Adolescent and adult reasoning about gender roles and fairness in Benin,West Africa

This study examined reasoning about gender roles in a traditional society in Benin, West Africa. Ninety-seven male and female adolescents and adults evaluated conflicts between a husband and a wife over gender norms to determine whether gender norms, are judged to be moral or conventional. Although most attributed decision-making power to the husband, justifications and evaluations that supported challenges to traditional gender roles indicate that social roles were seen as alterable conventions. In addition, concerns with punishment of one spouse were associated with endorsing the other spouse as decision-maker, indicating that endorsements of authority may be coerced. Very few age differences were found, indicating that adults are not more enculturated into an acceptance of hierarchy than adolescents. However, adults were more likely than adolescents to perceive coercion.     

Well-being, Happiness and Why Relationships Matter: Evidence from Bangladesh

Although Bangladesh is known as one of the poorest and most densely populated countries in the world, qualitative research and anecdotal evidence suggests its people report levels of happiness that are higher than those found in many other countries. This includes ‘developed’ countries where people have larger per capita incomes and can access a wider range of public services and goods. The paper explores this apparent paradox by analysing primary quantitative and qualitative data, and engaging with existing literature on happiness and objective wellbeing in Bangladesh. The data and analysis presented makes an original and timely contribution to the limited knowledge we have of the construction and experience of happiness and life satisfaction in contexts of extreme and persistent economic poverty. It identifies and offers insights into the ‘personal’ as well as social or ‘relational’ values and goals that people in Bangladesh consider important to achieve happiness in life. It also reflects on how different people experience these values and goals in very different ways. This, we argue, leads to a better understanding of the influence of the social and cultural context in the construction of people’s happiness. In the conclusion, we reflect on the policy implications of our findings.

Sexual ethics, marriage, and sexual autonomy: the landscapes for Muslimat and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered Muslims

Muslims today are increasingly re-examining gender and human rights in the light of Qur’anic teachings, and these issues crucially intersect in the terrain of sexual autonomy. The Qur’an insists that men and women are spiritually equal, yet dominant interpretations of sexual rights in Islam are not gender symmetrical. This paper asks whether Islam’s depiction of sexuality and marriage allows a space for female, and non-heterosexual, sexual autonomy. It also explores current interpretations of Islam, sexuality and same-sex relationships amongst British Muslims who identify as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered. Large issues are at stake for contemporary Muslims re-examining their institutions and identity. Does marriage remain authoritative when paradigms of sexuality shift, and what does this mean for sexual autonomy in the wider Muslim consciousness?     

The Unnatural Nature of Nature and Nurture: Questioning the Romantic Heritage

From a cultural-historical perspective, nature and nurture (and thus education) are contested concepts. The paper focuses on the nature/nurture debate in the work of William Shakespeare (influenced by Montaigne) and in the Romantic tradition (evidenced by Rousseau and Wordsworth), and argues that while our Romantic inheritance (still highly influential in education) problematises nurture, it tends to mystify nature. Given that conceptions of nature are culturally driven, there is an urgent educational challenge to problematise nature as well as nurture.

Gendered Power in Cultural Contexts: Part III. Couple Relationships in Iran

Sometimes therapists assume that gender equality is not relevant when working with couples from traditional cultures. This study of couples in Iran suggests more complexity. The authors identify a variety of views and practices regarding equality between men and women in relationships. Some aspired to traditional roles; others attempted to create mutually supportive relationships. Yet others were somewhere in-between. This study helps identify important dimensions that may be overlooked when we define couple equality only by American standards or understand it only through a Western lens. The study provides insight into the dilemmas couples face when ideals of equality intersect with societal structures that maintain gendered power and offers suggestions for addressing gender when working with couples with traditional cultural backgrounds.     

Gendered Power in Cultural Contexts: Part I. Immigrant Couples

Immigration is a world-wide phenomenon and practitioners are increasingly called on to work with issues related to it. The authors examine the experience of couples who are immigrants to the United States in regard to gender and power issues. Although the study limited participation to one religious group in order to hold that aspect of culture and gender attitudes constant, the experiences of these couples help to make visible the link between microlevel couple interaction and larger social processes. The results show how the couples manage a delicate balance between the push for gender change and avoiding too much conflict as male power is challenged.     

Development of the other-race effect during infancy: Evidence toward universality?

The other-race effect in face processing develops within the first year of life in Caucasian infants. It is currently unknown whether the developmental trajectory observed in Caucasian infants can be extended to other cultures. This is an important issue to investigate because recent findings from cross-cultural psychology have suggested that individuals from Eastern and Western backgrounds tend to perceive the world in fundamentally different ways. To this end, the current study investigated 3-, 6-, and 9-month-old Chinese infants’ ability to discriminate faces within their own racial group and within two other racial groups (African and Caucasian). The 3-month-olds demonstrated recognition in all conditions, whereas the 6-month-olds recognized Chinese faces and displayed marginal recognition for Caucasian faces but did not recognize African faces. The 9-month-olds’ recognition was limited to Chinese faces. This pattern of development is consistent with the perceptual narrowing hypothesis that our perceptual systems are shaped by experience to be optimally sensitive to stimuli most commonly encountered in one’s unique cultural environment.     

Community, Culture and Sustainability in Multilevel Dynamic Systems Intervention Science

This paper addresses intertwined issues in the conceptualization, implementation and evaluation of multilevel dynamic systems intervention science (MDSIS). Interventions are systematically planned, conducted and evaluated social science-based cultural products intercepting the lives of people and institutions in the context of multiple additional events and processes (which also may be referred to as interventions) that may speed, slow or reduce change towards a desired outcome. Multilevel interventions address change efforts at multiple social levels in the hope that effects at each level will forge synergistic links, facilitating movement toward desired change. This paper utilizes an ecological framework that identifies macro (policy and regulatory institutions), meso (organizations and agencies with resources, and power) and micro (individuals, families and friends living in communities) interacting directly and indirectly. An MDSIS approach hypothesizes that change toward a goal will occur faster and more effectively when synchronized and supported across levels in a social system. MDSIS approaches by definition involve “whole” communities and cannot be implemented without the establishments of working community partnerships This paper takes a dynamic systems approach to science as conducted in communities, and discusses four concepts that are central to MDSIS—science, community, culture, and sustainability. These concepts are important in community based participatory research and to the targeting, refinement, and adaptation of enduring interventions. Consistency in their meaning and use can promote forward movement in the field of MDSIS, and in community-based prevention science.     

Adolescent suicide, gender, and culture: A rate and risk factor analysis

The current paper provides a comprehensive research review of gender differences in rates of and risk factors for adolescent suicidal behavior in four main U.S cultural subgroups: African Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and Latino Americans. The paper highlights substantial findings from the most recent literature and provides direction for future research and clinical work. The data presented suggest that clinicians and interventionists relying on nonfatal expressions of suicide will continue to fail to identify adolescent males at risk for suicide, as females are more likely to report suicide ideation and attempts across all cultural groups reviewed. We conclude that researchers and clinicians should utilize indirect, broad measures of suicide proneness, as opposed to the traditional direct self-report tools. Although past research has examined cultural and gender differences in risk factors for suicidal behavior, these investigations have been primarily isolated from each other. Therefore, we sought to examine adolescent suicidal behavior and how it operates as a function of both gender and culture.     

Costs and benefits of cultural value mismatch in the globalising era: A commentary on the special issue “cross-cultural value mismatch: A by-product of migration and population diversity around the world” (IJP,December, 2018)

In this commentary, the author first seeks to counterbalance the current focus on the cost of cultural value mismatch by calling attention to ample evidence in the literature that value mismatch can produce cultural adaptation and resilience in the long run, besides promoting cultural innovations and individual creativity. Second, we propose three factors that differentiate the benefits from the costs of cultural value mismatch. Personal orientation towards integrating heritage and host culture, accurate perception of cultural value differences, and supportive multicultural environments are associated with benefits. In contrast, dichotomous orientation towards one or the other culture, exaggeration of value differences between heritage and host culture, and assimilationist social environments are associated with costs. Third, our analysis of the decoupling between cultural values and ecological niches in the special issue led to observation of bidirectionality in cultural value mismatch: Whereas most articles in the Special Issue focus on the cross-cultural value mismatch that occurs when people move from a more rural, low-resource, less technological ecology into a more urban, high-resource, more technological ecology, we were able to document the effects of value mismatch when movement occurs in the opposite direction.