PSYC 307 Midterm 2

Define and explain cultural values

**Cultural values** are guiding principles for how people in certain cultural environments interact with their physical and social environment (how they are supposed to act at least, both which each other and their environment)

How do different cultural environments shape self concepts?

Different cultural environments can shape self-concepts 


1. In different communities we face the same kinds of problems
2. For each of these problems, there is a set number of solutions and every community arrives at what the best solution they think is for them
3. There is a rank ordering of what solutions are your preferred solutions and solutions give rise to different values

Explain the various components of Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck’s value dimensions

Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck’s value dimensions are in line with the anthropological idea of solutions and values and consists of 4 value dimensions:


1. Time Dimension
2. Nature Dimension
3. Human Nature Dimension
4. Relational Dimension

Explain the various components of Hofstede’s value dimensions

These are the more commonly used value dimensions and include 5 dimensions:


1. Power Distance (high vs. low)
2. Uncertainty Avoidance (high vs. low)
3. Masculinity (vs. femininity)
4. Individualism (vs. collectivism)
5. Indulgence (v.s restraint)

What is the **Time Orientation**

**Time Orientation** addresses the problem of where in the chronological timeline do people focus on 

* Includes the alternative orientations of past orientation, present orientation, and future orientation
* There is individual variability in this
* **Past Orientation** -> tend to focus on and think about events in the past
* E.g. East/southeast Asian cultures with ancestor worship -> incorporate ancestor info into everyday language
* **Present Orientation** -> solving current problems, thinking about the here and now
* Tend to characterize people with substance abuse problems 
* **Future Orientation**-> Strong focus on planning for and thinking about the future
* In a large study of Muslim girls, those with a strong future orientation for school had higher academic achievement 

What is the **nature orientation**

**Nature Orientation:** Humans place in the cosmos, in this universe and how it is meant to interact with the environment -> where do we fit in this universe, what is our role, how to we interact with the environment around us (both the physical and the social)

* Includes the alternative orientations of subjugation to nature, harmony with nature, or mastery over nature (these are not mutually exclusive for groups and individuals it is more what is their preferred solution)
* **Subjugation to nature** -> have higher level of helplessness and feel there is little we can do to change what is in our environment 
* More documented in homeless people
* **Harmony with nature** -> humans are an extension of nature, we are meant to take care of it and it is a reciprocal relationship
* **Mastery over nature** -> feel they have agency over the environment and have the right to do what we want with the land 

What is the **human nature orientation**

**Human Nature Orientation:** What is the nature of humanity?

* Includes the alternative orientations of good, evil, or “mixed”
* **Good Orientation** -> assumes humans are innately good
* E.g. neo-confucianism = we are made up of a special energy that imposes a structure on the world, humans are by nature good but it is easy to stray so we have to cultivate that goodness
* **Evil Orientation** -> humans are innately bad 
* E.g. catholicism and needing to baptize to get rid of the original sin
* **Mixed Orientation** -> humans have the capacity for both good and bad 

What is the **relational orientation**

**Relational Orientation:** What is the nature of the relationships between people, how do we see ourselves in relation to the people around us 

* Includes the alternative orientations of collateral, lineal, or individualistic 
* **Collateral** -> more equality, no hierarchy in the family 
* ==E==.g. traditional navajo culture
* **Lineal** -> all about hierarchies, power concentrated at the top
* Decisions aren’t shared, they are made at the top and then filter down 
* **Individualistic** -> make decisions for me, by myself

What is **Power Distance**

**Power Distance:** whether people in a group, particularly those who are at the bottom of society, accept and expect unequal distributions of power in society 

* Low Power Distance = low rates of corruption in government, equal distribution of wealth and income, autonomy given to children
* E.g. Western European, English speaking
* High Power Distance = lots of corruption, political scandals are common, uneven distribution of wealth and income, children taught to respect authority 
* E.g. Eastern European, Southeast Asian

What is **uncertainty avoidance**

**Uncertainty Avoidance:** whether people in a group are comfortable with ambiguity and unstructured interactions 

* Low Uncertainty Avoidance = tolerate different viewpoints, dislike rules and norms, teachers can say “i don’t know” 
* E.g. English speaking, Nordic
* High Uncertainty Avoidance = different opinions are seen as dangerous and a threat, emotional need for clarity and structure, teachers are supposed to have all the answers 
* E.g. East Asian, South American 

What is **masculinity**

**Masculinity:** whether men and women in a group have differentiated gender roles (i.e. traditional gender roles) 

* Feminine = minimum gender role differentiation, many women elected in to politics, sexuality is not a moral issue 
* E.g nordic 
* Masculine = maximum gender role differentiation, few women in politics, sexuality is highly moralized 
* E.g. Eastern European, Asian 

What is **collectivism**

**Individualism:** whether people are integrated into cohesive groups rather than a loose collection of individuals 

* Collectivism = strong emphasis on maintaining harmony, idea that breaking rules leads to feelings of shame, born into a complex network of extended relationships
* E.g. central american, east asian
* Shame is an all encompassing negative evaluation of the self and is associated with anxiety and withdrawing oneself 
* Individualism = strong emphasis on speaking one’s mind, breaking rules leads to feelings of guilt, primary relationships involve immediate family 
* E.g. many western countries 
* Guilt is domain specific and motivates reparations

What is **indulgence**

**Indulgence:** whether people in a group value or control gratification of one’s desires, and value happiness 

* Retrained = little concern for freedom of speech, personal life seen through lens of helplessness, less likely to remember positive emotions
* E.g Ex soviet 
* Indulgent = great importance placed on freedom of speech, see personal life as controllable, more likely to remember positive emotions
* E.g. Nordic, english speaking

Compare and contrast between the Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck’s and Hofstede’s two value dimensions

the “relational” orientation is found to be similar to individualism and indulgence!

Describe the global distribution of Hofstede’s value dimensions

Power Distance:

* Low: Western European, English speaking
* High: Eastern European, Southeast Asian

Uncertainty Avoidance:

* Low: English speaking, Nordic
* High: East Asian, South America

Masculinity:

* Feminine: Nordic
* Masculine: Eastern European, Asian 

Collectivism:

* Collectivist: East Asian, Central American
* Individualist: Western

Indulgence:

* Restrained: ex-soviet
* indulgent: nordic, English speaking

What is a **self-schema**

**Self-schema** (aka a self construal) = a cognitive scheme (knowledge structure) that contains beliefs about the self 

* Has implications for how the self relates to other people and for the attainment of personal goals
* Independent self-construal, interdependent self-construal 

What is an **independent self-construal**

**Independent self-construal:** main separation is between the self and others 

* Fluid shifting between in-group and out-group 
* LInked to individualism
* More emphasis on the self
* Most important aspects of the self are contained in the self boundary

What is an **interdependent self-construal**

**Interdependent self-construal:** main separation is between in-group and out-group 

* In group is more difficult to penetrate
* Linked to collectivism 
* Most important aspects of the self are at the interaction between the self and others 
* Relationships are the most important

Differentiate between different self-construals, particularly the consequences of having different self-construals

Independent:

* The self is defined in ways that are not predicted by social context
* The structure of the self is more stable/bounded

Individual is their own entity
* The primary tasks are uniqueness, self expression, recognizing internal attributes and trying to make them come to fruition, promote personal goals
* Self esteem is based in ability to express themselves and their internal attributes

Interdependent:

* Self definition of the self more tied to the social context
* Structure of the self is more fluid and variable
* Primary tasks are fitting in, harmonizing with people, promoting group goals or the goals of others
* The basis of self esteem is ability to restrain yourself and maintain harmony with others

Ability to accomplish the goals of the culture you belong to

Explain various differences associated with differences in self-construal

1. Self-descriptors
2. Self-consistency
3. Implicit theories of the self
4. Self esteem

What is the difference in **self-descriptors** for independent/interdependent

**Self-descriptors:** think back to the 20 statements task 

* Independent: abstract, global, stable attributes and traits 
* E.g. I am easy-going, fun-loving, and extraverted
* A more general description 


* Interdependent: social categories, relationships, affiliations, social roles
* E.g I am a student at UBC and a sister

What is the difference in **self-consistency** for independent/interdependent

**Self-consistency: (i.e. structure of the self)**

* Independent: cultural narrative is that you are a consistent person regardless of who you are with 
* Conformity is seen negatively (immature, underdeveloped sense of self, people who adapt to different situations are seen as “fake” and “not authentic”)
* Interdependent: being different in different context/social 
* Conformity seen as positive and a sign of maturity 
* Able to overcome selfish urges of being yourself and changing your behaviors as the situation requires it 
* Insistence on non-conformity seen as immature and stubborn

What is the difference in **implicit theories of the self** for independent/interdependent

**Implicit theories of the self: what kinds of ideas people have about their own abilities**

* Independent self construal: **entity theory of self**
* the self is a stable, bound entity
* Our abilities are fixed and reflect innate qualities/abilities
* This has implications for failure: will blame lack of ability and withdraw from the behavior 
* Interdependent self construal: **incremental theory of the self**
* The self is malleable and fluid 
* Our abilities are malleable and can be changed with effort and practice
* Handling failure means blaming lack of effort so people keep trying work harder and practice more

What is the difference in **self esteem** for independent/interdependent

* Low levels of self concept confusion are associated with high levels of self esteem but we see this more in Europeans
* There is a similar pattern in Asians but it is smaller

Define “personality”

**Personality =** one’s characteristic pattern of thought, emotion, and behavior along with accompanying psychological mechanisms 

* We can use personality terms to describe the self and others

Challenges in studying personality/ evidence that personality is not universal

* Need to study using stable and consistent terms across situations, but there are different cultural views of this
* Lots of debate as to the applicability of “personality” being a universal 
* Some languages pay a lot of attention to personality (have lots of words for personality) like english but some only have a few to describe personality
* Different cultures conceptualize personality differently 
* In western cultures, personality is trans-situationally stable 
* Many other cultures don’t feel you have to be the same person across situations
* Studying personality may be an extension of studying western individualism

Some evidence personality may be universal:

* All cultural groups possess terms that describe one’s enduring characteristics 
* “Personality” exists by we may need to reconceptualize it as something existing within relationships for certain cultures 
* See consistency of personality within a relationship over time

What is the **lexical approach**

An approach to studying personality

**Lexical Approach:** all important differences in personality are encoded in natural language 


1. Look for all dictionary entries that are trait adjectives 
2. Reduce by eliminating physical descriptors, synonyms, unfamiliar terms, temporary states -> you are left with personality items that are commonly understood
3. Administer list of traits to participants to rate themselves/answer 
4. Use factor analysis to determine how many facets underlie a set of traits

What is the **five factor model of personality**

Openness to experience - intelligence and curiosity about the world

Conscientiousness - how responsible and dependable someone is

Extraversion - how active and dominant someone is

Agreeableness - how warm and pleasant an individual is 

Neuroticism - emotional instability and unpredictability  \n

* One of the most common measures of this is the NEO-PI-R
* Studies using the nEO-PI-R show universality across 50 cultures in the five factor model
* But! We started with english terms to yield 5 factors, therefore using those same words may yield 5 factors because of the language used
* Therefore we need to use the lexical approach in other context and cultures

What happens when we use the lexical approach in other cultures?

* In Tagalog from the Philippines, still saw 5 factors but they were different ones
* Gregariousness - liking the company of others, talking a lot, humorous 
* Self-assurance - assertive, brave, insensitive, not gullible
* Concern for others vs. egotism - not violent, humble
* Conscientiousness - dependable, hardworking, religious
* Intellect- clever, sensible, inquisitive, talented
* Getting people to fill out both measures to see if there were close connections show that:
* Gregariousness -> extraversion
* Self-assurance -> neuroticism
* Concern for others vs. egotism -> agreeableness
* Conscientiousness -> conscientiousness 
* Intellect -> openness
* They also found 2 more factors in the tagalog lexicon 
* Temperamentalness - emotional reactivity, hot-headedness, irritable
* Negative Valence - sadistic, social deviance, crazy 
* These are indigenous tagalog personality factors as they don’t seem to map onto the big 5

What is an **emic measure**

**Emic Measure =** a measure is created from within a culture, and used to assess people within the same culture 

* More variability

What is an **etic measure**

**Etic Measure** = a measure is created from one culture and exported for use in another culture 

* More universality (designed to reveal universality)

What is **cognitive dissonance**

**cognitive dissonance**

The distressing feeling that accompanies the awareness that one is behaving inconsistently, or against one’s sense of self-consistency.

what is **subjective self awareness**

A state of mind in which a person considers the self from the inside out, with the perspective of the subject interacting with the world, having little awareness of the self as an individual.

what is **objective self awareness**

A state of mind in which the person considers the self from the outside in, with the perspective of how they appear to others and is being evaluated

What is **self esteem**

**Self esteem =** how positively we have a global evaluation of ourselves -> positive self regard or negative self regard 

What is **self enhancement**

Independent self construal: strong emphasis on having and maintaining high self-esteem

* More likely to engage in **self enhancement** or the tendency to view selves in as positive terms as possible (view the self positively and socially desireably)
* Motivated by desire to bolster self-image and demonstrate unique attributes 

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* More emphasis on positive traits 
* More accustomed to thinking about who they are and who their ideal self is
* When encounter discrepancies, more likely to experience depressive symptoms so they try not to think about these discrepancies

What is **self effacement**

Interdependent self construal: more tendency to engage in **self effacement** or the tendency to view the self in a critical and disparaging way

* To fit in you need to think about your shortcomings
* Motivated by desire to fit in with others and self-improve 
* Social categories, affiliations, and social roles are important

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* More attention paid to negative traits
* Experience more actual-ideal self discrepancy
* Not as concerned about actual-ideal discrepancy -> lower rates of depressive symptoms

What are **compensatory strategies** (with examples)

**Compensatory strategies:** behavior/cognitive strategies to reduce/suppress cognitive dissonance and discrepancy between ideal self and actual self 

* **Downward social comparison** -> compare ourselves to someone less well off
* **Discounting** -> downplaying the importance of that attribute
* **External attributions**: attribute failure to others rather than ourselves 
* Why do we engage in these strategies? Because they give certain advantages
* Individuals are more ambitious and have more unrealistically positive views of the self 
* More likely to ignore adversity 
* Better physical health because they are less concerned/stressed about potential adversity 

How do we measure self-enhancement

**Rosenberg self-esteem scale:** self-enhancement is commonly studied with the rosenberg self-esteem scale

* Scored on 1-4 so there is no middle options 
* European canadians score pretty high on it which suggests more self-enhancement 
* Everyone else is in the middle 
* 2.5 is the average if no self enhancement

What are some proposed explanations for differences in self-enhancement

* Self enhancement vs. group enhancement?
* Doesn’t work: strong independent self-construal and self enhancement will enhance everything including the group
* Matter of importance?
* General sense of self is important -> independent self-construal so more self-enhancement
* Enhance specific aspects -> interdependent 
* Haven’t found this to be the case 
* Modesty Norms
* In a lot of cultural environments there is a norm of modesty which stops people from self-enhancing 
* They may feel highly about themselves but must be humble 

How do we test if **modesty norms** are responsible for self-enhancement

Studied this using **overconfidence** (having an unjustifiably positive belief in one’s characteristics or performance)

* **Overestimation**: how well you think you did compared to how well you actually did
* **Overplacement:** looking at the people around you, judging your own score and justin the performances of others too
* **Overprecision:** how certain you are in your estimation

Study measuring cultural variability in self-enhancement using the lens of overconfidence

* Gave participants an ambiguous task that they had little self-knowledge of
* Participants were from Canada, Hong Kong, and Japan
* Test of empathy, read emotions only from someone’s eyes
* Gave the participants 10 tokens or 10 coins of local currency
* Play a betting game for how well you scored on the test, out coins in bin where you scored on the test (can put coins on more than one score)
* Incentivized version: play with money and get to keep money that you bet in the right place -> this incentivizes people to not be humble about predicting how well they did and to instead be accurate
* Non Incentivized version: play with tokens that have no monetary value, more likely to show cultural norms
* Measures overestimation using average predicted performance - actual performance
* Also measured speak - smaller spread = more overprecision

__Results of the study:__

* No incentive condition: classic self-enhancement finding -> Euro-canadians show self-enhancement, japanese show some self-effacement
* Incentive condition: everyone showed self-enhancement and overestimation in their performance but Eurocanadians overestimate even more (more than they did in the no incentive condition)
* Modesty norms appear to explain away cultural variability
* But!! There is a complication - when you look at the spread in the incentive condition, Japanese participants and hong kong participants spread out their bets more
* More overconfidence but less certainty
* In the un incentivized condition the spread was very similar
* Modesty norms don’t explain uncertainty
* Therefore, the evidence suggests there is less cultural variability when examining overestimation and more cultural variability when examining overprecision

What are the **implicit theory of the self**

Whether or not we can change

no →**Entity theory of the self:** belief our abilities are fixed and innate

yes → **Incremental theory of the self:** belief our abilities are malleable and we can change through effort

What are the **implicit theories of the world**

Whether or not the world can change

no → **entity theory of the world:** the world is fixed beyond our ability to change it

yes → **incremental theory of the world:** the world is flexible and responsive to our efforts to change it

What is **primary control**

* Exercising agency by making changes in your environment to suit your own needs
* Assume an internal locus of control
* **Independent self construal, entity theory of self, incremental theory of world**
* “i cannot change so I will change the world”

What is **secondary control**

* Exercising agency by adjusting goals and desires to control the psychological impact of reality
* Assume an external locus of control
* **Interdependent self construal, incremental theory of the self, entity theory of the world**
* Changes self to adapt to the world

Explain the cultural and universal aspects of choice

Differences in Control and expression of agency = differences in choice making: 

* Independent self-construal -> important decisions made by ourselves
* Interdependent self-construal -> important decisions often made by close others

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What Happens when there are too many choices:

* Don’t want too much or too little
* Too little -> learned helplessness
* **Paradox of choice is a universal phenomenon**
* Overwhelming choices deplete mental resources so it is detrimental to have too many choices presented to us

What is **basking in the reflected glory**

**basking in the reflected glory**

Emphasizing one’s connection to successful others in order to feel better about oneself; sharing in the warm glow of their success.

What is**predestination**

**predestination**

A belief about the afterlife holding that prior to birth, it has already been determined whether one is among the “elect” who will spend eternity in heaven, or among those who will burn in hell forever.

What is **face**

**face**

the amount of social value others give an individual if they live up to the standards associated with their positions

What is **self improvement**

**self improvement**

identifying one’s potential weaknesses and working to improve them

What is a **prevention orientation**

**prevention orientation**

A concern with protecting oneself from negative outcomes.

what is a **promotion orientation**

**promotion orientation**

A concern with advancing oneself and aspiring for gains

what is an **emotion**

**Emotion =** a psychological and physiological state in response to some stimulus 

* Psychological : Has a subjective component and a cognitive component - we have thoughts about emotions and emotions about thoughts 
* Physiological : body’s reaction in response to stimuli

What is the **james lange theory of emotion**

Antecedent event → physiological changes/response (recognition of responses) → emotion

* Physiological responses = products of autonomic nervous system, designed to indicate proper reactions that facilitate survival 
* E.g. if you see a bear -> heart rate goes up, start to tremble and sweat -> realize it is fear -> run
* **Facial feedback hypothesis: manipulating physiological changes can change emotions -> e.g. by manipulating facial expression**
* **Problem!! Assumes 1:1 mapping of emotions and physiological responses, but multiple emotions can have similar expressions**

what is the **two factor theory of emotions**

* Emotions are more than looking into physiological changes -> what about our interpretations? 
* **Physiological changes + cognitive appraisals = emotions**
* Could lead to misattribution of arousal e.g. watching an exciting movie, are you feeling increased heart rate because of the movie or because of your date?

what do the two theories of emotion each suggest

James Lange theory: emotions should be universal - physiological similarities of all humans

Two factor theory of emotion: emotions should vary across cultures - different cultural experiences -. Different interpretations of physiological responses

What are the four lines of evidence that suggest universality of emotions?

* 4 lines of evidence showing universality of
* Emotional antecedents
* Physiological responses associated with emotions
* Emotional appraisal 
* Emotional expression

What is universal about **emotional antecedents**

* Antecedents = events that lead up to or elicit certain emotions
* What kinds of things lead people to experience certain kinds of emotions 
* Substantial overlap across cultural environments in emotional consequences of various antecedents  
* Loss of a loved one -> grief
* Perceived injustices -> anger
* Threat perception -> fear

what is universal about the **physiological responses associated with emotions**

* **Ergotropic:** physiological responses that reflect the actions of the sympathetic nervous system -> more about expending energy and prepping for action
* E.g. cardiovascular activity, muscular reactivity, perspiration
* **Trophotropic**; physiological responses that reflect the actions of the parasympathetic nervous system (relaxing muscles)
* E.g. gastric disturbances, crying and sobbing 
* **Felt-temperature**: the temperature one feels in their bodies when they are experiencing emotions
* Anger; feels hot, increases ergotropic responses and decreased trophotropic responses 
* Sadness: feels cold, decreased ergotropic responses and increased trophotropic responses 

what is universal about **emotional appraisal**

* Antecedents don’t automatically elicit emotions, appraisals and interpretations are important 
* People go through stimulus evaluation checks; appraising antecedents along several dimensions 
* **Expectation**: did you expect the event to occur
* **Pleasantness**; did you find the event pleasant or unpleasant 
* **Fairness**; was the event fair or unfair 
* Anger is the strongest when it is unexpected, unpleasant, and unfair 
* Happiness is higher when something is pleasant, fair, unexpectedness is mixed - can be happy about unexpected or expected

what is universal about facial expression

* Basic emotions: anger, happy, sad, surprise, disgust, fear
* We can even recognize these expressions on animals
* They have reliable levels of communicability and interpretability 
* regardless of cultural upbringing, people can recognize these emotions 
* Lots of evidence regarding the universality of emotions, but the story is very complex!

What are the two lines of evidence for emotional variability

* 2 lines of evidence support the variability of emotions
* Variability of emotional expression
* Variability of emotional lexicon

What is the evidence around **variability of emotional expression**

* When people share the same ethnicity, different on nationality makes a difference and people are able to discern which person is from which country above a chance level even if they are the same ethnicity
* **Display rules:** rules that are specific to different cultural environments in terms of what emotions are acceptable and appropriate  -> culturally specific rules that govern appropriateness and intensity of facial expressions and ritualized displays 
* **Ritualized displays** = displays that are unique to certain cultures and are unrecognizable to others
* These display rules are learned early in life and become automatic by adulthood
* Amplification vs. deamplification
* Neutralization vs. simulation
* Masking vs. qualification
* These are universal but may or may not be adopted

what is the display rule of **amplification**

**Amplification:** 

*  Emotional expression is more important than emotional experience 
* Whatever you’re experiencing you tend to express more than what you actually experience
* Emotional expression > emotional experience 

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**Deamplification:**

* Whatever you experience, you express it much less than what you experience 
* Emotional expression < emotional experience

What is the dispaly rule of **neutralization**

**Neutralization:** 

* Doesn’t matter what the emotional experience is, you turn your expression to 0
* Don’t express emotions (e.g. Poker Face)
* Emotional expression = 0 despite real emotion

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**Simulation:**

* Might not be experiencing an emotion, but you simulate an emotional expression
* Emotional expression is >0 but emotional experience is 0

what is the display rule of **masking**

**Masking:** 

* Emotional expression is not in sync with emotional experience 
* E.g. depressed people engage in a lot of masking
* Emotional expression =/= emotional experience 

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**Qualification:**

* Emotional expression is a combination of emotional experience and something else (often another emotion)
* Feeling conflicted/feeling multiple emotions
* Both emotions leak onto your face
* Nigawarai = uneasy smile given off (usually if you ask for permission for something that can’t give you permission for or for awkward situations) 
* Bottom part softens to compensate for top part which expresses negative emotions

what are some cultural differences in the different display rules

* “Control” display rules: rules used to reign in emotional expression 
* Deamplification, neutralization, masking, and qualification 
* More common in east asian, collectivist cultures 
* Amplification is more common in south american/individualism cultures
* Unless you are strongly expressing an emotion it isn’t as genuine

What is the evidence for variability of emotional lexicon

* Some languages have unique words for unique emotions 
* There is some debate as to whether this difference in the lexicon actually has impact for how we experience emotions 
* Does not having a word for an emotion affect our emotional experience? 
* **Sapir-whorf hypothesis (linguistic relativity)**
* Hard Version: if you don’t have a word for it, then you don’t experience it -> language determines how we think and our experience 
* This is not true
* Soft version: language affects how we think, but it isn’t deterministic 
* Language helps us think about and articulate ideas and experience 
* Without words it hinders our ability to remember/discuss experience 

What did the Gendron, Robertson, Van de Vyer and Barrett study in relation to the sapir-whorf hypothesis

Looked to members of the Himba ethnic group in Namibia and USA residents

* P’s were put in one of two conditions: Condition 1 was “anchored sort”, condition 2 was free sort
* Gave them a bunch of photos of people expressing different emotions:
* **Anchor**: sort into bins that are labeled with emotion terms
* **Free sort**: sort into 6 categories 
* Investigating whether the universality we saw earlier for these emotions was because they were cued to think about certain emotions
* Should see the highest universality in the anchored condition
* In the US Anchor condition:
* All Happy faces went into Happy, all fear went in fear, and all disgust went in disgust 
* Mostly neutral was placed in one bin with a little bit of anger
* Sadness was mixed with some anger and fear
* Overall it was mostly clear where went where
* In the US free sort:
* Happy all went to happy and fear went to fear 
* Neutral and disgust/sadness were very mixed
* Lack of reliability in sorting
* In the Himba Anchored” 
* Happy and fear are similarly distinct
* Everything else was mixed 
* In the Himba Free sort:
* Again, happy and fear distinct but everything else even more mixed 
* These results suggest there is some cultural universality with certain expressions but a lot of that is driven by preconceived notions about the facial expressions

What are the different types of theories of emotions

**Evolutionary Theories:** 

* Focused on universality -> similarities across cultures and species 
* Emotions are hardwired, automatic responses tied to the nervous system 
* Culture plays a minimal role in emotions
* Physiological changes are seen as antecedents to emotions, not consequences 
* James Lange theory of emotions

**Appraisal Theories:**

* Allows for universality in biological features that underlie emotions but there is cultural variability of evaluative processes
* Allows for individual variability in appraisals
* Culture plays an important role in emotional experience due to influences on appraisals  and interpretations

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also the newer **bicultural model of emotions**

what is the **bicultural model of emotions**

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* **Input** -> event happens and goes through an appraisal progress 
* This is where interpretation comes into play
* Interpreted event is what makes it into the core system
* **Core system**: internally, we have a core system in our mind that continuously scans for info to find patterns that match predetermined situations
* E.g. the loss of loved ones leads to sadness
* Something in the environment hits on predetermined patterns leads to…
* **Response tendencies** - your body gets ready to do something/express certain emotions
* Your body is getting ready to engage in autonomic responses 
* Both response tendencies and the core system/predetermined patterns contribute to subjective experience 
* Everything at this point is happening in your head
* Response tendencies go through display.feeling rules and come out!!
* E.g. (event)you are on a car that is falling off a bridge
* (appraisal) this is bad and fearful
* Core system preps facial expression and autonomic responses
* Leads to subjective experience of fear
* Also goes thought display rules which filter what we express

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what are the different components of emotion

* Aspects of emotion
* Type of emotion
* Emotional context
* The individual

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**Aspects of Emotion:**

* Intensity - highly intense emotions “flood” the system (not a huge role for culture)
* Regardless of cultural background if an emotion is intense it floods the system and does not allow culture to play a strong role

**Type of emotion:**

* Culturally based emotion or more basic?
* Lots of different types 
* Some are foundational for survival, some aren’t
* Culturally Based: outside the basic emotions
* Exist specifically in a particular cultural environment
* E.g. ame
* Rooted less in survival factors and are based more on socialization
* Subject to the influence of culture 

**Emotional Context:**

* Different cues in the environment for emotional expressions 
* Might go into a different environment and the cues might lead you to express certain emotions 
* What emotions are you supposed to engage in
* Presence of cues indicating appropriate emotional expressions
* Environment pushes you to do things in a certain way

**The Individual:**

* Cultural identification plays a role
* What extent does the individual identify with the cultural context/environment 
* Identifying strongly with your environment will have a big impact

what is **historical heterogeneity**

**historical heterogeneity** = the extent to which a modern country’s population came from migration from other countries in the last 500 years

* **Low Heterogeneity:** country’s present population is sources from its own country since 500 years ago or from very few countries
* E.g. Japan
* **High heterogeneity:** a country’s present day population is sourced from many countries over the last 500 years 
* E.g the UK

how does historical heterogeneity result in differences in emotional expressivity

**Low:** more certainty/more in common (certainty in customs, beliefs, intentions)

* More implicit understanding of each others thoughts
* Require less explicit info in communication
* Mutual understanding 
* High context cultures: cultures that rely more on contextual information to communicate than explicit info

**High Heterogeneity:** more uncertainty in communicating things/emotional states

* This hinders cooperation
* Need more explicit info because we can’t assume 
* Low context cultures: cultures that don’t rely on implicit info or context cues, need more explicit info

\n Role of historical heterogeneity - **adaptive over-expressivity**

* People from highly historically heterogeneous countries have more expressive facial expressions and body language
* They produce more recognizable emotional expressions even in people from other countries
* Explains emotional expressions beyond individualism and collectivism!!

what are the two kinds of happiness

**Hedonism: concerned with satisfaction, happiness, and subjective well-being**

* Most research studies this aspect of happiness

**Eudaimonia: from aristotle, means living a good life**

* Measured by meaning in life
* Rich in the sense of meaning, overarching purpose, feeling of mattering
* When we measure meaning of life compared to societal wealth/GDP the wealthier countries have lower meaning of life

Does dwelling on negative feelings produce negative outcomes?

* Cultures vary to the extent that people strive to enhance positive feelings and avoid negative feelings
* For North Americans, more positive feelings are associated with less depression and health problems
* For east asians, the amount of positive feelings and risk of depression and health problems is uncorrelated 
* Russians are famous for apparently wanting to wallow in their despair
* Russians and Americans were compared in terms of how much they tend to brood, how much they identified with a ruminating target in vignettes, and how depressed they were 
* Russians reported brooding more and they identified more with a ruminating target 
* Americans who ruminated were more depressed than those who didn’t
* There was no difference in depression levels between ruminating and non-ruminating Russians

what are the different ways to consider happiness

Sum total of all the happy feelings that you have experiences

* As you experience happiness, it adds up

How you retrospectively evaluate your happiness

* Research finds that it’s people’s retrospective evaluations of their happiness that guide their decisions in life more than their actual experiences  
* Colonoscopy study:
* Either had colonoscope removed quickly at the end (quickly ending their pain) or removed slowly (increasing total duration of pain but making it so that the pain slowly diminished)
* Patients who had the slow removal (with more total pain) viewed the procedure as overall less painful than those who had the quick removal 
* Another study was conducted with asian-american and euro-american ratings of their satisfaction to disentangle people’s experienced satisfaction and their retrospective satisfaction
* Given a palm pilot that would go off and they would rate satisfaction in the moment (evaluated how happy they are overall)
* Also rated their satisfaction retrospectively, describing their past week 
* There were no cultural differences in the actual daily reports of satisfaction
* There were big differences in retrospective reports: retrospective accounts are influenced largely by people’s theories of what they think their life is like 
* Euro-americans reported their overall/retrospective happiness as much higher therefore they are more likely to possess a theory that they are happy, even when their daily reports might not be

\n

What kind of happiness do people prefer?

* Cultures differ in the kinds of positive emotions that people want to pursue, “ideal affect”
* Cultural variation is more pronounced for the kinds of affect that people want to have than for their actual affect
* East asians prefer low arousal positive states (e.g. calm, relaxed) compared with north americans who prefer high arousal positive states (eg. excited)
* East asians prefer music with slower tempos, mor passive leisure activities, use more drugs that elicit calm states (heroin, opium), children's books have smaller smiles, self help books emphasize calmness, magazines contain more calm smiles
* Westerners prefer faster tempo music, more active activities, westerners use more that elicit excited states (cocaine, amphetamines), children’s books have bigger smiles, self help books encourage more high arousal positive states
* When kids from the two cultures are shown exciting or calm storybooks, they subsequently chose activities that were either exciting or calm -> the books seem to socialize kids into preferring different affective states

what is **ideal affect**

**ideal affect**

The kinds of feelings people desire, or emotions they want to have; they structure their lives in order to maximize the opportunities for experiencing them

Define sensation

**Sensation:** sensory signals reaching the detectors in our bodies, research our brain (e.g. light waves hitting the retina, sound waves hitting the eardrum)

Define perception

**Perception:** process by which the brain selects, organizes, and interprets the sensory info that it receives from the sense organs

Differentiate between sensation and perception

Sensory info is going on around us all the time but we don’t perceive all of it

* Our brain perceives only what we need/want to perceive
* There are things that drown out other sensory signals
* Also if we pay attention we ignore other things

We have an internal representation of what we think things look like but it isn’t 1:1 of what objectively is there 

* What matters is what we construe is happening 
* We interpret in the way we expect to see things (e.g. THE CHT)
* Our expectations impose upon our environment and influence how we will receive info and perceive the environment

how does visual perception differs across cultural environment

* Prior experience plays an important role in our perception -> cultural experience should matter too then 
* See lots of evidence from cultural differences in:
* susceptibility to illusions
* pictorial depth perception
* object vs. field focus

How do cultures differ in susceptibility to illusions

Optical illusions reflect different aspects of physical environment 

Differences in physical environment = differences in susceptibility 

* E.g the muller-lyer illusion and the carpenter world hypothesis 
* E.g. t**he horizontal-vertical illusion**
* Higher susceptibility for people who reside in open environments 
* Lots of sky but not crowded by buildings e.g. people who grow up on plains or suburbs tall things tend to be off in the distance
* **Foreshortening hypothesis:** horizontal line represents standpoint of the viewer and vertical line represents extending into the distance
* Assume the vertical will extend into the distance beyond what we can see (vertical line is being cut off before it should have ended)
* Not a proven hypothesis! 


* How we experience/see our physical world impacts our susceptibility to optical illusions 
* Our brian has to try and figure out how to interpret 2-D info into 3-D using various cues

What are the depth cues

* **Relative size of Objects**
* Objects in foreground are perceived as closer because they are bigger, we don’t perceive them as being taller than people in the background 
* **Object superimposition** 
* Idea that an object that is father will be obscured by an object that is closer
* **Vertical position**
* Objects higher on the visual field tend to be father away from us
* **A liberal perspective**
* There is a horizon line and when things are parallel, they go towards a vanishing point on the horizon
* A spectator is at a point at the bottom 
* Can be used to direct attention
* Also indicates depth!
* **A texture gradient**
* As we go from close to far we have less texture (things become courser) 
* E.g. expressions are clearer when they are closer 

How do cultures differ in pictorial depth perception

* Western education also trains children to be sensitive to depth cues 
* teaches kids how to draw prisms, houses etc. 
* E.g. 2 prong trident “impossible figure”
* Children who have been exposed to western education have more difficulty interpreting it and recreating it 
* It takes a lot more time to copy the figure 
* If people are less sensitive to depth cues, it is just a series of lines

Differences across cultural environments are not just seen in isolated examples! 

* We see different perspectives in art from different places
* Difference in producing perspective on a 2D medium
* One point perspective (in-perspective) 
* “True perspective”
* Historically we haven’t always drawn like this  -> it’s a mathematical invention 
* Drawing things in perspective means the author has to preserve the relative size of objects
* Oblique perspective (not in perspective)
* Perspective of a set of eyes from the sky looking down on everything 
* Flattens things
* No convergence/vanishing point 
* Focus on everything, no directed attention
* Japanese artistic tradition changed in the 18th century - some linear perspective
* Why? European powers began asserting influence over Japan, introduction of european art through cultural exchange
* Horizons are also something that differ in art (will come back to!)

How do cultures differ on object vs field focus

* Focus on “object” vs “field”
* People from different cultural environments tend to differ on focusing on focal object vs. the field around the focal event 
* E.g. the rod and frame task
* Holistic or analytical thinking style

What is a **holistic thinking style**

**Holistic Thinking:** perceive scenes and situations as an integrated whole, paying more attention to the context

* Field dependence: tendency to attend to the context that surrounds focal object and relationships among objects in the environment  
* When you look at a scene you don’t focus on the focal object but rather the environment that surrounds it
* More common for collectivistic cultures and interdependent self construal 

what is an **analytical thinking style**

**Analytical thinking:** perceive objects focusing on specific elements rather than contexts and use fixed abstract rules to explain and predict behavior

* Thinking about a situation as a function of the specific objects that make it up  
* Field independence: tendency to separate focal object from its environment and attend to attributes to the focal object 
* When looking at a scene will separate the objects from each other and the environment 
* More common in individualism and independent self construal

How are thinking styles reflected in art

Matsuda et. al (2008)

* Compared the styles of horizons across the world 
* Horizons for european/western art were quite low
* For east asian paintings and south/central asia, the horizons were placed a lot higher 
* Tried to replicate this beyond artists
* Asked uni students to draw a picture that included a house and different elements
* Japanese and western students
* Japanese students included a lot more elements in their scene beyond what they were asked to
* Horizons are still lower in euro-canadian drawings
* Differences weren’t as reliable when compared to the professional art 
* Artists are “cultural masters” 
* A significant difference was still found

Portraits:

* Area of face as a focal object - European art has a lot more face in the frame
* european/western takes up much more face space than east Asian portraits

\n

What is the significance of this?

* Higher horizons, broader portraits = more space to show relations and connects between more objects 
* More indicative of holistic thinkers

how thinking style affects three different cognitive processes

Difference between holistic and analytical thinking styles also emerges in 3 different domains:

* attribution
* categorization
* dialecticism

what is **attribution**

**Attribution:** 

* Analytical thinking style:
* Emphasis on internal, dispositional attributions
* Holistic thinking style: 
* More focus on external, contextual information, making situational attributions
* **Fundamental attribution error** 
* Tendency to put too much focus on someone’s internal dispositions as attributions for one’s behavior, underestimating the impact of external/contextual factors
* Despite explicit external constraints!
* Associated with analytical thinking style 
* Called fundamental because it was first identified in north american studies and was assumed to be universal but!! People in different cultures engage in this in different ways 
* To study, compare US to india across different age groups
* Given a scenario, come up with different attributions for their behavior (dispositional or external)
* As US p’s get older, they engage in more dispositional attribution and less situational 
* In india, p’s made mostly situational attributions, as they got older they became more pronounced 
* This indicates that socialization is a driving force of this error 

what is **categorization**

**Categorization:** what kind of logic do we use?

* Analytic thinking style - focus on internal traits and dispositions
* Leads to tendency to categorize objects based on common traits 
* Holistic thinking style - focus on relationships between objects
* Leads to tenancy to categorize objects based on their connections and relationships
* To study: give 3 options and have to group which 2 go together and articulate why
* E.g. man woman baby
* Analytic put man and woman together because they are both adults
* This is more characteristic of children from the US
* Group based on shared characteristics
* Holistic thinking style
* Group woman and baby because the mom takes care of the child
* More characteristic of children from china and many indigenous groups 
* Grouped based on relationships 

what is **dialectacism**

**Dialecticism:** thinking style affects how we see the world and how we see relationships in the world 

* Affects perceptions of patterns and relationships in the world
* How tolerant people are of contradiction 
* European:no tolerance for contradiction:  historical laws of thought
* **Law of identity**; whatever it is it is, a thing is it’s attributes 
* X = X 
* **Law of noncontradiction**: nothing can both be and not be
* If you have two contradictory statements one must be false 
* If x > y then x

Differentiate between knowledge gap, desirability gap, and action gap

**Knowledge gap:** what we think we have vs. what we actually have

**Desirability gap:** what we think is right vs. what we actually have 

**Action gap:** how do we take things and actually take action

what is **Income inequality**

uneven distribution of income within a population 

what is **wealth inequality**

uneven distribution of assets within a population (e.g. income, property, cars etc.)

how is economic inequality tied to authoritarianism

Economic inequality is tied to political inequality

* **Authoritarianism** = obedience to authority figures
* Obedience is important generally
* Authorities deserve respect
* Bosses should be obeyed
* Increased income inequality, increased power differential in society, increased experience with power difference, increased acceptance and perceived naturalness 
* Acceptance of authoritarianism has implications for political activism
* More acceptance of authoritarianism is associated with increased fatalism about one’s situation in terms of politics (whatever happens happens and i can’t change that)
* Leads to lower political engagement (lower interest, discussion, and participation in elections)
* This in turn leads to political inequality 

how is SES associated with people’s psychology

Differences in SES -> differences in behavior and psychological tendencies 

* Higher SES is associated with:
* Independent self construal
* More dispositional attributions
* Higher sense of personal control
* Engage in more unethical behavior
* Lower SES is associated with:
* Interdependent self-construal
* Situational attributions
* Empathy and helping behavior 
* Donate larger portion of wealth to others
* Lower engagement with educational and occupational opportunities and are less likely to benefit from them because they are made aware they don’t belong there 
* More likely to engage in behavior that are perceived to exacerbate the situation
* This is a framing issue!
* They are more present oriented, more pessimistic when thinking about the future, higher risk of external mortality risk 
* Greater impulsivity - behaviors that are immediately beneficial