18  In-group advantage (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002)  Observers more accurate when they judge facial expressions of members of their own culture  Partly explained by the Dialect Theory of facial expressions (Elfenbein, 2013)  Different cultures may exhibit slight variations in innate expressions  Basic emotions = universal language 19  Variations = accents Dialect theory (Elfenbein et al., 2007) 20  Summary  Evidence that the 6 basic emotions are recognized and produced cross- culturally (although see Gendron et al., 2018!)  Similarities in spontaneous facial expressions  Universality of basic emotions in music  Similar physiology and self-reported 21 bodily sensations Cultural dimensions: Tools for explaining differences 22  Cultural dimensions (Hofstede, 1980, 2001)  Cross-cultural similarities and differences in emotion expression and experience  How can we explain these variations?  We cannot examine all countries in the world!  CULTURAL DIMENSIONS – value constructs used to describe a specific culture  Allow comparisons and clustering of Collectivism – individualism (Hofstede, 1980, 2001)  Geert Hofstede  Culture = software of the mind  Survey among IBM employees 1967- 1973  A framework of six cultural dimensions  Regularly updated  The extent to which people see themselves as: Autonomous personalities (individualism) or Collectivism – individualism (Hofstede, 1980, 2001)  North American countries = individualistic values  East Asian & Eastern European countries = collectivistic values 25 Independent and interdependent self (Markus & Kitayama, 1991) Different cultures have different construals of self and others Individualistic cultures Collectivistic cultures Independent self-concept Interdependent self- concept Unique self Self connected to the group Personal goals Communal goals Express one’s uniqueness Maintain connections, harmony Collectivism – individualism (Hofstede, 1980, 2001) Culturally prescribed rules that dictate the management and modification of the universal expressions, depending on social circumstances Describe how emotions should be expressed. Where and when the expression is appropriate  American and Japanese participants 27 watching stressful movies alone or  Individualism and collectivism: Implications Display rules: Expression of negative emotion less desirable in collectivistic than individualistic cultures (Friesen, 1972) No differences when alone Japanese inhibit their emotion expressions in presence of the Individualism and collectivism: Implications Matsumoto et al. (2008): individualistic countries encourage greater expressivity Individualism and collectivism: Implications  Thinking styles (Masuda et al., 2008)  Independence - Analytic thinking styles: object-oriented  Interdependence - Holistic thinking styles: context-oriented  Implications for emotion perception: observers from collectivistic cultures more influenced by emotional tone of a context than observers from Ito, Masuda, & Li (2013)  Central character expresses emotion among other faces  Task: Judge intensity of happiness or sadness  Compared to European Canadians, Japanese participants are more influenced by Religious values  Dialectical doctrines of emotion  Dominant religious doctrines influence the experience of emotion  Daoism, Buddhism, Confucianism are major religions in East Asia.  Dialectical understanding of the experience of positive and negative emotions  Good feelings and experiences connected to bad feelings and bad experiences Implications for emotion experience  Positive emotions universally more valued than negative emotions  The difference is more marked in Western countries  Compared to Americans, East Asians are more likely to mention negative features of happiness (Uchida & Kitayama, 2009)  East Asians also report feeling more moderate positive and negative feelings, and more often feel both (Kitayama et al., 2000; Mesquita & Karasawa, 2002)  Honour  Self-esteem determined by own reputation or by reputation of one’s family  Family members uphold reputation through avoidance of humiliation  Cultures of honour: American South, Spain, Mediterranean countries  Anger and violence more acceptable in honour cultures as responses to insults to honour (Cohen et al., 1996) Tsar Bombastic 36 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-4G-2HbNqg Cohen et al. (1996)  Social ecology  How natural and social habitats affect human mind and behavior (and vice versa)  Collectivism linked with pathogen prevalence (Fincher et al., 2008)  …or with rice agriculture (Talhelm et al., 2014)  Traditional use of plough predicts gender inequality (Alesina et al., 2011)  Demography matters 38  How do people establish and maintain  Relational mobility (Thomson et al., 2018)  Freedom and opportunity to choose interpersonal relationships based on personal preference 39  But what’s emotion got to do with it? You keep your distance with a system of touch Can I go where you go? And gentle persuasion Can we always be this close I'm lost in admiration forever and ever? Could I need you this much? And ah, take me out, and take me Oh, you're wasting my time You're home (forever and ever) just—, just—, just wasting time You're my, my, my, my Something happens Lover And I'm head over heels 40  What’s love got to do with it? (Yamada et al., 2017)  A study of romantic passion in Japan and in the United States  Measures of relational mobility and passionate love  Passion associated with greater commitment in both societies  Levels of passion are higher among American than among Japanese participants  Difference partially explained 41 by relational mobility  Moving and emotion  Residential mobility = how frequently people move residence (Oishi, 2010)  Linked with relational mobility  High residential mobility fosters individualistic self-construals (Talhelm & Oishi, 2014)  Residential mobility is associated with higher sensitivity to disappearance of facial expressions of happiness (Ishii et al., 2020) 42 Historical migration and emotion (Niedenthal et al., 2018) Number of source countries that contributed to a country’s population between 1500 and 2000 43 Historical migration and emotion (Niedenthal et al., 2018) Historical heterogeneity predicts smiling, laughter, and positive emotion 44 World United  Summary & Conclusions  Nature vs. nurture  Some evidence that emotions are recognized and produced cross- culturally  Important cultural variation suggesting that part of emotional experience is learned  Need to take into account both biological and social determinants  Cultural dimensions help in predicting emotions across cultures 45 emotion? How do different cultures do emotion? 46  Thank you for your attention! Consultation times: Wednesday at 16h00 Or send a message! 47