Competition: A Cultural Imperative?

Competition represents a prevalent behavioral mode within American society that has serious implications for members of the helping professions. Suggestions for action are proposed.     

Children’s Judgments of Cultural Expertise: The Influence of Cultural Status and Learning Method

The authors investigated children’s use of cultural status (i.e., foreign vs. American) and learning method to evaluate informants’ expertise in novel cultural practices. Ninety-six 6- to 9-year-olds heard about a foreign informant (i.e., member of an unfamiliar out-group) and an American informant (i.e., member of the participant’s in-group) who each learned about a novel cultural practice differently (i.e., from a person vs. from a book). Participants decided which informant executed the cultural practice better, which informant they would prefer to learn from, and which learning method they would want to use themselves (i.e., learning method preference). Overall, participants endorsed foreign informants over American informants and foreign informants who learned from a person were generally viewed as the preferred option for imparting information in this context. These findings suggest that during the transition to middle childhood, learning context is an important influence on children’s evaluations of cultural identity and learning methods.     

Cultural modulations of space–time compatibility effects

The representation of elapsing time may require spatial attention. In certain circumstances, this spatial representation develops from left to right. This is suggested by a performance advantage in responding short with the left hand and long with the right hand (spatial–temporal association between response codes [STEARC]). The present study tests whether one possible determinant of the directionality of the STEARC effect is cultural. In particular, we investigated whether reading/writing habits can affect STEARC direction by administering a visual time judgment task to Italian participants, who were exposed to a left-to-right reading/writing system, and Israeli participants, who mainly used a right-to-left system. The Italian participants showed a left-to-right STEARC effect, while this effect was not present in the Israeli group. The study demonstrates that cultural habits can influence the way in which spatial attention supports the representation of time, similar to the pattern found in other nonspatial domains such as numbers.     

Mexican American Adolescents’ Cultural Orientation, Externalizing Behavior and Academic Engagement: The Role of Traditional Cultural Values

This study of 598 7th grade students of Mexican origin examined the role of traditional cultural values as a mediator of the effects of immigrant status, Mexican cultural orientation and Anglo cultural orientation on adolescent externalizing behavior and academic engagement. Immigrant status of adolescents and their maternal caregivers uniquely predicted increased Mexican cultural orientation and decreased Anglo cultural orientation, and both Mexican and Anglo cultural orientation related positively to adolescents’ endorsement of traditional cultural values. Endorsement of traditional cultural values related, in turn, to decreased externalizing behaviors and increased academic engagement and these findings were replicated across adolescent and teacher report of these two outcomes. Tests of mediation provided further evidence to support these pathways. Findings support the central importance of traditional cultural values as a protective resource that explains why immigrant youth exhibit fewer externalizing problems and increased academic engagement when compared to their second and third generation peers.     

Cultural safety: towards postcolonial counselling practice?

ABSTRACT

This article examines the discursive production of counsellor identity and practice through the operations of colonising and postcolonial discourse in Aotearoa New Zealand. It argues that constructs of cultural safety, tino rangatiratanga and Māori sovereignty, which arose as part of the postcolonial politics of life in Aotearoa, have achieved discursive status and both enable and restrain counsellor practice. This argument is informed by research that explored the discursive production of Pākehā counsellors' practice with non-Pākehā clients.     

Comment on “Nudges and Cultural Variance”

In this brief commentary, I suggest Selinger and Whyte are essentially correct in their criticism of the Nudge approach advocated by Thaler and Sunstein. I use some examples from road behavior and traffic planning to amplify the criticism that the simple behavioral economics approach fails to take account of the embedding of humans and technology in the wider social and cultural context.     

Should Universalism Trump Cultural Relativism in Counseling?

Certain cultural customs and practices are viewed as abhorrent by many people, yet contemporary American counselors rarely criticize any specific culture. In this article, the authors explore why counselors abstain from such criticism. Furthermore, the authors demonstrate that universalism, often regarded as a politically incorrect and an academically archaic philosophy, is manifestly prevalent within the world's religious and political realms, as well as within the counseling profession. The authors assert that universalism should be prevalent within the counseling profession and that it can be integrated with multicultural principles. Finally, the authors suggest a procedure for identifying universal principles and practices.     

Cross‐Cultural Examination of the Tripartite Model in Adults

Abstract

Operant conditioning was applied to a total of 32 female anorexia nervosa patients in order to restore their normal weight. A comparative study was carried out on two groups of 16 patients each, who were treated with two different therapeutic procedures. The group having informational feedback, more flexible contacts with their family and a special psychomotor program (Group B), achieved a greater rate of weight gain compared to the other group (Group A), with an average of 1.75 versus 1.30 per week. The differences in weight evolution and problems during treatment are discussed. The fact that the study only is a short-term one concerning a limited aspect of the treatment of anorexia nervosa, and also the need for further follow-up research is strongly emphasized.     

“Emperor Hundun 渾沌”: A Cultural Hermeneutic

Among the four reading-levels, the textual and exegetical levels of Zhuangzi’s Hundun-story are problem-free, and so we focus expository-wise on its conspicuous hospitality (not fighting as other myths) with nine implications. Then, hermeneutically, we see Hundun instructing us against clarity toward unclarity—cosmological, self-composing, cognitive, and communal—of kindly humus, in cosmic confusion, sleep and idleness, mist and pond-dragonfly, and non-ruling people-sovereignty. Pan-hospitality is our Emperor Hundun’s non-arbitrary imperative to nurture life.     

Cultural Differences in Belief Bias Associated with Deductive Reasoning?

Norenzayan, Smith, Jun Kim, and Nisbett (2002) investigated cultural differences in the use of intuitive versus formal reasoning in 4 experiments. Our comment concerns the 4th experiment where Norenzayan et al. reported that, although there were no cultural differences in accuracy on abstract logical arguments, Koreans made more errors than U.S. undergraduates in judging the logical validity of concrete arguments. Norenzayan et al. concluded that Koreans are less likely than European Americans to decontextualize an argument's content from its logical structure, as Koreans were more likely to consider the believability of the conclusion when assessing an argument's validity (a belief bias). Notably, Korean participants were more conservative (less likely to say an argument is valid) than European American participants when assessing arguments. An analysis of the average of the hit and correct rejection rates in each of the conditions (abstract, concrete–believable, concrete–nonbelievable) revealed that, contrary to conclusions of Norenzayan et al., European Americans were no better than Koreans at determining the validity of concrete deductive arguments with conclusions varying in believability.     

Was he happy? Cultural difference in conceptions of Jesus

In two studies, we examined whether (a) conceptions of Jesus would differ between Koreans and Americans, and whether (b) national differences in self-reported personality and well-being are mediated by the cultural norm for personality and well-being. Because there is only one Jesus, different conceptions held by Koreans and Americans are likely to reflect cultural construction processes. In Study 1, we asked Korean and American participants to engage in a free association task with Jesus as a target. Americans associated Jesus with primarily positive connotations (“awesome”) and rarely with negative connotations (“pain”), whereas Koreans associated Jesus with both positive and negative connotations. In Study 2, we asked Korean and American participants to rate Jesus and themselves using personality and well-being scales. Americans rated both Jesus and themselves as more extraverted, agreeable, conscientious, open, and happier than did Koreans. Most important, national differences in self-reported agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness, and happiness were partially mediated by conceptions of Jesus.     

Cultural Dysthymia: An Unrecognized Disorder Among African Americans?

Many African Americans experience low‐grade depression, referred to as dysthymia in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed., text rev.; American Psychiatric Association, 2000). After more than 250 years of enslavement, prejudice, and discrimination, dysthymia is reflected in chronic low‐grade sadness, anger, hostility, aggression, self‐hatred, hopelessness, and self‐destructive behaviors. To avoid misdiagnosis, counselors need to understand how cultural factors can elicit a collective psychological condition in an oppressed group. Muchos Afroamericanos experimentan depresión leve, llamada distimia en el Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4a ed., texto rev.; American Psychiatric Association, 2000). Después de más de 250 años de esclavitud, prejuicio y discriminación, la distimia se refleja como tristeza crónica leve, ira, hostilidad, agresividad, odio a uno mismo, desesperanza y comportamientos autodestructivos. Para evitar un diagnóstico erróneo, los consejeros deben comprender cómo los factores culturales pueden acarrear una condición psicológica colectiva en un grupo oprimido.     

Visiting the Ruins of Detroit: Exploitation or Cultural Tourism?

Are Detroit ruin tours a form of morally permissible cultural tourism, or do these tours amount to a form of exploitation? To answer this question I compare Detroit ruin tours with ‘slum tours’ – guided tours of slums in the world's major cities. I argue that exploitation of the sort we find in slum tourism also exists, to a lesser extent, in Detroit ruin tours. To show this I detail two different accounts of exploitation and argue that Ruth Sample's account best captures what is most morally problematic with slum tours and ruin tours. I then identify the similarities and differences between slum tours and ruin tours, and provide suggestions for how ruin tours could be retooled to avoid some (but not all) of the worries of exploitation. Finally, I suggest that with the proper framing Detroiters could embrace photographic tours as a new form of cultural tourism.     

On ‘Doing’ Memory and Self in Different Cultural Contexts

After a brief and pointed recapitulation of the main issues of Demuth, Chaudhary and Keller’s article, Memories of me. Comparisons from Osnabrück (Germany) and Delhi (India) students and their mothers (doi:), alternative or complementary approaches to the investigation of ‘doing’ memory and self in different cultural contexts are outlined in a sketch of three interrelated proposals. These proposals turn around a) ‘contemporaneousness of the non-contemporaneous’ (Gleichzeitigkeit des Ungleichzeitigen) and the analysis of ‘cultural hybrids’, b) ‘indigenous concepts of memory and self’ and c) ‘memory and self in actual cultural practice’.