PSYC 307 CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY CHAPTER 1: A PSYCHOLOGY FOR A CULTURAL SPECIES - We have populated more parts of the world, in more diverse environments, using a broader range of subsistence systems and social arrangements, than any other species. - Humans have culture, and it is this reliance that has enabled us to succeed in such diverse environments. - People from different cultures live their lives differently; they speak other languages, have certain customs, eat different foods, have other religious beliefs and child-rearing practices, and so on. - Psychological processes are shaped by experiences. - People from all cultures share the same abilities and limitations of the universal human brain. What is culture? - Culture is any kind of information that is acquired from other members of one's species through social learning that can influence an individual's behaviors. o Culture is any kind of idea, belief, technology, habit, or practice that is acquired through learning from others. - A culture is a group of people who are existing within some kind of shared context. People within a given culture are exposed to many of the same cultural ideas. - "Western Culture" to refer to people participating in cultures that stem from countries clustered in northwestern Europe and societies descendant from theses countries like Canada, US, Australia. - Challenges - Cultural boundaries are thus not distinct. - Urban culture, LGBTQ culture, Trekkie culture. What makes these groups arguably qualify as "cultures" is that their members exist within a shared context, communicate with each other, have some norms that distinguish them from other groups, and have some common practices and ideas. - Cultures change over time. Some shared cultural information disappears as new habits replace the old. - Most important challenge is the variability among individuals who belong to the same culture: o Look at nationality as a rough indicator of culture. o They are dynamic and ever changing o Each person inherits a distinct temperament. o Each person belongs to a unique collection of various social groups, each with its own distinctive culture. o Each person has a unique history of individual experiences. - Individual differences- Westerners are more emotionally expressive than East Asians, on average, people from Western cultures score higher on some measure of emotional expressiveness than people from East Asian cultures. o Cultural membership does not determine individual responses. o "culture" refers to a dynamic group of people who share a similar context, are exposed to many similar cultural messages, and contain a broad range of different individuals who are affected by those cultural messages in various ways.
PSYC 307 CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY Psychological Processes Can Vary Across Cultures - One striking way that people's psychology differs between cultures is sense of humour. What is funny in some cultures might not be seen as that funny in others. - These kinds of readily observable cultural differences in preferences are common ways to think about cultural variation: People from other cultures are different because they like other kinds of jokes,