Cult and Emotions (Psych 4700) Flashcards
Cultural construction of emotion introduction
Emotions vary across contexts
Frequency & intensity (e.g., anger) contents/ connotations (e.g., happiness); patterns of emotional responses (own compatible with group)
Experiencing normative emotions seen as + and assoc. w/ higher well-being and lower symptom reporting
Why?: helps with “collective intentionality” - power of minds to be jointly directed at objects, matters of facts, states of affairs, goals or values.
Processes at collective level(I)
Promote normative emotional states is by emphasizing them in the cultural products that people engage with.
Promotion (e.g., children’s books-Taiwan vs. North American; calm vs. excited smiles thus model emotions conducive to central cultural tasks. Same with self help
Creation (e.g., sympathy cards – European American + less - can do mentality promote achievement and mastery goals vs. German allow for more - emotions more suited for the more pronounced concern with harmony and fitting in
Emotional states in social interactions
Emotional states in social interactions
Japan (goal of relational harmony shame norm and self-reflection realize relational harmony vs. North Am (anger norm, promotes autonomy and independence. (anger vs. shame); Frequency varies with normativity
Replicated in other countries (e.g., Turkey and Belgium)
condemned emotions ran against collective intenionality
Parenting & norm-inconsistent behaviour
Parents thus use socially valued emotions to override other, less desirable, emotions and behaviors.
Bara (Madagascar-hierarchical): instilling fear (tahotsy) more functional
Minangkabau (Indonesia-stratified): instilling shame (malu) more suitable for maintaining smooth relations social harmony goal
Process at the individual level Seek out situations that foster emotions that are useful to culturally central tasks
Seek out situations that foster emotions that are useful to culturally central tasks
Appraise these situations in ways to help them fulfill their cultural tasks. Amer (success self failure others)vs Japn remember situations of success and failure differently (success situation and selves and failure to themselves)
E.g., success & associated emotions ( Japan luck vs. Amer pride); failure root (self vs. env’t)
Processes at indiv level: indiv role in constructing emotional experience from interoception
Individuals foreground experiences that are important to performing cultural tasks
E.g., Japanese (55% hurts relationship with others least so nodding and smiling and rumination) vs. American forms of anger (43% assoc. both blaming the other person and giving piece of mind)
US vs. Japan: Emotions as rising from individual or relationships between individuals
Jap use the surrounding people’s facial expressions to establish the target person’s emotions but west did not.
US emotions found arising from indiv but Jap arising from relationships between indiv.
Jap athletes report more emotions when they described their relationship w/ others than Amer ath. Jap perceived more emotions in ath who were surrounded by others than Amer.
Smiling faces
Agency from within the individual or group
Agency in eur amer based within indiv vs Asia Amer may be grounded in family or group
E.g., emotion perception in the Himba is based on the environment not primarily subjective feeling. Explanation is that agency in this culture is based on situational prescription rather than located within the individual
Future research for culture and emotions
Should map the precise ways in which people in diff cults jointly and collectively do emotions, thus providing insight in the social mechanisms underlying cultural diff in emotions
