Week 6 Lecture 1 - Culture & Development

Children’s decisions

Children may make decisions about:

Preferences:

• Favourite people

• Favourite activities

Behaviours:

• Response to emotions

• Response to others

Values:

• Fairness

• Etiquette

What is culture?

“A culture is a socially transmitted or socially constructed constellation consisting of practices, competencies, ideas, schemas, symbols, values, norms, institutions, goals, constitutive rules, artefacts, and modifications of the physical environment.” (Fiske, 2002)

Not limited to a nationality or ethnic group

Brofenbrenner’s Bioecological model

Circle of relationship between child and others

Developmental theory about culture

Culture: - Practices, Competencies, Ideas, Values, Schemas, Symbols, Norms, Institutions, Goals, Rules, Artefacts, Modifications

…Shapes...

Development - Intelligence: visual spatial memory, problem solving

Visuospatial memory and culture

• Artefactual, different (20)

  • Eg. Knife, eraser, thimble, dice, ring, scissors, matchbox

• Natural, different (20)

  • Eg. Feather, rock, bark, leaf, small skull, wildflowers

• Artefactual, same (12)

  • Eg. Unlabelled bottles that vary in shape, size, colour, age

• Natural, same (12)

  • Eg. Small rocks that vary in shape, size, colour, texture

“Look hard at all the things and try to remember where they all are”

Cultural influences on problem solving

Cultural ideas:

• Folk lore

• Fairy tales

• Parables, fables

Novel experience:

• Moral dilemma

• Adaptive task

• Unfamiliar decision

Do cultural folk tales influence the way that young people solve novel problems?

270 undergraduate students:

• 152 Chinese

• 118 American

“Write down any ideas that you think might be appropriate. Any idea is valid.”

Six insight problems with varying levels of complexity:

• 2 target problems: the ‘statue’ problem the ‘cave’ problem.

• 4 control problems - no known relevant source analogues in either culture

Cultural folk tales show how cultural familiarity, through exposure to folk tales or cultural narratives, influences problem-solving.

In the study, Chinese students solved the Statue Problem at much higher rates than US students (because of cultural analogues), while Americans solved the Cave Problem more successfully

On control problems, performance was equivalent in both groups

Statue problem

A village chief has a heavy stone statue that needs to be weighed (or used to collect taxes in gold coin) but the scale is unavailable.

Solution: submerge the statue (or place it in a tub of water), measure the displaced water, then use that reading to match the weight using gold coins

Cultural link: it is isomorphic (have same form, structure or shape, even if elements themselves are different), to the Chinese folk-tale familiar to many Chinese students, so they performed much better on this problem

Cave problem

A treasure hunter enters a cave without a map or compass, and must find his way out.

Solution: drop small objects (pebbles, sand, breadcrumbs) along the path so you can trace them back and exit the cave safely.

Cultural link: this idea mirrors the “Hansel and Gretel” type of Western folktale where children leave a trail to find their way back. American students, more likely to have heard such stories, performed better on this problem

Four control problem: “Classical” insight problems (no cultural analogues)

Radiation problem: How to destroy a tumour without damaging the surrounding healthy tissue.

String problem: How to tie together two long strings that are hanging from the ceiling two arm-lengths apart

Water jar problem: Using three available containers to achieve a desired amount of water

Pool problem: Building a bridge to a platform in the middle of a pool filled with water with only a small number of flat boards but no nails, glue, or rope

Limitations and strengths

Limitations

• Influence of cross-ethnic experiences

• Treated culture as ethnicity

• Insight problems must be novel (designed to test creative problem-solving — solution not obvious or previously learned)

Strengths

• Approach to measuring cultural “ideas” (tales)

  • Allow researchers to quantify how cultural knowledge influences thinking rather than just assuming culture has an effect

• Approach to measuring decision-making (problems)

  • Objectively measure how people think, reason and solve novel problems