CHAPTER SEVEN

EMOTION
 Research on emotions has become increasingly popular in the past few decades.
Everyone knows what emotions are; we experience them within ourselves and sense
them in others.
 However, concepts of emotions and theoretical approaches in psychology vary
widely.
 In cross-cultural studies the most central question is how to find a balance between
emotions as psychological states that presumably are invariant across cultures, and
emotions as social constructions that differ in essential ways across cultures.
 we start with a section called “understanding ‘others.” It gives an account of a
classic research project by Osgood and colleagues demonstrating that dimensions of
affective meaning are cross-culturally quite similar and that common concepts also
tend to have the same affective.
 In the second section we present research aimed at distinguishing a set of universal
basic emotions. The evidence derives mainly from culture-comparative studies
showing evidence of cross-cultural similarities in the expression of emotions in the
face, in the voice, and in gestures.
UNDERSTANDING “OTHERS”
 In this section we formulate a tentative answer to the question of why human beings,
even from very different cultures, often make sense of each other’s behavior. We
do this with reference to a “classic” empirical research project conducted by Charles
Osgood (1977; Osgood et al. 1975).
 The project stems from a research tradition in which the central theme is how
members of various cultural groups experience themselves and their social
environment. A distinction can be made between objective and subjective aspects of
culture (Herskovits, 1948). The objective aspects are reflected in indicators about
climatic conditions, number of years of schooling, national product, etc. Subjective
indices reflect how members of a culture view themselves and how they evaluate their
way of life. This reflects their subjective culture.
 In the analysis of subjective culture people are asked how they perceive
themselves and how they see others. Triandis and Vassiliou (1972) found that
Greeks tend to describe themselves as philotimous. As much as 74 percent of a
sample of respondents used this term in self-description. There is no direct English
 equivalent of the concept of philotimo. Triandis and Vassiliou (1972, pp. 308–9)
write: “A person who has this characteristic is polite, virtuous, reliable, proud, has a
‘good soul’, behaves correctly, meets his obligations, does his duty, is truthful,
generous, self-sacrificing, tactful, respectful, and grateful.” They summarize by
stating that a person who is philotimous “behaves towards members of his ingroup the
way they expect him to behave.”

Words not only have a denotative, but also a connotative meaning. A word points to a
certain referent; it has a designative or referential meaning, that is called denotative. In
addition a word has an emotional and metaphoric tone; this is called the connotative
meaning. The terms objective meaning and subjective meaning capture more or less the
same contrast. The semantic differential technique (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum, 1957)
is a method for describing the connotative meaning of words. A respondent is given a
word that has to be rated on a number of seven-point scales. The poles of each scale are
marked by a pair of contrasting adjectives, for example good versus bad, light versus
dark, or quick versus slow. From factor analyses in the USA it emerged that the ratings on
all
kinds of words could be represented by three factors that were labeled evaluation (good
bad), potency (strong–weak), and activity (active–passive). These three factors together
defined a three-dimensional space of affective meaning.
The affective meaning of any word can be identified in terms of its position in this
three-dimensional space. For example, the word “kind” has a high positive value on the
evaluation factor, a medium value on potency, and a low value on activity.
UNIVERSALITY OF EMOTIONS
There is a range of theories in biology and the neurosciences about the evolutionary
history of emotions and their location in brain structures. In psychology there is a long
tradition of research in which psycho-physiological processes and other bodily events,
like facial expressions, have been investigated as concomitants/occur of internal states
experienced as emotions. The nature of the relationships between self-reports of feeling
states and underlying processes is not very clear, and many researchers would seem to
agree that the biological basis of commonly distinguished separate emotions like
happiness, anger, fear, and sadness has not been clearly established (Cacioppo
&Tassinary, 1990). However, quite apart from their validity the theories do reflect a fairly
common belief that emotions are associated with
biological processes characteristic of the human species. Thus, it is not surprising that
there is also cross-cultural research pursuing universalities in emotional life. The most
extensive topic of study has been the facial expression of emotions.
RECOGNITION OF FACIAL EXPRESSION
 Modern studies of the expression of emotions go back to Darwin (1872/1998). He
saw the universal occurrence of the same facial expressions as important evidence
that emotions are innate. From a survey among British residents in various countries
Darwin acquired information which he saw as a validation of his viewpoint.
 Ekman (e.g., 1973; see also Darwin, 1998) has pointed out that Darwin’s criterion of
universality of emotional expression does not provide a sufficient proof for the
biological inheritance of emotions. Early experiences common to all humans in
infancy and childhood form an alternative explanation.
 According to authors like Klineberg (1940) and Birdwhistell (1970) these differences
mean that human emotional expression is acquired in the process of socialization, at
least to a considerable extent.
 The best-known studies that systematically probe the question of cross-cultural
invariance of facial expression are those conducted by Ekman among the Fore in East
New Guinea. Ekman (1980) has published a series of photographs that show a similar
range of emotional expressions as are found in the industrialized countries. Although
subjectively convincing, this does not constitute strong scientific evidence. Ekman
and his team also conducted two types of experiments. In one type they presented the
respondents with three photographs of people each displaying a different emotion,
and asked them to indicate the person to whom something had happened (e.g., whose
child had died). In the other type of experiment respondents were asked to make the
face they would show when they were happy to see their friends, angry enough to
fight, etc. These facial expressions were photographed and later on analyzed to
determine whether the same emotionspecific muscular patterns in the face could be
found as previously established for Western respondents.
RECOGNITION OF VOCAL EXPRESSION
 Research on cross-cultural recognition of emotional intonation in the voice has
shown similar results to those obtained for facial expression.
 Albas, McCluskey, and Albas (1976) collected speech samples meant to express
happiness, sadness, love, and anger from English- and Cree-speaking Canadian
respondents. These expressions were made semantically unintelligible by means of
 an electronic filtering procedure that left the emotional intonation intact. Respondents
from both language groups recognized the emotions intended by the speakers far
beyond chance level, but the performance was better in the own language than in the
other language.
 In another study McCluskey, Albas, Niemi, Cuevas, and Ferrer (1975) made a
comparison between Mexican and Canadian children (six to eleven years of age).
With a similar procedure they found that the Mexican children did better than the
Canadian respondents also on the identification of Canadian English expressions, a
finding which was tentatively ascribed to a greater importance of intonation in
Mexican speech.
NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION
Emotions serve communicative functions in social interaction. According to Fridlund
(1997) facial expressions have evolved in the evolutionary history of the human species
for this purpose. According to Frijda (1986, p. 60) it is an open question whether
emotional expressions have evolved phylogenetically for the purpose of communication;
they may have come about for quite different reasons (see also ch. 10). Nevertheless,
emotional expresssions can often serve communication and they can be produced with
that intention. There are also other channels of non-verbal communication, some of which
will be mentioned here.
 A well-studied form of non-verbal communication are gestures. This interest has
cross-cultural roots. In earlier times explorers often managed to acquire goods and
even engaged in some kind of bargaining with people with whom they did not share
any common language.
 Presumably all types of gestures are shaped in the process of socialization and
enculturation. Child training includes the modification of adaptors, especially those
that are considered improper in the presence of others.
EMOTIONS AS CULTURAL STATES
A well-known study rejecting the notion that human emotional experiencing is basically
the same across cultures is an ethnographic analysis by Lutz (1988) of the emotional life
of the Ifaluk who live on an atoll in the South Pacific. She set out to contrast cultural
assumptions found in Western thinking about emotions with those found in another
society. She argues: “This book attempts to demonstrate how emotional meaning is
fundamentally structured by particular cultural systems and particular social and material
environments.
 CHAPTER EIGHT
PERCEPTION
Sensory functions
 There are four classes of cross-cultural explanations of cross-cultural differences
in reactions to simple sensory stimuli, namely (1) conditions in the physical
environment that affect the sensory apparatus directly, (2) environmental conditions
that affect the sensory apparatus indirectly, (3) genetic factors, and (4) cultural
differences in the interaction with the environment.
 An example of the direct effect of physical conditions can be found in Reuning
and Wortley (1973). They reported a better auditory acuity in the higher frequency
ranges (up to 8,000 Hz) for Kalahari Bushmen than the reference values given for
Denmark and for the USA.
 The differences were more striking for older respondents, suggesting that in the
Kalahari desert there is less hearing loss with increasing age. Reuning and Wortley
emphasized that other factors, such as for example diet, can provide alternative
explanations. Still, they were inclined to see the low levels of ambient noise in the
Kalahari as the critical factor, citing findings by other authors on slow deterioration
of hearing in non-industrial societies.
 An indirect effect of an environmental factor, namely poor nutrition, was
suspected when black recruits to the South African mining industry were found to
have a slower dark adaptation than white South Africans (Wyndham, 1975).It was
thought that deficiencies in the diet could have led to a low level of vitamin A. (A
low level of this vitamin leads to insufficient functioning of the rods in the retina that
are used for vision under conditions of low illumination.)
 It has been established that some genetic traits occur with different frequencies in
various populations. Most famous is the difference in the incidence of red–green
color blindness. It was already known in the time of Rivers (1901) that the frequency
of red-green color blindness was much lower in some non-European groups than in
some European groups. Within an evolution-theoretical framework this has been
attributed to the disadvantages that color-blind people have when hunting and
gathering is the main means of subsistence (cf. Post, 1962, 1971).
 Socialization and enculturation practices are generally seen as the main antecedents
of differences in sensory sensitivity and discrimination. Of the differences in
sensation that have been reported in the literature many have to do with a socially
 conditioned preference or dislike for stimuli, rather than with the capacity for
discrimination or with tolerance thresholds.
Perception of Patterns and Pictures

 The drawing, taken from a study on pictorial recognition among a remote group in
Ethiopia, the Mekan or Me’en, who, at the time, had little previous exposure to
pictorial representations (Deregowski, Muldrow, &Muldrow, 1972). With few
exceptions they identified a leopard, but only after some time and not without effort.
 In the process of examination some respondents would go beyond visual
inspection/examination; they would touch the cloth on which the pictures were
painted and sometimes even smell it. These results were in line with various
miscellaneous reports to the effect that the perception of clear representational
pictures and even (black and white) photographs is not always immediate in cultures
without a pictorial tradition.
 Pictures are non-arbitrary mainly because of cultural traditions about how to
represent an object or scene. Codes are conventions that members of particular
cultures learn and adhere to even when they are not aware of this. An opposite
viewpoint is emphasized by Gibson (e.g., 1966), who argued that a picture could
represent an object or scene because it contained information for any perceiver that
was similar to information from the real environment.
Simple patterns and figures
Pictures such as that of the leopard in the above fig. are fairly complex and involve
culturally rooted artistic styles. Therefore, it may be useful to look at simpler figures.
First of all there are data which show cultural differences in the susceptibility of two-
dimensional, geometric visual illusions. For an overview we refer to Segall et al. (1999).
A summary of the findings is presented in box 8.1. Although the effects of physiological
factors on illusions cannot be ruled out, long-term exposure to environmental conditions,
summarized in the concept of carpenteredness, seems to account for most of the cross-
cultural differences that were reported by Segall, Campbell, and Herskovits (1966).
 Depth perception
 There are two depth cues that deserve special attention. The first is the gradient of
texture. When one is looking along a brick wall details of separate bricks can be seen
in the foreground. As the distance to the observer increases fewer and fewer details of
texture can be perceived hence the term “gradient of texture.” This is a powerful
depth cue in photographs, but one that is absent from virtually all stimulus sets used
in cross-cultural studies. This is one reason why these stimuli are lacking in
important information and to the first-time observer may display unusual qualities.
The second cue is linear perspective. In many pictures, including some of Hudson’s, a
horizon is drawn on which all lines converge that represent parallel lines from real space.
It has been a point of considerable debate whether this depth cue, that has an evident
impact on the perception of depth for Western respondents, should be seen as a cultural
convention. One of the arguments for the conventional character of this cue is the
existence of many art traditions in which linear perspective does not occur.
Face recognition
 Various forms of perceptual learning theory presume that faces are stored in some
hypothetical space in which relevant features (or composites of features) form the
dimensions (e.g., Valentine, 1991; Valentine & Endo, 1992). Out-group faces then
become better separated in this space with increasing experience; presumably more
similar appearing out-group faces should be located closer together in the perceptual
space than the more differentiated own-group faces. Despite considerable support
(e.g., Sporer, 2001) this theorizing has been challenged by MacLin, Malpass, and
Honaker (2001). With a construction kit the latter authors prepared faces that were
ethnically ambiguous.
 This can be done by taking the average of each typical feature of two ethnic groups
(in this case Hispanic American and African American). The ambiguous faces were
provided with an “ethnic marker,” namely a Hispanic American hair style, or an
African American hair style. Hispanic American respondents classified about two-
thirds of these faces with the ethnic group suggested by hair style, while they
classified the remaining one-third in various ethnicities.
Psychological esthetics
 Looking at works of art leads to two perplexing findings. The first is the
tremendous variation in conventions and styles of expression.
 The second is the flexibility of the human perceptual mechanisms in coping
with this range in variation.
 Conventions play a certain role in perception, especially of depth cues. They
certainly are important in the making of art, witness the large variation in styles. If
conventions play a dominant role in appreciation there is no reason to expect
much agreement between respondents from different cultures.
 A few comparative studies of esthetic preferences have been reported that
support this expectation.
 For example, Lawlor (1955) showed eight designs from West Africa to
respondents from that region and to British respondents, asking them to indicate
which two they liked best and which two they liked least. There was considerable
agreement between the respondents within each sample, but the preferences of the
two groups were quite distinct. Lawlor concluded that there was little evidence for
a general factor that depended on the designs. Rather the cultural background of
the judges was the important determinant of agreement in ratings.
 Still, the weight of the evidence is that there is at least a moderate agreement in
esthetic preferences between cultures.