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Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 1
Anthropology 4616 Culture and Personality
Midsemester Exam Spring 2006
29 June 2017
Answer FOUR (only 4) of the following questions. Keep in mind that there is more than
one approach you can take in answering these questions. Each question is worth 4.0
points.
Follow these guidelines:
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Organize your answer before you begin.
Be sure to state:
1. What or who something is
2. Where it occurred or is located (if appropriate)
3. Why it is important
3. When it occurred
State YOUR position or approach clearly.
Cite specific examples or references to support your statements.
Mention problem areas or other relevant materials which you would like
to consider further in a more thorough statement.
Summarize your argument or discussion.
Wherever appropriate use materials from more than one region of the
world.
Remember that each of your responses should have a beginning, a
middle, and an end.
Note: Do not discuss any topic at length in more than one question.
1. Relate the study of any one topic so far considered in your Culture and Personality
class to what you are currently studying in one or more of your other classes.
xxx
2. Discuss the question, AWhy are people afraid of the dark?@
or discuss the Derek Freeman / Margaret Mead controversy.
3. Chapter One, AThe Sociocultural Nature of Human Beings, discusses AHow to
Comprehend Behavior and Culture.@ Discuss both the authors= and your views on
this topic, in the context of culture and personality studies.
4. Chapter One, AThe Sociocultural Nature of Human Beings, discusses AThe
Centrality of Learning.@ Discuss the centrality of learning in the context of culture
and personality studies.
5. Chapter Two, ACross-Cultural Research: Scope and Methods,@ outlines, obviously,
the scope and methods of cross-cultural psychological anthropological and
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psychological research. Discuss the main features of Chapter Two as they apply to
culture and personality studies in anthropology.
6. Chapter Three, AHuman Development and Informal Education,@ discusses AThe
Developmental Niche.@ What is AThe Developmental Niche@ and why is it
important to Culture and Personality studies?
7. In regards to toy construction (Chapter Three), how are American people
conditioned "to have" toys instead of "to toy”?
8. Chapter Four discusses APerceptual and Cognitive Processes.@ In class we have
been looking at Acognition, perception, and mental conception@ (cogito, percepts,
concepts). How do the materials presented in Chapter Four relate to our class
discussions?
9. Identify four of the following in two or three sentences. Identify them in the context
of Culture and Personality studies. Give at least one good example of each
concept.
A.
B.
C.
A.
B.
C.
A.
B.
A.
A.
ACultural specific definitions of intelligence@
sociobiology
inferential reasoning
D.
projective tests
E.
positions and roles
F.
ideal culture
G.
"equivalence sorting"
H.
AThe Developmental Niche@
I.
racial differences in intelligence
J.
"culturology"
A. displacement
"savage passions"
canalization
national character
recapitulation theory
cultural ecology
cultural shock
postulates
10. Discuss the difference between reality and illusion in the context of our in-class
discussions of cognition. Include in your discussion a hypothesis on how that
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relates to personality development in various cultures around the world.
11. Discuss four (4) items that you are supposed to be Aincubating@ about.
12. If you do not like these questions, make up and answer a question of your own
choice relating to a topic which you have not considered in your other answers.
Answers should contain specific information supporting your position. Both your
question and your answer will be evaluated. If you like these questions but simply
prefer to make one of your own, go ahead.
If you elect to make up and answer a question, you may prepare your question
and answer in advance and bring them with you to the exam. If you prepare your
question and answer in advance you only need to answer three (3) midterm exam
questions in class.
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13. Chapter Five discusses AAlternative Views on Human Competence: General
Intelligence and Genetic Epistemology.@ What are the AAlternative Views@ on
general intelligence and its measurement?
14. What is "psychoanalytic anthropology?" Discuss its elements, its origins, and two
or more of its foci.
15. The attached article, ATravails of a girl, who is told she is a boy,@ appeared on The
Times of India WebPage, Wednesday, February 26, 2003. Dr. G. K. Vankar has
found out that you are taking Psychological Anthropology and has hired you as a
consultant to advise ARatna@ and the medical team about what to do. There are
over a dozen variables in this story that relate to items relevant to cross-cultural
Psychological Anthropology studies.
A. What are the relevant variables?
B. What advice would you give?
C. Why do you give the advice you do?
16. Anthropologists talk about Amodal personality,@ Abasic personality,@ and Anational
character.@
A. Compare and contrast these terms.
B. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using each of the three
terms?
A.
A.
imposed etic
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
H.
I.
J.
K.
"psychic unity of mankind"
socialization
eidetic imagery
human nature
culturally constituted behavioral environment
real culture
the ecocultural framework
life history
Müller-Lyer illusion
normative orientation
Gestalt
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
H.
"progress"
BPS
carpentered-world hypothesis
perceptual world
Human Relations Area Files
affective behavior
child animism
Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 5
I.
J.
17.
18.
range of variation
"feminine"
Explain the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis as it relates to you (i.e., an Englishspeaking American); what does your language do to your personality?
Do apes have true language?
19.
Describe how culture influences an individual's perception of reality using
examples from the text, class discussion, films/videotapes, and your own
experience. Compare the Nativism / Empiricism controversy in relation to cognition.
20.
On Monday an article from the Washington Post, ASixth sense: What Your
Immune System Knows,@ was passed out in class. Discuss the main points of this
article and your opinion of them.
21.
Do you feel that how other people perceive you as a "person" affects the way
that you will behave--and thus your overall personality? Why or why not?
22. Over the past several years there has been much discussion about American
Indian hunting and fishing rights in Wisconsin and Minnesota. There have also
been problems at fishing locations in Wisconsin, and at hunting locations in
Minnesota, and the issue has in the past divided voters on the Fond Du Lac
Reservation.
23. Assume you are an applied anthropologist working for Governor Carlson, and that
you are hired to do a Culture and Personality study on the situations described in
the above paragraph in order to make recommendations to the Governor of
Minnesota. Outline how you would approach the project, i.e., describe the methods
you would use, the hypotheses or hypothesis you would test, and how you expect
to report the results. (Keep in mind the Governor will want you to present him with
three or four specific options for action that he might use in the future.) Finally,
what results do you expect to find?
Note: Answer this question viewing it as a cultural / subcultural situation with a
strong Culture and Personality component. Do not view it simply as a law
enforcement problem. Look for solutions to the basic problems.
24. On page 20 of Psychological Anthropology Erika Bourguignon states, "the
difference between psychological anthropology and other specialized divisions of
our discipline [anthropology] is one of perspective, not, initially, one of data."
Discuss that proposition, indicating as part of your discussion whether or not you
agree with her. Be sure to give specific reasons why you do or do not agree with
her.
25. Compare and contrast the "nativist" and the "empiricist" positions in Culture and
Personality studies.
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26. On pages 76 - 78 of Psychological Anthropology Erika Bourguignon states, "Even among
those who have contributed greatly to the development of psychological anthropology,
opposition between a relativist and a universalist view exists." Explain and discuss this
quote.
27. Describe "cognitive anthropology or ethnoscience."
28. On the following page you will find the results of our exploratory testing of perceptions of
TEENSPORTS using Susan Weller and A. Kimball Romney's "triadic comparisons" (from
Systemataic Data Collection, Sage Publications, 1987) data collection technique.
These were then processed using Stephen P. Borgatti's ANTHROPOAC 4.0 (Analytic
Technologies, 1993).
What you are looking at is a scattergram of the results of multidimensional scaling. (The
results turned out to be so close that the names of the sports items didn't print well.
Hence appears a second scattergram using only the numbers. The numbers of the
sports items are listed below the second illustration.)
Question:
Part A.
Interpret/analyze these results?
Part B.
Explain this project to a friend of yours who is a sophomore thinking about
majoring in anthropology. Your friend knows almost nothing about Culture
and Personality, and very little about social science methods.
29. On Friday, 21 January 1994, the management of the Black Bear Casino laid off about 60
employees. About 20 of the laid off employees were members of the Fond du Lac band
of Chippewa. The Black Bear is a casino on the Fond du Lac Indian Reservation, owned
and operated by and for the enrolled members of the Fond du Lac Band. There has
been much discussion about the layoffs, both privately, and in the Duluth/Superior news
media. On Thursday, 27 January 1994, a UMD student and Fond du Lac Band member
organized and led a protest picket at the Black Bear Casino near Carlton.
Layoffs were decided using a point system. A worker was docked five points for missing
work without calling, four points for unexcused absences, three points for being late or
for an undocumented illness, two points for other reasons, and one point for a
documented illness. and so on. Reservation chairperson, Bob "Sonny" Peacock, said
that the layoffs were based solely on records, not race. "The bottom line is that this is a
business," he said. "You go with the good, solid workers."
Many from Fond du Lac protest the layoffs, indicating that those Indian peoples most
traditional were most penalized by the point system, and therefore the tribe actually laid
off its own people disproportionately. Others argued that the whites should have been
laid off, without regard to any point system, voicing the feeling that "since it is our casino,
why let white people decide who gets to work?"
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The former Executive Director of the Fond du Lac Reservation is a highly respected
member of the Band, and a UMD graduate in Anthropology. Knowing you are talking this
course in Culture and Personality, he hires you to assist in resolving this conflict situation.
It is your first big assignment as an anthropologist.
Explain how you would go about the task?
At least part of what you need to do is a Culture and Personality study on the
situations described in the above paragraphs in order to make recommendations to a
joint commission of the Fond du Lac Reservation Business Committee and the
Governor's Human Rights Committee. Outline how you would approach the project,
i.e., describe the methods you would use, the hypotheses or hypothesis you would
test, and how you expect to report the results. (Keep in mind the joint commission
will want you to present it with three or four specific options for action that he might
use in the future.) Finally, what results do you expect to find?
Note: Answer this question viewing it as a cultural / subcultural situation with a strong
Culture and Personality component. Do not view it simply as a law enforcement problem.
Look for solutions to the basic problems.
30. Yesterday, Thursday, 26 January 1995, National Public Radio announced that scientists
at Penn State University have identified male/female biological differences in the
functioning of the human brain. While many (most?) of the organic workings of male and
female brains were "the same," there were reportedly significant differences in the way
males and females process motion. Assume this report is correct. What, if any,
difference will that major discovery be to studies of Culture and Personality?
31. Thursday, 26 January 1995, the following piece appeared in the Duluth News-Tribune (p.
10B):
Want to sell? Pick Right Colors
NEW YORK -- Color matters to retailers.
Most prefer the bottom line to be black. And a store's color palette could paint a message that
consumers can't ignore, a visual designer says.
A green store environment calms shoppers down so much that they're too relaxed to reach for
their wallets. Too much red and it's fisticuffs over the last sweater on the bargain table.
Pink gives shoppers that loving feeling. Yellow and orange signal affordability. Dark green,
navy blue and burgundy convey the opposite.
Stores need to get their colors "done," just as some women consult specialists to learn which
colors look best on them, designer Linda Cahan told 150 retailers last week at the National Retail
Federation's convention.
Colors used in signs, window designs and merchandise send strong signals to customers,
signals that resonate right down to their chakras -- energy centers in the body, according to Asian
though -- said the Connecticut consultant.
Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 8
Analyze this article from the point of view of Culture and Personality studies.
32. Why is evil taken so seriously in Christianity, as if as important as goodness? Is it to
explain the bad things in peoples' lives, or does it lie within the Christian's mind as an
explanation to the temptation to so-called "bad" things?
33. What is the importance of make-believe in society and do you believe that your own
experience with make-believe has or will help you in your own lifetime? [If so, how?]
34. Define perception and describe the steps involved in the formation of a percept.
35. Professor Roufs has said that one can not think without the use of language. Alvarez
says one can think without using language. Who is right and why?
36. On page 187 of the text the authors state: "A goal of everyday-cognition studies is to
maximize cultural validity; to achieve this, some experimental control may be lost. And,
experimental methods must be combined with natural observation in particular cultural
milieus. What makes the research cross-cultural is more the method used than the
place where the research is carried on." Discuss this quote.
37. In class we were asked to smell the room and describe what we smelt. Why couldn't we
(students) describe what we smelt, and why couldn't we smell very much? If we grew up
in another culture could we have smelled more?
38. In Chapter Six,"Everyday Cognition," three different learning processes were discussed.
Describe these three processes and discuss their implications for Culture and
Personality.
39. Why is it that some cultures only see two colors and others, such as ours, see many.
40. How does cognition affect our personality?
or What effect does it have on our personality?
or How does cognition influence/shape our personality?
41. Anthropologists sometimes talk about "unobtrusive measures." Unobtrusive measures
are ways of getting information just by looking around at things that you can see, without
talking to anyone, interviewing anybody, or conducting an experiment or survey. Taking
a photograph of a public event, for example, would be an unobtrusive measure. Myth
analysis would be another example. A headline in the 23 January 1996 Duluth NewsTribune, about the John Beargrease dogsled race, reads "Dog Truckin': Handler's
Vehicles Show Personality." The article suggests that you can tell a lot about the dog
handler's personality by looking at her/his truck. Can studying a person's vehicle be a
valid unobtrusive measure of one's personality?
42. An article in the 23 January 1996 The New York Times (pp. B5, B10) reports that
humans have two brains, one in the gut and one in the head. "The gut has a mind of its
own, the enteric nervous system. Just like the larger brain in the head, researchers say,
Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 9
this system sends and receives impulses, records experiences and responds to
emotions. Its nerve cells are bathed and influenced the same neurotransmitters. The
gut can upset the brain just as the brain can upset the gut." They continue, "The 'brain in
the gut' takes the form of two networks of neural connections in the lining of the
gastrointestinal tract . . . . The nerves are highly interconnected and have direct
influence on things like the speed of digestion, the movement and secretions of the . . .
intestines and the contractions of the different kinds of muscle in the gut wall." The "gut
brain" also gives you the commonly known "gut feelings." The two brains are
interconnected; when one gets upset, the other does, too. Researchers note, "The brain
in the gut plays a major role in human happiness and misery." They also note, "The
human gut has long been seen as a repository of good and bad feelings." In sum, the
gut is not something wired directly to the brain in the skull, as has been thought in the
past; the gut has a brain of its own.
What will the discovery that we have two brains likely have on Culture and Personality
studies?
43. According to Linton, "Every society has a basic personality type." What does he mean by
this?
44. Why is it important to look at both the percepts and the concepts of an individual or
culture? When you begin comparing cultures, how do you handle the comparisons of
percepts and concepts? You may, if you wish, include in your answer a discussion of the
stages in sensory transmission -- but do not limit your answer to those stages.
45. Why are people so against the possibility that Margaret Mead may have been wrong with
her work on Samoa and Samoan sexual development?
46. Compare and contrast "basic personality" and "modal personality."
47. Chapter Two, ACross-Cultural Research: Scope and Methods@ argues for AThe Need for
a Global Perspective.@ Why is there a need for a global perspective in culture and
personality studies?
AThe five-factor model is comprised of five personality dimensions (OCEAN): Openness to Experience,
Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism. The five dimensions are held to be a complete
description of personality. A competing model with three dimensions based on psychophysiology is the PEN Model.
Extraversion and Agreeableness are only rotations of the dimensions in Interpersonal Theory.@ B
http://www.personalityresearch.org/bigfive.html
AThe PEN model is comprised of three personality dimensions based on psychophysiology: Psychoticism,
Extraversion, and Neuroticism. As dimensions of temperament, the three dimensions are related to Basic Emotions.
A competing model of personality structure is the Five-Factor Model.@ B
http://www.personalityresearch.org/pen.html
48. Chapter Two, ACross-Cultural Research: Scope and Methods,@outlines a Aconceptual
framework@ for cross-cultural psychology. Discuss that conceptual framework.
Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 10
49. Chapter Four discusses APerceptual and Cognitive Processes.@ In class we have been
looking at perception and conception and how they relate to culture. Explain the
cognitive processes of perception and conception and cite examples of how that affects
language and/or culture in your personal life.
50. Describe the difference between the "emic" and the "etic" approach to cross-cultural
psychology, and to the study of other cultures in general.
B. What are the advantages and disadvantages of each approach?
51. Compare and contrast the contributions of two of the following individuals in the area of
culture and personality research:
A.
A.
Lucien Lévy-Bruhl
B.
Ype H. Poortinga
(3)
Bronislaw Malinowski
(4)
W. H. R. Rivers
(5)
Ruth Benedict
(6)
Cora Du Bois
(7)
Edward Sapir
(8)
Margaret Mead
(9)
A. Irving Hallowell
(10)
James Frazer
(11)
Franz Boas
(12)
E. B. Tylor
(13)
Anthony F. C. Wallace
A.
Lucien Lévy-Bruhl
Louis Henry Morgan
52. Harry C. Triandis is often quoted in your text. In the 2002 edition of the Annual Review of
Psychology, (53:133-160) he and Eunkook M. Suh wrote an article called ACultural
Influences on Personality.@ An AAbstract@ of that article is attached as the last page of
this exam. Read the AAbstract.@ From what you know of Culture and Personality
discuss what you think the Triandis and Suh article might be about.
53. On page 36 of Psychological Anthropology Erika Bourguignon states, "The concept of a
species-specific "perceptual world" is of crucial importance in recognizing a uniquely
human mode of adaptation." What is "species-specific 'perceptual world?'" Do you
agree that it is of crucial importance in recognizing a uniquely human mode of
adaptation?" If so, why? If not, why not?
54. On page 34 of Psychological Anthropology Erika Bourguignon states, "Hallowell's
approach to human evolution was "conjunctive." Discuss what that means, and why it is
important.
Culture and Personality, 29 June 2017, page 11
55. ii. Do Chimps really use tools?
56. The same day The Guardian (Manchester, England) published the article e-mailed to you
earlier this week, “How Time Flies” (2/24/05), the The Guardian also published an article
entitled, “Tests of Faith: Religion May be a Survival Mechanism. So are we born to
believe?” by Ian Sample. Sample’s article is attached. Discuss Sample’s article from the
point of view of the nature – nurture controversy in culture and personality studies.
57.