The Japanese Way of Strength-Based Correction

Abstract

The study outlines Japan’s positive use of red ink to grade children’s homework in order to limit the amount of shame children experience over failures. The psychology of seeing and the psychodynamics of self-conscious emotions are used to explain the mechanism of Japan’s positive versus America’s negative shame-inducing grading practices. It provides an explanation for unconscious cultural grading practices that tend to differentially produce either pride or shame.