Psychology 307:
Cultural Psychology
Lecture 15
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Midterm Exam
March 13th, 3:30-5:00 PM
● For those students who do not write a paper, the exam
is worth one-third of your final grade; for those students
who do write a paper, the exam is worth one-quarter of
your final grade.
● The exam will be scored out of 50 points:
26-28 multiple choice questions (1 point each)
5 short answer questions (ranging in value from 2 to 6
points)
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● Please arrive on time to facilitate rapid distribution of
the exams.
● Bring a pencil, eraser, pen, and your student ID to the
exam.
● All electronic devices must be put away before the start
of the exam.
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● Bags and backpacks should be left at the front of the
room. Please do not bring valuables to the exam.
● Hats (e.g., baseball caps) should not be worn during
the exam.
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Reminder
I will hold additional office hours in preparation for the
midterm exam:
Thursday, March 8th: 1:00-2:00
Friday, March 9th: 12:30-1:30
Monday, March 12th: 11:30-1:30
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Emotion
1. What evidence provides support for the universalist
position? (continued)
2. What evidence provides support for the cultural
constructionist position?
3. Can the universalist vs. cultural constructionist
debate be resolved?
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By the end of today’s class, you should be able to:
1. review evidence that supports the universalist position
on emotions.
2. review evidence that supports the cultural
constructionist position on emotions.
3. distinguish between distinct display rules.
4. discuss the neocultural theory of emotional
expression.
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What evidence provides support for the univeralist
position? (continued)
(c) Evidence for the universality of emotional expression
 Cross-cultural studies:
 Have shown that, across diverse cultures, people
create similar facial expressions when they experience
happiness, anger, disgust, fear, sadness, or surprise.
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 Example: Ekman and Friesen (1971)
 Took posed photos of facial expressions of happiness,
anger, disgust, fear, sadness, and surprise.
 Showed the photos to participants in Argentina, Brazil,
Chile, Japan, and the U.S.
 Asked participants to select the emotional label that
best described the individual in each photo.
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Ekman and Friesen’s (1971) Six Emotional
Expressions
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Percentage of Participants Who Correctly
Identified Each Emotion
Country
Happiness
Anger
Disgust
Fear
Sadness
Surprise
Argentina
94
72
79
68
85
93
Brazil
97
82
86
77
82
82
Chile
90
76
85
78
90
88
Japan
87
63
82
71
74
87
U.S.
97
69
82
88
73
91
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 Found that:
(a) the rate of correct identification was high across
cultural groups.
(b) when the six emotions were combined, there were
no significant differences across cultural groups.
 These findings were replicated among the Fore of New
Guinea.
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Your friend has come to
see you (happy).
Your child has died
(sad).
You are about to
fight (anger).
You see a dead pig that has
been there for a long time
(disgust).
 On the basis of these findings, Ekman concluded that
there are 6 emotions for which there are universal
facial expressions (i.e., “basic emotions”):
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Emotion
Associated Facial Expression
Anger
Both the lower and upper eyelids tighten as the brows lower and
draw together. Intense anger raises the upper eyelids as well.
The jaw thrusts forward, the lips press together, and the lower
lip may push up a little.
Fear
The eyes widen and the upper lids rise, as in surprise, but the
brows draw together. The lips stretch horizontally.
Disgust
The nose wrinkles and the upper lip rises while the
lower lip protrudes.
Surprise
The upper eyelids and brows rise, and the jaw drops open.
Happiness
The corners of the mouth lift in a smile. As the eyelids tighten,
the cheeks rise and the outside corners of the brows pull down.
Sadness
The eyelids droop as the inner corners of the brows rise and, in
extreme sadness, draw together. The corners of the lips pull
down, and the lower lip may push up in a pout.
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Ekman and Friesen’s (1971) Six Emotional
Expressions
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 On the basis of more recent work, Ekman suggests
that there may be a 7th emotion for which there is a
universal facial expression:
Emotion
Associated Facial
Expression
_________
This expression
appears on just one
side of the face: One
half of the upper lip
tightens upward.
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 Other researchers have suggested that there are
universal expressions for:
Shame.
Interest.
Pride (reflected in facial expression and body posture;
Tracy & Robins, 2008).
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 Developmental studies:
 Have shown that:
(a) infants possess the same facial musculature as adults.
(b) the facial musculature is fully functional at birth.
(c) infants display facial expressions similar to those that
adults display for happiness, anger, disgust, fear,
sadness, and surprise.
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Examples of Infant Facial Expressions
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 At birth, infants are capable of producing facial
expressions that display disgust and happiness.
At 2 months, infants are capable of producing facial
expressions that display anger and sadness.
At 6 months, infants are capable of producing facial
expressions that display fear and surprise.
 Infants’ ability to produce facial expressions similar to
those of adults appears to be culturally universal.
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What evidence provides support for the cultural
constructionist position?
● Two types of evidence support the cultural
constructionist position on emotion:
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(a) Evidence for the cultural construction of emotional
expression: Display rules
 According to Ekman (1973), display rules dictate
how universal emotions are expressed, are learned
early in life, and become automatic determinants of
emotional expression by adulthood.
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 Ekman and Freisen (1969) identified 6 display rules:
Amplification, deamplification, neutralization,
qualification, masking, and simulation.
 Researchers have examined cultural differences in the
tendencies to amplify, deamplify, neutralize, qualify,
mask, and simulate emotional expression.
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 Example: Matsumoto et al. (2005)
 Developed the Display Rule Assessment Inventory
(DRAI) to assess the extent to which participants
modify their emotional expressions in diverse social
situations (e.g., with family, close friends, colleagues).
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Sample Response Sheet from the DRAI
Instructions: Please tell us what you think people should
do when they feel each of the emotions listed toward
someone in each of the four situations when interacting
with that person. At the top of the page is a list of seven
possible responses for how one may behave in those
situations. Please select a response for each emotion and
each situation. Record that number in the appropriate
space provided for that emotion and situation.
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Possible responses:
1. Express the feeling as is with no inhibitions.
2. Express the feeling, but with less intensity than one's
true feelings.
3. Express the feeling, but with more intensity than one's
true feelings.
4. Try to remain neutral; express nothing.
5. Express the feeling, but together with a smile to qualify
one's feelings.
6. Smile only, with no trace of anything else, in order to
hide one's true feelings.
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Recording sheet:
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 Recruited participants from Japan, Russia, and the
U.S.
 Found that:
(a) Americans had higher expression and amplification
scores than Japanese and Russians.
(b) Japanese had higher deamplification and
qualification scores than Americans and Russians.
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 Matsumoto et al. (1998) found that the tendency to
“control” emotional expression through the use of
deamplification, neutralization, qualification, and
masking is positively correlated with collectivism.
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Sponge Bob
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Hello Kitty
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Tsai, Louie, Chen, and Uchida, 2007
 In collectivistic cultures, the tendency to control the
expression of negative emotions was greatest when
interacting with ingroup members. In individualistic
cultures, the tendency to control the expression of
negative emotions was greatest when interacting with
outgroup members.
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 When individuals control the expression of emotion,
the subjective experience of the emotion is dampened.
Thus, people living in cultures that promote the
control of emotional expression tend to report fewer
and less intense emotional experiences than people
living in cultures that promote emotional expression.
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 Consistent with this finding, collectivists prefer affective
states associated with lower levels of arousal than
individualists:
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 Tsai, 2007; Tsai et al., 2007
 East Asians prefer music with a slower tempo than
Westerners.
 East Asians prefer more passive activities (picnicking)
than Westerners (jogging).
 Among those who use drugs, East Asians are more
likely to use drugs that elicit calm states (e.g., opium);
Westerners are more likely to use drugs that elicit
excited states (amphetamines).
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 East Asian magazines contain ads with calmer smiles
and fewer excited smiles than Western magazines.
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 East Asian self-help books encourage calmness,
whereas Western self-help books encourage relatively
high arousal positive states.
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(b) Evidence for the cultural construction of emotional
states: Emotional lexicon
 Analyses of diverse languages suggest that different
languages recognize different emotions.
 Although some languages have equivalent terms for all
of the “universal” emotions identified by Ekman, other
languages do not.
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Languages in Which Terms for Ekman’s
“Universal” Emotions Do Not Exist
Emotion
Languages in Which an Equivalent Term Does Not Exist
Anger
Overlaps with sadness or grief in Luganda, Illongot,
and Ifaluk.
Fear
Missing in Ifaluk; overlaps with shame in Gidjingali.
Disgust
Missing in Polish, Ifaluk, and Chewong; overlaps with
hate in Samoan.
Surprise
Missing in Fore, Dani, Malay, and Ifaluk.
Happiness
Missing in Chewong.
Sadness
Missing in Tahitian and Chewong, overlaps with anger in
Luganda, Illongot, and Ifaluk.
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 Moreover, there are emotional terms in some
languages for which an equivalent term does not exist
in English.
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Emotional Terms for Which an Equivalent
Term Does Not Exist in English
Language
Emotional Term
Description of Emotion
Czech
Litost
Grief, sympathy, remorse, longing, “torment
caused by a sudden insight into one’s own
miserable self” (Kundera, 1979).
German
Schadenfreude
Pleasure derived from another’s
displeasure.
Japanese
Amae
Pleasure derived from dependence on a
close other.
Javanese
Iklas
Pleasant or indifferent frustration
!Kung
Kua
A combination of awe, respect, and fear
associated with ceremonially recognized
milestones in one’ life.
Samoan
Lotomaualalo
An absence of malice, anger, or resentment
in situations of potential conflict.
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 Some theorists argue that the diversity of emotional
terms across languages is meaningless because
language does not influence our experience of
emotion.
 Other theorists argue that the diversity of emotional
terms across languages indicates that there is
significant cultural variation in the experience of
emotion. This view is consistent with the Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis.
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Can the universalist vs. cultural constructionist debate
be resolved?
 There are an increasing number of researchers who
recognize that the universalist position and the cultural
constructionist position are not mutually exclusive.
 Their views are consistent with the Neurocultural
Theory of Emotional Expression, proposed by
Ekman.
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 According to this theory:
“Universality may be limited to a rather small set of
basic emotions, which serve as platforms for
interactions with learned rules, social norms, and
shared social scripts, resulting in a myriad of more
complex culture-specific emotions” Matsumoto (2004,
p. 259).
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Emotion
1. What evidence provides support for the universalist
position? (continued)
2. What evidence provides support for the cultural
constructionist position?
3. Can the universalist vs. cultural constructionist
debate be resolved?
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