Going native
Is the Romantic–Sexual Kiss a Near Human Universal?
William Jankowiak, Shelly Volsche & Justin Garcia
American Anthropologist, forthcoming
Abstract:
Scholars from a wide range of human social and behavioral sciences have become interested in the romantic–sexual kiss. This research, and its public dissemination, often includes statements about the ubiquity of kissing, particularly romantic–sexual kissing, across cultures. Yet, to date there is no evidence to support or reject this claim. Employing standard cross-cultural methods, this research report is the first attempt to use a large sample set (eHRAF World Cultures, SCCS, and a selective ethnographer survey) to document the presence or absence of the romantic–sexual kiss (n = 168 cultures). We defined romantic–sexual kissing as lip-to-lip contact that may or may not be prolonged. Despite frequent depictions of kissing in a wide range of material culture, we found no evidence that the romantic–sexual kiss is a human universal or even a near universal. The romantic–sexual kiss was present in a minority of cultures sampled (46%). Moreover, there is a strong correlation between the frequency of the romantic–sexual kiss and a society's relative social complexity: the more socially complex the culture, the higher frequency of romantic–sexual kissing.
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Culture and Suicide Acceptability: A Cross-National, Multilevel Analysis
Steven Stack & Augustine Kposowa
Sociological Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
Cultural perspectives on suicidality have been largely marked by work explaining variability in suicide acceptability in the United States using structural variables including marital status and demographics, and limited symbolic or values orientations such as feminism, political liberalism, and civil liberties. The present article applies recent developments in comparative cultural sociology to the problem of suicidality. The central hypothesis is that cultural approval of suicide is related to a general cultural axis of nations (self-expressionism) encompassing several values orientations such as tolerance and post-materialism. Data are from Wave 4 of the World Values Surveys and refer to 53,275 individuals nested in 56 nations. Controls are incorporated from previous studies and include structural and demographic constructs. A hierarchical linear regression model determined that the degree of individual-level adherence to the values of self-expressionism predicted suicide acceptability (SA), independent of controls including ones interpretable from Durkheimian perspectives. Furthermore, persons high in individual-level self-expressionism nested in like-minded nations were relatively high in SA. The analysis of the subject is expanded to 56 nations representing all major culture zones and varied levels of economic/political development. It determined that SA is shaped by a new, broad cultural construct, self-expressionism whose impact is independent of Durkheimian familial and religious integration.
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Immorality East and West: Are Immoral Behaviors Especially Harmful, or Especially Uncivilized?
Emma Buchtel et al.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
What makes some acts immoral? Although Western theories of morality often define harmful behaviors as centrally immoral, whether this is applicable to other cultures is still under debate. In particular, Confucianism emphasizes civility as fundamental to moral excellence. We describe three studies examining how the word immoral is used by Chinese and Westerners. Layperson-generated examples were used to examine cultural differences in which behaviors are called “immoral” (Study 1, n = 609; Study 2, n = 480), and whether “immoral” behaviors were best characterized as particularly harmful versus uncivilized (Study 3, N = 443). Results suggest that Chinese were more likely to use the word immoral for behaviors that were uncivilized, rather than exceptionally harmful, whereas Westerners were more likely to link immorality tightly to harm. More research into lay concepts of morality is needed to inform theories of moral cognition and improve understanding of human conceptualizations of social norms.
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Modern Attitudes Toward Older Adults in the Aging World: A Cross-Cultural Meta-Analysis
Michael North & Susan Fiske
Psychological Bulletin, September 2015, Pages 993-1021
Abstract:
Prevailing beliefs suggest that Eastern cultures hold older adults in higher esteem than Western cultures do, due to stronger collectivist traditions of filial piety. However, in modern, industrialized societies, the strain presented by dramatic rises in population aging potentially threatens traditional cultural expectations. Addressing these competing hypotheses, a literature search located 37 eligible papers, comprising samples from 23 countries and 21,093 total participants, directly comparing Easterners and Westerners (as classified per U.N. conventions) in their attitudes toward aging and the aged. Contradicting conventional wisdom, a random-effects meta-analysis on these articles found such evaluations to be more negative in the East overall (standardized mean difference = −0.31). High heterogeneity in study comparisons suggested the presence of moderators; indeed, geographical region emerged as a significant moderating factor, with the strongest levels of senior derogation emerging in East Asia (compared with South and Southeast Asia) and non-Anglophone Europe (compared with North American and Anglophone Western regions). At the country level, multiple-moderator meta-regression analysis confirmed recent rises in population aging to significantly predict negative elder attitudes, controlling for industrialization per se over the same time period. Unexpectedly, these analyses also found that cultural individualism significantly predicted relative positivity — suggesting that, for generating elder respect within rapidly aging societies, collectivist traditions may backfire. The findings suggest the importance of demographic challenges in shaping modern attitudes toward elders — presenting considerations for future research in ageism, cross-cultural psychology, and even economic development, as societies across the globe accommodate unprecedented numbers of older citizens.
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Gunnar Norrman & Emanuel Bylund
Developmental Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
The question of a sensitive period in language acquisition has been subject to extensive research and debate for more than half a century. While it has been well established that the ability to learn new languages declines in early years, the extent to which this outcome depends on biological maturation in contrast to previously acquired knowledge remains disputed. In the present study, we addressed this question by examining phonetic discriminatory abilities in early second language (L2) speakers of Swedish, who had either maintained their first language (L1) (immigrants) or had lost it (international adoptees), using native speaker controls. Through this design, we sought to disentangle the effects of the maturational state of the learner on L2 development from the effects of L1 interference: if additional language development is indeed constrained by an interfering L1, then adoptees should outperform immigrant speakers. The results of an auditory lexical decision task, in which fine vowel distinctions in Swedish had been modified, showed, however, no difference between the L2 groups. Instead, both L2 groups scored significantly lower than the native speaker group. The three groups did not differ in their ability to discriminate non-modified words. These findings demonstrate that L1 loss is not a crucial condition for successfully acquiring an L2, which in turn is taken as support for a maturational constraints view on L2 acquisition.
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Historical Legacies of Interethnic Competition: Anti-Semitism and the EU Referendum in Poland
Volha Charnysh
Comparative Political Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
How do historical legacies shape contemporary political outcomes? The article proposes a novel attitudinal mechanism through which distant interethnic competition can influence political preferences in the present. It theorizes that historically conditioned predispositions at the local level can moderate the effects of national-level framing of a policy issue. Using Poland as a test case, I show that subnational variation in support for EU accession was influenced by populist claims about the increase in Jewish influence in the postaccession period. Anti-Semitic cues resonated with voters in areas with historically large Jewish populations and a contentious interethnic past, where latent anti-Semitism persisted throughout the communist period. To provide evidence for this argument, the article draws on rich historical and contemporary data at the county, town, and individual level of analysis and utilizes novel research methods.
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Changes in Chinese Culture as Examined Through Changes in Personal Pronoun Usage
Takeshi Hamamura & Yi Xu
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, August 2015, Pages 930-941
Abstract:
For the last several decades, Chinese society has experienced transformative changes in its social ecology. Is Chinese culture more individualistic today as a result? The current research examined this question by cross-temporally examining the usage of Chinese personal pronouns associated with individualism–collectivism. A Chinese corpus encompassing the period from 1950 to 2008 was analyzed using the Google Ngram Viewer. Cross-temporal changes in the usages of personal pronouns conceptually associated with individualism–collectivism were non-linear and highly similar to the patterns found for pronouns and non-pronoun words unassociated with individualism–collectivism. Follow-up analyses that disentangled these patterns indicated an increasing usage of individualistic pronouns and a decreasing usage of collectivistic pronouns in recent decades.
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William Tsai, Jessica Chiang & Anna Lau
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Extant research shows that individuals can reflect either adaptively or maladaptively over negative experiences. However, few studies have examined how culture influences this process. We examined the effects of self-enhancement and self-improvement reflection on emotional and physiological recovery from a laboratory social stressor among 56 Asian Americans (interdependent cultural group) and 58 European Americans (independent cultural group). The extent to which people gained emotional and physiological benefits from self-reflection depended on whether the self-reflection processes were congruent with individuals’ heritage cultural backgrounds. When there was a cultural match, participants showed improved emotional recovery, quicker return to baseline levels of cortisol, and greater persistence following the stressor. These findings provide evidence suggesting culturally distinct processes through which individuals recover from negative experiences.
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Matthew Makel et al.
Gifted Child Quarterly, July 2015, Pages 177-189
Abstract:
Despite growing concern about the need to develop talent across the globe, relatively little empirical research has examined how students develop their academic talents. Toward this end, the current study explored how academically talented students from the United States and India spend their time both in and out of school. Indian students reported spending roughly 11 more hours on academics than their U.S. peers during the weekend in both STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) and non-STEM topics. U.S. students reported spending about 5.4 more hours than their Indian peers on non-STEM academics during the week, leaving an approximately 7-hour-a-week academic gap between U.S. and Indian students. Additionally, U.S. students reported using electronics over 14 hours per week more than their Indian peers. Indian students also reported having control over a greater proportion of their time during the week than U.S. students did. Generally, there were far more cross-cultural differences than gender differences. These results inform discussions on how academically talented students develop within educational systems as well as what each culture supports in and out of school.
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Shu-wen Wang & Anna Lau
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, August 2015, Pages 916-929
Abstract:
Social support seeking is not uniformly beneficial for different cultural groups, and in fact, is experienced as less helpful and more distressing for Asians and Asian Americans compared with European Americans. However, relationship factors that may attenuate this cross-cultural difference are little understood. We examined the effects of mutual (i.e., interdependent) and non-mutual support on psychological, biological, and behavioral stress responses to support seeking using a laboratory stressor paradigm. Findings show that across all three distress indicators, East Asian Americans were more benefited when they construed support as mutual versus non-mutual, whereas European Americans’ response did not differ by support condition. Furthermore, the data support previous research showing that Asian Americans are more likely to seek support from discretionary (i.e., peers) than obligatory ties (i.e., parents). Our discussion addresses cultural differences in the priority placed on mutuality, interdependence, and harmony in relationships, and their implications for how people construe their relationships. Future areas for research are discussed.