-

Transcultural
prycholo
Universality
or diversrty?
U nti I fa i rly rece ntly, psych olog ica I
Ii.\,
Y.r,
research paid little attention to the
influence of culture upon the human
behaviour and experience which it studied.
Times have changed. Andrew Stevenson
explores one way in which psychology can
move forward and incorporate cultural
awareness and sensitivity into itsfocus.

' .: . sychologists worldwide have been
, tormented by questions about the
cultural universality of human
behaviour and experience for
decadcs. For exarnple, in 1972, Deregowsl<i
asl<ed whether the perception of three
dimensions in drawing is the same in
different cultures. And in 1966 Piaget asl<ed
whether thinl<ing develops in children at
the same rate in different cultures.
A psychologist lool<ing for cultural
universals is searching for aspects of behav-
iour or experience common to all cultural
settings. This univcrsalist approach to tran-
scultural research (research looking at the
relationship between culture and behav-
iour) is often termed cross-cultural
psychology. Ps.ychologists who lool< for
cultural universals tend to favour fwo theo-
retical assumptions.
$. ;i!uer*{1-1.
$'$ury"lasr !rrr!y skin .*feep
Underpinning cross cultural psychologz is
an assumption of psychic unity. ln everyday
terms, this states that human diversity is
only sl<in deep. This suggests that differ-
ences in psychological functioning (person-
ality traits, performance on perceptual tests)
and in social behaviour (courtship, atti-
tudes) across cultures are merely superficial.
So if children in Mozarnbique remember

AQA (A) Psychology Review

:!

Transcultural
prycholo
LJnivers ality
or diversiry?
U nti I fa i rly rece ntly, psychol ogi ca I
research paid little attention to the
influence of culture upon the human
behaviour and experience which it studied.
Times have changed. Andrew Stevenson
explores one way in which psychology can
move forward and incorporate cultural
awareness and sensitivity into its focus.

sychologists worldwide have been A psychologist lool<ing for cultural 3 iiuntnv: *iir*ui!,; !l *iriy siri*r *i**p
tormented by questions about the universals is searching for aspecls ol'behav- Underpinning cross-cultural psychology is

cultural universality of human
bchaviour and experience f'or
decadcs. For exanrplc, in 1972, Deregowsl<i
asl<ed whether thc perception of three
dimensions in drawing is the same in
different cultures. And in 1966 Piaget asl<ed
whether thinl<ing develops in children at
the same rate in different cultures.
iour or experience common to all cultural
scttings. This universalist approach to tran-
scultural research (research lool<ing at the
relationship between culture and behav-
iour) is often termed cross-cultural
psychology. Psychologists who look for
cultural universals tend to tavour two theo-
retical assumptions.
an assumption of psychic unit3r. ln everyday
terms, this statcs that human diversity is
only skin deep. This suggests that differ-
ences in psychological functioning (person-
ality traits, performance on perceptual tests)
and in social behaviour (courtship, atti-
tudes) across cultures are merely superficial.
So if children in Mozambique remember

AQA (A) Psychology Review

 But what can we conclude from all this?
Box 1 ls obedience culturally universal? That the Dutch are to be feared and
Name and date Where Sample Obedience rate Australian females are disobedient?
Milgram (rsol) USA Malesfemales 65% Perhaps not. There are a number of
Ancona et al. (1968) Ita ly Students 85% confounding variables standing in the way
of such conclusions:
Mantell (1971) Cermany Males 85%
* the confederates receiving the shocl<s
Kilham et al. (I97a) Malefemale students 40%/L6%
Au stra lia
varied in each study, some perhaps
Burley et al. (7977) UK Male students 50% appearing more vulnerable than others
Shanab and Yahya (1978) Jorda n Students 62% r in the Australian study the confederate
Miranda (rear) Spain Students 90% was female
e in the Dutch study, electric shocl<s were
Schurz (ress) Austria Males/females 80%
not used at all, but another form of (verbal)
Meeus et al (1986) Holla nd Malesfemales 92%
chastisement (electricity can break my will
but words will never hurt me)
r time may alter obedience levels (a kind
Box 2 Are there gender differences in obedience? of longitudinal effea)
Author Country Obedience rate Gender differences Perhaps the most worl<able conclusion is
Edwards (1969) South Africa 875% No to say that obedience to authority occurs in
Bock (1972) USA 40% No many cultural settings, but that these levels
(1974) also vary in different social contexts.
Kilham and Mann Australia 28% Ye* M 4O%F 1,6%

costanzo (1976) USA 81% No

Shanab and Yahya(1977) Jordan
Miranda et al.(1981) Spain
Schurz (1SAS) Austria
from stories more accurately than do
details
Welsh children, this is regarded as a local
difference.
2 Searchingfor universals means
comparing like with like
The search for universals is often backed by
an assumption of cultural equivalence.
Comparing like with lil<e means designing
research in which two (or more) groups are
treated in an equivalent manner through-
out the study and are drawn from equiva-
lent populations, which differ only with
respect to their cultural background. lt
follows then that any difference between
the groups' performance can be confi-
dently altributed to cultural difference.
When cross-cultural psychologists take
the ideas of psychic unity and cultural
equivalence out into the field, replication
studies are very often the result. The
thinking behind these is pretly straighfor-
ward. An original study is repeated (repli-
cated) in different cultural settings to see if
Box 3 Some key terms
Transcultural psychology The study of the relationship between culture and human
behaviour and experience.
Cross-cultural psychology Atranscultural
universals.
Community psychology Atranscultural approach dedicated tothe search for diversity
and the reduct jon of inequality.
625% No
80% No
80% No
the same results emerge. Replication
studies have produced mixed, occasionally
confusing, findings.
ln replicating Milgram, one would
whether his f indings travel well.
Milgram's (1963) original obedience study,
carried out at Yale University in the USA,
65% of the participants gave 450 volt
electric shocks to their colleagues in what
they (the participants) thought was
learning experiment. ls there a culturally
universal human predisposition to obey
authori{, even when there is the possibiliry
of causing harm to others?
Many researchers have sought to address
this question by replicating Milgram's study.
Box 1 summarises some findings. Blass
(2000) reviews more studies (Box 2) testing
gender and obedience across cultures, with
only one showing gender to be a factor. This
study, in Australia, also shows the lowest
obedience rate. Overall though, despite vari-
able obedience rates across cultures, gender
seems to exert little influence.
approach dedicated tothe search for cultural
Problems with replication
Why does replication research tend to
uncover such variable findings? The
following are two responses to this
question.
L Universal phenomena are out there
but replicating original studies has not
asl< yet uncovered them
ln There is no suggestion here that there is
anything wrong with searching for univer-
sals, only that replication research has not
met the demands of the tasl<. According to
this view, the following are specific draw-
a backs of the replication method:
.r Culturally equivalent participants are
hard to find. Despite trying to ensure that
samples are drawn from similar groups
within their own cultures (students, the
clergy, schoolchildren, housewives), these
labels have dilferent connotations in
different settings.
s Some researchers are more 'controlled'
than others. ln all but a few rare cases,
replications are not done by the same
researchers as the original worl<. Although
all experimental psychologists follow
professional research guidelines, it is likely
that some are more ef ficient than others.
" Replications can lose something in
translation. ln any controlled psychological
research, it is vital that all participants
receive standardised instructions- ln
cross-cultural replications these instruc-
tions have to be translated into different
languages.
* For some of us, participating in research
is second nature. Filling in questionnaires,
answering telephone polls and being

SeDtember 2005 't ;

 *.t
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interviewed are all part of urban living. yet
when research lil<e this is replicated in
sefiings where it is a less familiar feature of
everyday life, the strangeness and novelty
of the social situation under investigation
may well have an impact on the results
which emerge.
Proponents of this first response would
not favour abandoning replication research
altogether. lnstead, they might prefer to
hone the tools of replication so that greater
levels of cultural equivalence (greater
control) could be achieved.

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be tke rmest *ffestiwn Lisa *{ mt.lr tinre
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Anyone putting forward this response
would highlight more fundamental
problems with replication research:
Culturally diverse settings really are very
diverse. While replicating research in
dif ferent settings, transcultural psycholo-
gists come across social structures, norms
and expectations that distinguish these
host cultures from each other and from the
one where the study was originally carried
out (Segall etal.1990). Smallwonder, then,
that culturally variable findings emerge
from cross-cultural replications.
Culturally diverse settings mean cultur-
ally diverse meanings. lt has already been
suggested that some of the words used in
replication research do not translate easily
from one language to another. More
fundamentally, it is arguable that some of
the very concepts that are investigated in
original research lose or alter their meaning
once they are tal<en into other cultural
setlings. Consider 'stress' , for example. The
meaning of stress, arguably, arose out of
and is situated in a Western cultural
context. Consequently, cross-cultural
Box 4 Emics and etics: two approaches to transcultural research studies can never rcally be true replications
Transcultural research can be viewed in terms of the linguistic notions of phonemics and Proponents of this response suggesl
phonetics.
a direction change for transcultura
Phonemics the study of spoken sounds particular to certain languages.
is psychologr. lnstead of asl<ing 'What do all
Emic researchers tend to: humans have in common?', we are invited
o select their subject matter and instruments for analysis once the research is in progress to turn the question on its head and
o apply their findings to the field in which they were gathered consider 'What mal<es humans culturally
o use tools for analysis which are informed by local knowledge diverse?'
o only begin to collect data when they are familiar with the ways and manners of the local
culture Searching for cultural diversity
Phonetics isthe studyofthe universal properties ofspoken sound.
What l<ind of transcultural psychologl
awaits the researchcr who steps into the
Etic researchers tend to:
uncontrolled to search for cultural variation
o decide what to study and how to analyse it before arriving in the field
and diversity in behaviour and experience?
o apply their research findings globally Well, to begin with they will find them-
o analyse behaviour using instruments brought in from outside selves subscribing to two theoretical ideas
o begin gathering data as soon as they arrive in the field which will drive their search for human
diversity.

AO-A (N Psychology Review

1 Psychic unity is dead
lnstead of looking for psychic unity, the
search for cultural variation can lead the
transcultural psychologist to pursue aspects
of humanity as they appear in the outside
world. Rather than investigating a universal
human psychology irrespective of social and
cultural cont6xt, the search is on for behav-
iour and experience in diverse, eueryday set-
tings.ln this kind of search, local variations
in behaviour and experience are the whole
point of transcultural psycholory. They are
its subject matter, rather than something to
be controlled or made equivalent as part of
the experimental replication method.
lnstead of asl<ing, 'Which internal memory
structures are common to all humans?" a
more suitable research question would be,
'How does the praclice of remembering and
forgetting manifest itself in the everyday
lives of people in New York, Tehran or Bel-
grade?'
2 Researchers are interpreters, not
objective ob$ervers
Transcultural psychologists need not see
their interpretations of the events they
witness as separate from those events. For
Shweder (1991), it is impossible to conceive
of events in the world without acknowl-
edging our interpretations or mental repre-
sentations of them. Researchers are not
objective observers of cultural worlds, they
are active, subjective participants and inter-
preters. So instead of asking, 'ls there a
piece of research which provides the defin-
itive account of attitude change in Western
Australia?', try asking, 'Can you show me
some research which provides a good
account of attitude change in Western
Australia?'
What kind of projects emerge out of a
search for diversity in human behaviour
and experience? Typically, these are projects
which take a more emic, less etic approach
(see Box 4), such as the one adopted by the
community prychologSl movement. To end
this review of approaches to transcultural
research, I look at an example of such a contact between protagonists from both
project.
Community psychology: finding
diversityin community
Under the banner of community psych-
ology (Sloan 1996), a number of
researchers are developing methods which
support in practice as well as in theory
- -
the view that behaviour and experience
need to be studied in communiry settings.
Community psychology is an instance of
psychology formulating questions and
Box 5 Community psychology formulates research questions in
response to immediate social and wider societal conditions
Theoretical ly, com m u nity psychology:
o rejectstheportrayaloftheresearchparticipantasanindividualdetachedfromthesocialand
wider societal context
o rejects psychology's aspirations to be a science, along with its claims to the trappings of the
experimental, laboratory-bound methods of physics, chemistry and biology
o challenges situations of inequality, conflict and poverty
o devisesresearchquestionsinresponsetoeventsandconditionswithinacommunity,instead
of importing questions from more economically developed countries
o seekstoredressthepowerbalancebetweenresearcherandparticipantsothatthechief
beneficiaries of any research should be the indigenous communities
Methodologica I ly, com m u n ity psychology:
o rejects the location of research in the laboratory setting
o uses methods for collecting data which view participants in their social and wider societal
contexts
. engages participants in the process ofdeveloping research questions
o works with fully informed, consenting, active participants in the process of collecting data
. engages participants in the application of research findings to issues arising out ofthe social
realities in the community
o challenges its practitionerstoabandonthe roleof expert researchers posingquestionsthey
have generated. lnstead, research questions are gleaned from the community scenario
methods for answering them which are mately this may lead to the alteration of
active responses to particular cultural these circumstances. This can be seen as an
circumstances at particular times in history. alternative to the theory-testing approach
Box 5 summarises the ideas underpinning adopted by those who seek to investigate
community psychology. universal aspects of culture. Clearly there
Community psychology in situ can - are advantages and disadvantages to both
neighbours become good friends? Land these approaches for the overall project of
disputes between indigenous Western transcu ltu ra I psychology.
Australians and their white counterparts
were the subject of Natalie Contos's Referenres
research project (cited by Drew et al. 2000). Drew, N. et al. (2000) 'ls doing good just
She looked at how inter-group attitudes enough? Enabling practice in a disabling
crystallise and sometimes shift, despite discipline' (2000) in T. Sloan Critical
histories riddted with animosity. A key Psychology: Voices for Change, Macmillan.
feature of her study was her willingness to Segall, M. et al. ('1990) Human Behaviour in
allow the subject marter of the research to Global Perspectite, Pergamon An excellent,
emerge out of the events and relationships if dense, all-round introduction.
already at large in the community. She Serpell, R. (1976) Culture's ln;fluence on
spol<e at length with indigenous commu- Behaviour, Methuen. Still a pocket classic,
nity leaders and with whites who were ahead of its time.
sympathetic to their cause. ln At the inter- Sloan, T. (ed.) (2000) Critical Psychology,
face between the two communities' Palgrave. Excellent on community
(p.181), Contos facilitated face to face psychologz.
Shweder, R. (1991) Thinking Through
sides of the inter-group divide. Before long, Cultures, Harvard Universify Press. Dense,
she reported a tangible reduction in preju- but a useful guide to the search for
dice, especially in the white community. cultural diversiry.
The change owed much to the increased
contact bewveen the two camps, as well as Andrew Stevenson teaches psychology to
a recognition of the shared goals of peace A-level, Access and Jirst-year undergraduates
and reconciliation. at Aquinas College, Stockport, and
ln the search for cultural diversity, the Manchester Metropolitan University. His first
aim ofthe psychology research project is book, Studying Psychology (Palgrave), was
often to discover more about human published in 2001-. His second book,lntro-
behaviour and experience as it is ducingTranscultural Research, will be
embedded in cultural circumstances. Ulti- published by Palgrave in 2006.
September 2005 ffiK