Monday, August 3, 3:00 - 6:00 p.m.
Concert Hall, Performing Arts Center
Chair: John W. Berry, Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, CANADA
Precursors of cross-cultural psychology and the context of culture
Rogelio Díaz-Guerrero, MEXICO
Reflections of a pre-nominal cross-cultural psychologist
Gustav Jahoda, UNITED KINGDOM
Cross-, intra-, inter- and just plain cultural psychology
Douglass R. Price-Williams, USA
Odysseus wandered for 10 and I wondered for 50 years
Harry C. Triandis, USA
A Note from the Symposium Chairperson:
The relationships between culture and human behavior have been of interest
to scholars for centuries. About 80 years ago anthropology, psychology and
psychiatry jointly began to advance the field conceptually and empirically.
More recently (from the 1960s) there has been an upsurge in interest, rooted
in earlier work, and advanced by a group of scholars identified here as
Founders. From many perspectives and cultural backgrounds, and engaged in
diverse research domains, they established a field (or more accurately,
a set of related fields) within which culture-behavior relationships can
be studied and interpreted. This symposium brings together many of these
Founders on the occasion of the Silver Jubilee of IACCP. The goal of the
symposium is to share personal reflections on the origin, changes and current
status of the field. Believing that a balanced sense of our recent past
is the only sound basis for understanding our present and anticipating our
future, it is hoped that a living history will unfold during this Symposium.
-John W. Berry
A Note from the Congress President:
I wish to make a few remarks that go a bit beyond John Berry's brief and
informative comments about this symposium.
John and I discussed candidates for this symposium in some detail. We first had to establish criteria for defining a person as a "founder." We thought that being at least 65 years of age, clearly devoted throughout one's career to examining the interaction between psychology and culture, and reasonably active in associations like IACCP should be among the main qualifications. We identified a number of people who met two or three of these qualifying characteristics. Indeed, we could have invited at least a dozen people to join this symposium. However, budgetary as well as space limitations restricted our list. Therefore, the following people were invited: Ernest E. Boesch (Germany), Rogelio Díaz-Guerrero (Mexico), Leonard W. Doob (USA), Gustav Jahoda (Scotland), Douglass Price-Williams (USA), Durganand Sinha (India), and Harry C. Triandis (USA). While by no means the definitive list of founders, we thought that this excellent collection of scholars would be representative of many who could have qualified for inclusion. For various reasons, this list of seven dwindled to four. Most tragically, the death of Durganand Sinha on March 23, 1998 reduced our list. Others were unfortunately not able to attend because of personal reasons. A statement written by Prof. Dr. Boesch has been distributed seperately.
The four people who are on the list are truly representative of many others, and it's a pleasure to include them. Fortunately, there are several other people who can be regarded as founders who were able to attend this event. With us today are Pieter Drenth, Wayne Holtzman, Sidney H. Irvine, Daphne and John Keats, Alastair Mundy-Castle, James and Jane Ritchie, Ronald Samuda, Marshall Segall, and Ronald Taft. Certainly I've omitted the names of others who are present and could be cited in this context. However, one could say that a psychologist who was doing serious research or writing in the 1960s and especially in the 1950s that in some way focussed on if, why, where, and when culture affects some aspect of human behavior-that is, if "culture" was the centerpiece in scholarly endeavors -would qualify one as a founder.
Finally, I want to acknowledge the generous support of Sage Publications. Their contribution went a long way toward funding this entire symposium. As perhaps the most visible and influential publisher of cross-cultural books and journals, it is fitting that Sage be recognized and applauded for their continuing work to publish quality cultural and cross-cultural material, all of it consistent with the aims of IACCP.
-Walter J. Lonner
Abstracts
Precursors of cross-cultural psychology and the context of culture
Díaz-Guerrero, R., Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, MEXICO
Because I must have been early imprinted in the Mexican culture, it was
easy to welcome, when I returned to Mexico City with a Ph.D. from the State
University of Iowa in 1947, that so many Mexican philosophers and writers
should be so intrigued, and write volumes about, the psychology of the Mexican.
But it was speculation and poetry. What I did about it started my adventure
with culture and personality. A few years later, the inauguration of the
Interamerican Society of Psychology, the contacts it favored and the happenings
in two unique international meetings, advanced opportunity to determine,
if what was considered Mexican, would remain in cross-cultural studies and
then, to dig deeper into the relation of culture and behavior. The personal
account of how all of these happenings interact with the birth and development
of our association will be the focus of my comments.
Reflections of a pre-nominal cross-cultural psychologist
Jahoda, G., University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland, UNITED KINGDOM
My background is a cross-national one, my parents stemming from different
parts of what had been the Austro-Hungarian empire. My education started
in Vienna, continued in Paris, and was concluded in London. After posts
at Oxford and Manchester universities, I went in 1951 to the then newly
established University College of the Gold Coast (now University of Ghana),
where I stayed for 5 years. This exciting experience was a turning-point
that changed my whole outlook on psychology. After returning to UK, first
to Glasgow and then Strathclyde universities, I continued with empirical
research (mainly in Africa) whenever I managed to get away for a few months.
By the end of the 1970s I began to feel too long in the tooth for the rigours
of fieldwork and gradually retreated to the library, a process completed
on retirement in 1985. Since then I have concentrated on theoretical and
historical issues. This provides me with ample scope to live up (down?)
to my well-deserved reputation as an awkward customer.
Cross-, intra-, inter- and just plain cultural psychology
Price-Williams, D.R., University of California, Los Angeles, USA
Since the beginning of my interest with cross-cultural psychology, which
I date about forty years ago, I have been grappling with the rationale of
this work and its place in the social and behavioral sciences. The comparative
aspect of this work, the "cross" dimension, first got my attention.
This gave way to the "intra" dimension - the fact that one's individual
psychology is embedded in a cultural framework - then began to interest
me, prompting my connection with anthropology. Researches with ethnic groups
of this country made me more aware of the "inter" dimension, as
interactional effects were more salient, and both myself and minority groups
were at the same time components of a larger unit. In turn this prompted
my curiosity of the inevitable reflexivity of this work, rather like a clinician
is made aware of the counter-transference factor. Together, these three
dimensions forced me to theorize about the basis of our discipline, enabling
me to suggest in 1980 that just plain cultural psychology was the root of
all these dimensions.
Odysseus wandered for 10 and I wondered for 50 years
Triandis, H.C., University of Illinois, USA
My moving from Greece to Canada at age 21 exposed me to cultural differences
that I finally came to realize emodied many aspects of collectivism and
individualism. When I started my career, cross-cultural studies were not
in vogue, so I spent much of my time on mainstream issues such as the formation
of attitudes and how they are changed. That research resulted in my 1971
book, Attitude and attitude change. After getting tenure in 1964
I got more involved in cross-cultural studies. That involvement resulted
in a variety of books and projects. Examples include The analysis of
subjective culture (1972) and earlier, in 1964, when I introduced emics
and etics in Berkowitz's Advances in experimental social psychology.
The 1966-67 Ibadan conference aroused my concern for intellectual colonialism;
it was there that the idea for the Cross-Cultural Social Psychology Newsletter
was born. I edited it for a short period. Of course, it is currently
known as the Cross-Cultural Psychology Bulletin. I was pleased to
serve as IACCP president (1974-76), but was disappointed in the failure
to get a code of ethics approved. A highlight was serving as general editor
of the six-volume Handbook of cross-cultural psychology, published
in 1980. My review of the manuscript that led to Hofstede's Culture's
consequences (1980) shifted my research emphasis and brought me full
circle to individualism-collectivism. The study of cultural syndromes, described
in the April 1996 issue of the American Psychologist, is an example
of what may be a promising course of study in cross-cultural psychology.