Emotions as Dynamic Cultural Phenomena

Abstract

Abstract Following Darwin’s work on emotional expression, many psychologists set out to demonstrate the features of emotions that are universal. Cross-cultural research has suggested universality of a number of facial, vocal, and bodily expressions, antecedent events, appraisals, action readiness modes, and physiological changes associated with certain emotions (for reviews of this evidence, see Mesquita & Frijda, 1992; Mesquita, Frijda, & Scherer, 1997). The evidence for universal constituents of emotions is convincing. But does this evidence mean that the emotional experience of people in different cultures is similar? In this chapter I suggest that this is not the case: Emotional experience greatly varies across cultures. I argue that cultural models are necessary to understand and predict these variations. The central purpose of this chapter is to suggest that emotional experience is to be understood and predicted from cultural models. Cultural models are at one and the same time forms of knowledge and social practices (Moscovici, 1988). Cultural models are like schemas: They can be flexibly applied to the context. Somewhat different properties of the schema will emerge depending on their relevance to the situation at hand. Cultural models importantly constitute a person’s reality, because they focus attention, they guide perception, they lend meaning, and they imbue emotional value. A cultural model is decisive in what your world is like (Bruner, 1986) and reflects the cultural “answers” to existential questions, such as the real, the good, the self, the group, and so forth (D’Andrade, 1984; D’Andrade & Strauss, 1992; Holland & Quinn, 1987). In a middle-class American context an important aspect of the cultural model is to gain success through one’s own contributions. Through individual hard work, people can be successful; this will boast their self-esteem, a central concern in America, and it will make them happy, the most desirable emotion in an American context (e.g., D’Andrade, 1984; Heine, Lehman, Markus, & Kitayama, 1999). Success is good, happiness is good, and high selfesteem is good, and those goals need to be fostered and if necessary protected from group pressure. In fact, the very choice of the groups that one is part of should be made to serve individual success and happiness (Triandis, 1995). The promotion of happiness and the fostering of situations which afford happiness are important themes in America. In contrast, in many Mediterranean cultures, honor is central to the cultural model (Bourdieu, 1966; Peristiany, 1966; Pitt-Rivers, 1966). In these cultures the cultural models emphasize maintaining one’s social status and respect (i.e., one’s position in the society) rather than the gain of individual success. One’s honor is in great part determined by the honor of close family members.