Lecture 15 - Emotion and culture II

Question 1

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Synopsis:
We saw in the previous lecture that Americans report more positive emotions than Japanese do. Emotions can be classified on a dimension of interpersonal engagement. Cultural norms in America are individualistic and value interpersonal disengagement. Cultural norms in Japan are interdependent and place value on interpersonal engagement. It turns out that people are generally happier when they experience more of the kinds of positive emotion that their culture values (Kitayama et al., 2000), and emotions among Japanese are experienced more in a context of relationships than is the case for Americans (Uchida et al., 2009).
Americans tend to prefer high arousal positive emotions whereas East Asians prefer low arousal positive emotions, and people report more symptoms of depression when their actual positive emotions differ from those most valued in their culture than when they don’t (Tsai et al., 2006). Uchida and Kitayama (2009) asked people to write down features or aspects of happiness, and they found that Japanese were more inclined to write down nonpositive features of happiness, such as the idea that happiness doesn’t last for long, than Americans were. These cultural differences have practical consequences: for example, when choosing modules to study, Euro-Canadians based their choice mainly on information about enjoyability whereas East Asians gave more weight to usefulness for employment. In general, Americans report more positive emotions than Japanese do because Americans are more oriented towards their own interests and seek out positive experiences for their value to themselves, whereas Japanese are more oriented to others and relationships. This does not mean that Americans are generally happier than Japanese are, just tha they tend to place different values on things.
Overall, however much about emotion is innate, it is clear that the experience of emotion is strongly modified by culture.

Answer 1

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Question 2

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Describe the (Kitayama et al., 2000) study about cultural norms of happiness.

Answer 2

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See burgundy writing on page 1 in G doc notes.

Question 3

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Describe the (Uchida et al., 2009) study on arousal level differences between cultures.

Answer 3

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See turquoise writing on page 2 in G doc notes.

Question 4

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Describe the (Tsai et al., 2006) + (2007) study on high arousal in Americans.

Answer 4

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See purple writing on page 2 in G doc notes.

Question 5

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Describe the Uchida and Kitayama (2009) study on Euro-Canadians based their choice mainly on information about enjoyability.

Answer 5

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See orange writing on page 3 in G doc notes.

Question 6

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Describe the Falk et al. (2010) of the practical implications of enjoyability weighting for choices across cultures.

Answer 6

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See green writing on page 4 on G doc notes.