lecture 3 Flashcards
(99 cards)
What is culture?
Culture is the part of the environment made by humans, consisting of meanings and everyday practices adopted or developed by a group in a specific time and place.
What functions does culture serve?
Culture facilitates smooth social coordination, clarifies group boundaries, and provides a space for innovation.
What are the two main dimensions of culture?
Material (Objective) Culture and Subjective Culture.
What is material (objective) culture?
It includes physical objects such as buildings, tools, clothing, and methods of transportation.
What is subjective culture?
It consists of characteristic ways of viewing the environment, including ideas, theories, and standards for judging events (e.g., political, religious, scientific, aesthetic, economic, moral, and social standards).
How can subjective culture be institutionalized?
Through government, education, religion, and other societal systems.
How does culture relate to social and emotional interactions?
All social and emotional interactions occur within a specific cultural context, shaped by shared beliefs and practices.
How does culture unite and differentiate communities?
It creates shared beliefs and practices that bring communities together while also distinguishing them from others.
Why might something that appears to be a universal feature of development actually be cultural?
Because what seems universal is often just one of many possible cultural solutions to a problem.
What is culture shock?
The experience of disorientation when encountering a cultural environment different from one’s own.
What are possible reactions to culture shock?
It can be a negative or positive reaction to experiencing an unfamiliar way of life due to immigration, travel, or moving between social environments.
What metaphor is used to describe culture?
Culture is an iceberg – the biggest parts of culture are things we are not consciously aware of; emotive valence is huge.
How does culture affect solutions to problems?
What may appear to be a universal feature of development is often one of myriad cultural solutions to a problem.
What did rankings from over 80,000 employees of a large multinational corporation show?
Western nations tended to encourage greater individualism, especially compared to nations in Latin America and Asia.
What are Traditional values?
Traditional values emphasize the importance of religion, parent-child ties, deference to authority, and traditional family values. People who embrace these values also reject divorce, abortion, euthanasia, and suicide. These societies have high levels of national pride and a nationalistic outlook.
What are Secular-Rational values?
Secular-rational values are the opposite of traditional values. They place less emphasis on religion, traditional family values, and authority. Divorce, euthanasia, abortion, and suicide are seen as relatively acceptable.
What are Survival values?
Survival values place emphasis on economic and physical security and are linked with a relatively ethnocentric outlook and low levels of trust and tolerance.
What are Self-Expression values?
Self-expression values prioritize environmental protection, tolerance of foreign, gays and lesbians, gender equality, and rising demands for participation in decision-making in economic and political life.
What are social norms?
An important aspect that we take for granted.
What is Tightness in cultures?
Tight cultures have strict social norms and high levels of punishment for nonconformity. They have more order, coordination, and uniformity. People in tight cultures regulate their behavior a lot to avoid punishment.
What is Looseness in cultures?
Loose cultures have more relaxed norms and lower levels of punishment. They are more open to new ideas (more creative), new people (less ethnocentric), and change.
What causes tight vs. loose cultures to develop?
Objective threats (such as pathogens, wars, or invasions) lead to a need for social coordination and the development of strict social norms in some societies.
What is Collectivism?
Collectivism values concern for others and groups, dependence and relationships, conformity, harmony, traditions, and indirect communication. It fosters an interdependent self.
What is Interdependent self-construal?
The thoughts, feelings, and actions of others in the relationship. It is connected with the social context and emphasizes belonging, fitting in, and promoting others’ goals.