Culture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Social and political organization varies between different cultures.

 

Celebrations, rituals and patterns of consumption are important aspects of folk culture.

 

Human symbolic expression developed as prehistoric humans reached behavioral modernity.

 

Religion and expressive art are important aspects of human culture.

Culture (/ˈkʌltʃər/) is the social behavior and norms found in human societies. Culture is considered a central concept in anthropology, encompassing the range of phenomena that are transmitted through social learning in human societies. Cultural universals are found in all human societies; these include expressive forms like art, music, dance, ritual, religion, and technologies like tool usage, cooking, shelter, and clothing. The concept of material culture covers the physical expressions of culture, such as technology, architecture and art, whereas the immaterial aspects of culture such as principles of social organization (including practices of political organization and social institutions), mythology, philosophy, literature (both written and oral), and science comprise the intangible cultural heritage of a society.

In the humanities, one sense of culture as an attribute of the individual has been the degree to which they have cultivated a particular level of sophistication in the arts, sciences, education, or manners. The level of cultural sophistication has also sometimes been seen to distinguish civilizations from less complex societies. Such hierarchical perspectives on culture are also found in class-based distinctions between a high culture of the social elite and a low culture, popular culture, or folk culture of the lower classes, distinguished by the stratified access to cultural capital. In common parlance, culture is often used to refer specifically to the symbolic markers used by ethnic groups to distinguish themselves visibly from each other such as body modification, clothing or jewelry. Mass culture refers to the mass-produced and mass mediated forms of consumer culture that emerged in the 20th century. Some schools of philosophy, such as Marxism and critical theory, have argued that culture is often used politically as a tool of the elites to manipulate the lower classes and create a false consciousness, and such perspectives are common in the discipline of cultural studies. In the wider social sciences, the theoretical perspective of cultural materialism holds that human symbolic culture arises from the material conditions of human life, as humans create the conditions for physical survival, and that the basis of culture is found in evolved biological dispositions.

When used as a count noun, a "culture" is the set of customs, traditions, and values of a society or community, such as an ethnic group or nation. Culture is the set of knowledge acquired over time. In this sense, multiculturalism values the peaceful coexistence and mutual respect between different cultures inhabiting the same planet. Sometimes "culture" is also used to describe specific practices within a subgroup of a society, a subculture (e.g. "bro culture"), or a counterculture. Within cultural anthropology, the ideology and analytical stance of cultural relativism holds that cultures cannot easily be objectively ranked or evaluated because any evaluation is necessarily situated within the value system of a given culture.

Etymology

The modern term "culture" is based on a term used by the Ancient Roman orator Cicero in his Tusculanae Disputationes, where he wrote of a cultivation of the soul or "cultura animi," using an agricultural metaphor for the development of a philosophical soul, understood teleologically as the highest possible ideal for human development. Samuel Pufendorf took over this metaphor in a modern context, meaning something similar, but no longer assuming that philosophy was man's natural perfection. His use, and that of many writers after him, "refers to all the ways in which human beings overcome their original barbarism, and through artifice, become fully human."

In 1986, philosopher Edward S. Casey wrote, "The very word culture meant 'place tilled' in Middle English, and the same word goes back to Latin colere, 'to inhabit, care for, till, worship' and cultus, 'A cult, especially a religious one.' To be cultural, to have a culture, is to inhabit a place sufficiently intensive to cultivate it—to be responsible for it, to respond to it, to attend to it caringly."
Culture described by Richard Velkley:

... originally meant the cultivation of the soul or mind, acquires most of its later modern meaning in the writings of the 18th-century German thinkers, who were on various levels developing Rousseau's criticism of "modern liberalism and Enlightenment". Thus a contrast between "culture" and "civilization" is usually implied in these authors, even when not expressed as such.

In the words of anthropologist E.B. Tylor, it is "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society." Alternatively, in a contemporary variant, "Culture is defined as a social domain that emphasizes the practices, discourses and material expressions, which, over time, express the continuities and discontinuities of social meaning of a life held in common.

The Cambridge English Dictionary states that culture is "the way of life, especially the general customs and beliefs, of a particular group of people at a particular time." Terror management theory posits that culture is a series of activities and worldviews that provide humans with the basis for perceiving themselves as "person[s] of worth within the world of meaning"—raising themselves above the merely physical aspects of existence, in order to deny the animal insignificance and death that Homo sapiens became aware of when they acquired a larger brain.

The word is used in a general sense as the evolved ability to categorize and represent experiences with symbols and to act imaginatively and creatively. This ability arose with the evolution of behavioral modernity in humans around 50,000 years ago, and is often thought to be unique to humans, although some other species have demonstrated similar, though much less complex, abilities for social learning. It is also used to denote the complex networks of practices and accumulated knowledge and ideas that is transmitted through social interaction and exist in specific human groups, or cultures, using the plural form.

Change

The Beatles exemplified changing cultural dynamics, not only in music, but fashion and lifestyle. Over a half century after their emergence, they continue to have a worldwide cultural impact.

It has been estimated from archaeological data that the human capacity for cumulative culture emerged somewhere between 500 000 - 170 000 years ago.

Raimon Panikkar identified 29 ways in which cultural change can be brought about, including growth, development, evolution, involution, renovation, reconception, reform, innovation, revivalism, revolution, mutation, progress, diffusion, osmosis, borrowing, eclecticism, syncretism, modernization, indigenization, and transformation. In this context, modernization could be viewed as adoption of Enlightenment era beliefs and practices, such as science, rationalism, industry, commerce, democracy, and the notion of progress. Rein Raud, building on the work of Umberto Eco, Pierre Bourdieu and Jeffrey C. Alexander, has proposed a model of cultural change based on claims and bids, which are judged by their cognitive adequacy and endorsed or not endorsed by the symbolic authority of the cultural community in question.

A 19th-century engraving showing Australian natives opposing the arrival of Captain James Cook in 1770

 

An Assyrian child wearing traditional clothing.

Cultural invention has come to mean any innovation that is new and found to be useful to a group of people and expressed in their behavior but which does not exist as a physical object. Humanity is in a global "accelerating culture change period," driven by the expansion of international commerce, the mass media, and above all, the human population explosion, among other factors. Culture repositioning means the reconstruction of the cultural concept of a society.

Full-length profile portrait of Turkman woman, standing on a carpet at the entrance to a yurt, dressed in traditional clothing and jewelry

Cultures are internally affected by both forces encouraging change and forces resisting change. These forces are related to both social structures and natural events, and are involved in the perpetuation of cultural ideas and practices within current structures, which themselves are subject to change.

Social conflict and the development of technologies can produce changes within a society by altering social dynamics and promoting new cultural models, and spurring or enabling generative action. These social shifts may accompany ideological shifts and other types of cultural change. For example, the U.S. feminist movement involved new practices that produced a shift in gender relations, altering both gender and economic structures. Environmental conditions may also enter as factors. For example, after tropical forests returned at the end of the last ice age, plants suitable for domestication were available, leading to the invention of agriculture, which in turn brought about many cultural innovations and shifts in social dynamics.

Cultures are externally affected via contact between societies, which may also produce—or inhibit—social shifts and changes in cultural practices. War or competition over resources may impact technological development or social dynamics. Additionally, cultural ideas may transfer from one society to another, through diffusion or acculturation. In diffusion, the form of something (though not necessarily its meaning) moves from one culture to another. For example, hamburgers, fast food in the United States, seemed exotic when introduced into China. "Stimulus diffusion" (the sharing of ideas) refers to an element of one culture leading to an invention or propagation in another. "Direct borrowing," on the other hand, tends to refer to technological or tangible diffusion from one culture to another. Diffusion of innovations theory presents a research-based model of why and when individuals and cultures adopt new ideas, practices, and products.

Acculturation has different meanings, but in this context it refers to replacement of the traits of one culture with those of another, such as what happened to certain Native American tribes and to many indigenous peoples across the globe during the process of colonization. Related processes on an individual level include assimilation (adoption of a different culture by an individual) and transculturation. The transnational flow of culture has played a major role in merging different culture and sharing thoughts, ideas, and beliefs.

Early modern discourses

German Romanticism

Johann Herder called attention to national cultures.

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) formulated an individualist definition of "enlightenment" similar to the concept of bildung: "Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-incurred immaturity." He argued that this immaturity comes not from a lack of understanding, but from a lack of courage to think independently. Against this intellectual cowardice, Kant urged: Sapere aude, "Dare to be wise!" In reaction to Kant, German scholars such as Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803) argued that human creativity, which necessarily takes unpredictable and highly diverse forms, is as important as human rationality. Moreover, Herder proposed a collective form of bildung: "For Herder, Bildung was the totality of experiences that provide a coherent identity, and sense of common destiny, to a people."

Adolf Bastian developed a universal model of culture.

In 1795, the Prussian linguist and philosopher Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835) called for an anthropology that would synthesize Kant's and Herder's interests. During the Romantic era, scholars in Germany, especially those concerned with nationalist movements—such as the nationalist struggle to create a "Germany" out of diverse principalities, and the nationalist struggles by ethnic minorities against the Austro-Hungarian Empire—developed a more inclusive notion of culture as "worldview" (Weltanschauung). According to this school of thought, each ethnic group has a distinct worldview that is incommensurable with the worldviews of other groups. Although more inclusive than earlier views, this approach to culture still allowed for distinctions between "civilized" and "primitive" or "tribal" cultures.

In 1860, Adolf Bastian (1826–1905) argued for "the psychic unity of mankind." He proposed that a scientific comparison of all human societies would reveal that distinct worldviews consisted of the same basic elements. According to Bastian, all human societies share a set of "elementary ideas" (Elementargedanken); different cultures, or different "folk ideas" (Völkergedanken), are local modifications of the elementary ideas. This view paved the way for the modern understanding of culture. Franz Boas (1858–1942) was trained in this tradition, and he brought it with him when he left Germany for the United States.

English Romanticism

British poet and critic Matthew Arnold viewed "culture" as the cultivation of the humanist ideal.

In the 19th century, humanists such as English poet and essayist Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) used the word "culture" to refer to an ideal of individual human refinement, of "the best that has been thought and said in the world." This concept of culture is also comparable to the German concept of bildung: "...culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has been thought and said in the world."

In practice, culture referred to an elite ideal and was associated with such activities as art, classical music, and haute cuisine. As these forms were associated with urban life, "culture" was identified with "civilization" (from lat. civitas, city). Another facet of the Romantic movement was an interest in folklore, which led to identifying a "culture" among non-elites. This distinction is often characterized as that between high culture, namely that of the ruling social group, and low culture. In other words, the idea of "culture" that developed in Europe during the 18th and early 19th centuries reflected inequalities within European societies.

British anthropologist Edward Tylor was one of the first English-speaking scholars to use the term culture in an inclusive and universal sense.

Matthew Arnold contrasted "culture" with anarchy; other Europeans, following philosophers Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, contrasted "culture" with "the state of nature." According to Hobbes and Rousseau, the Native Americans who were being conquered by Europeans from the 16th centuries on were living in a state of nature^{[citation needed]}; this opposition was expressed through the contrast between "civilized" and "uncivilized." According to this way of thinking, one could classify some countries and nations as more civilized than others and some people as more cultured than others. This contrast led to Herbert Spencer's theory of Social Darwinism and Lewis Henry Morgan's theory of cultural evolution. Just as some critics have argued that the distinction between high and low cultures is really an expression of the conflict between European elites and non-elites, other critics have argued that the distinction between civilized and uncivilized people is really an expression of the conflict between European colonial powers and their colonial subjects.

Other 19th-century critics, following Rousseau, have accepted this differentiation between higher and lower culture, but have seen the refinement and sophistication of high culture as corrupting and unnatural developments that obscure and distort people's essential nature. These critics considered folk music (as produced by "the folk," i.e., rural, illiterate, peasants) to honestly express a natural way of life, while classical music seemed superficial and decadent. Equally, this view often portrayed indigenous peoples as "noble savages" living authentic and unblemished lives, uncomplicated and uncorrupted by the highly stratified capitalist systems of the West.

In 1870 the anthropologist Edward Tylor (1832–1917) applied these ideas of higher versus lower culture to propose a theory of the evolution of religion. According to this theory, religion evolves from more polytheistic to more monotheistic forms. In the process, he redefined culture as a diverse set of activities characteristic of all human societies. This view paved the way for the modern understanding of culture.

Anthropology

Petroglyphs in modern-day Gobustan, Azerbaijan, dating back to 10,000 BCE and indicating a thriving culture

Although anthropologists worldwide refer to Tylor's definition of culture, in the 20th century "culture" emerged as the central and unifying concept of American anthropology, where it most commonly refers to the universal human capacity to classify and encode human experiences symbolically, and to communicate symbolically encoded experiences socially. American anthropology is organized into four fields, each of which plays an important role in research on culture: biological anthropology, linguistic anthropology, cultural anthropology, and in the United States, archaeology. The term Kulturbrille, or "culture glasses," coined by German American anthropologist Franz Boas, refers to the "lenses" through which we see our own countries. Martin Lindstrom asserts that Kulturbrille, which allow us to make sense of the culture we inhabit, also "can blind us to things outsiders pick up immediately."

Sociology

The sociology of culture concerns culture as manifested in society. For sociologist Georg Simmel (1858–1918), culture referred to "the cultivation of individuals through the agency of external forms which have been objectified in the course of history." As such, culture in the sociological field can be defined as the ways of thinking, the ways of acting, and the material objects that together shape a people's way of life. Culture can be any of two types, non-material culture or material culture. Non-material culture refers to the non-physical ideas that individuals have about their culture, including values, belief systems, rules, norms, morals, language, organizations, and institutions, while material culture is the physical evidence of a culture in the objects and architecture they make or have made. The term tends to be relevant only in archeological and anthropological studies, but it specifically means all material evidence which can be attributed to culture, past or present.

Cultural sociology first emerged in Weimar Germany (1918–1933), where sociologists such as Alfred Weber used the term Kultursoziologie (cultural sociology). Cultural sociology was then "reinvented" in the English-speaking world as a product of the "cultural turn" of the 1960s, which ushered in structuralist and postmodern approaches to social science. This type of cultural sociology may be loosely regarded as an approach incorporating cultural analysis and critical theory. Cultural sociologists tend to reject scientific methods, instead hermeneutically focusing on words, artifacts and symbols. "Culture" has since become an important concept across many branches of sociology, including resolutely scientific fields like social stratification and social network analysis. As a result, there has been a recent influx of quantitative sociologists to the field. Thus, there is now a growing group of sociologists of culture who are, confusingly, not cultural sociologists. These scholars reject the abstracted postmodern aspects of cultural sociology, and instead look for a theoretical backing in the more scientific vein of social psychology and cognitive science.

Early researchers and development of cultural sociology

The sociology of culture grew from the intersection between sociology (as shaped by early theorists like Marx, Durkheim, and Weber) with the growing discipline of anthropology, wherein researchers pioneered ethnographic strategies for describing and analyzing a variety of cultures around the world. Part of the legacy of the early development of the field lingers in the methods (much of cultural sociological research is qualitative), in the theories (a variety of critical approaches to sociology are central to current research communities), and in the substantive focus of the field. For instance, relationships between popular culture, political control, and social class were early and lasting concerns in the field.

Cultural studies

In the United Kingdom, sociologists and other scholars influenced by Marxism such as Stuart Hall (1932–2014) and Raymond Williams (1921–1988) developed cultural studies. Following nineteenth-century Romantics, they identified "culture" with consumption goods and leisure activities (such as art, music, film, food, sports, and clothing). They saw patterns of consumption and leisure as determined by relations of production, which led them to focus on class relations and the organization of production.

In the United States, cultural studies focuses largely on the study of popular culture; that is, on the social meanings of mass-produced consumer and leisure goods. Richard Hoggart coined the term in 1964 when he founded the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies or CCCS. It has since become strongly associated with Stuart Hall, who succeeded Hoggart as Director. Cultural studies in this sense, then, can be viewed as a limited concentration scoped on the intricacies of consumerism, which belongs to a wider culture sometimes referred to as "Western civilization" or "globalism."

From the 1970s onward, Stuart Hall's pioneering work, along with that of his colleagues Paul Willis, Dick Hebdige, Tony Jefferson, and Angela McRobbie, created an international intellectual movement. As the field developed, it began to combine political economy, communication, sociology, social theory, literary theory, media theory, film/video studies, cultural anthropology, philosophy, museum studies, and art history to study cultural phenomena or cultural texts. In this field researchers often concentrate on how particular phenomena relate to matters of ideology, nationality, ethnicity, social class, and/or gender. Cultural studies is concerned with the meaning and practices of everyday life. These practices comprise the ways people do particular things (such as watching television, or eating out) in a given culture. It also studies the meanings and uses people attribute to various objects and practices. Specifically, culture involves those meanings and practices held independently of reason. Watching television in order to view a public perspective on a historical event should not be thought of as culture, unless referring to the medium of television itself, which may have been selected culturally; however, schoolchildren watching television after school with their friends in order to "fit in" certainly qualifies, since there is no grounded reason for one's participation in this practice.

In the context of cultural studies, the idea of a text includes not only written language, but also films, photographs, fashion or hairstyles: the texts of cultural studies comprise all the meaningful artifacts of culture. Similarly, the discipline widens the concept of "culture." "Culture" for a cultural-studies researcher not only includes traditional high culture (the culture of ruling social groups) and popular culture, but also everyday meanings and practices. The last two, in fact, have become the main focus of cultural studies. A further and recent approach is comparative cultural studies, based on the disciplines of comparative literature and cultural studies.

Scholars in the United Kingdom and the United States developed somewhat different versions of cultural studies after the late 1970s. The British version of cultural studies had originated in the 1950s and 1960s, mainly under the influence of Richard Hoggart, E. P. Thompson, and Raymond Williams, and later that of Stuart Hall and others at the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham. This included overtly political, left-wing views, and criticisms of popular culture as "capitalist" mass culture; it absorbed some of the ideas of the Frankfurt School critique of the "culture industry" (i.e. mass culture). This emerges in the writings of early British cultural-studies scholars and their influences: see the work of (for example) Raymond Williams, Stuart Hall, Paul Willis, and Paul Gilroy.

In the United States, Lindlof and Taylor write, "Cultural studies [were] grounded in a pragmatic, liberal-pluralist tradition." The American version of cultural studies initially concerned itself more with understanding the subjective and appropriative side of audience reactions to, and uses of, mass culture; for example, American cultural-studies advocates wrote about the liberatory aspects of fandom. The distinction between American and British strands, however, has faded. Some researchers, especially in early British cultural studies, apply a Marxist model to the field. This strain of thinking has some influence from the Frankfurt School, but especially from the structuralist Marxism of Louis Althusser and others. The main focus of an orthodox Marxist approach concentrates on the production of meaning. This model assumes a mass production of culture and identifies power as residing with those producing cultural artifacts. In a Marxist view, those who control the means of production (the economic base) essentially control a culture. Other approaches to cultural studies, such as feminist cultural studies and later American developments of the field, distance themselves from this view. They criticize the Marxist assumption of a single, dominant meaning, shared by all, for any cultural product. The non-Marxist approaches suggest that different ways of consuming cultural artifacts affect the meaning of the product. This view comes through in the book Doing Cultural Studies: The Story of the Sony Walkman (by Paul du Gay et al.), which seeks to challenge the notion that those who produce commodities control the meanings that people attribute to them. Feminist cultural analyst, theorist, and art historian Griselda Pollock contributed to cultural studies from viewpoints of art history and psychoanalysis. The writer Julia Kristeva is among influential voices at the turn of the century, contributing to cultural studies from the field of art and psychoanalytical French feminism.

Petrakis and Kostis (2013) divide cultural background variables into two main groups:

1. The first group covers the variables that represent the "efficiency orientation" of the societies: performance orientation, future orientation, assertiveness, power distance and uncertainty avoidance.
2. The second covers the variables that represent the "social orientation" of societies, i.e., the attitudes and lifestyles of their members. These variables include gender egalitarianism, institutional collectivism, in-group collectivism and human orientation.

In 2016, a new approach to culture was suggested by Rein Raud, who defines culture as the sum of resources available to human beings for making sense of their world and proposes a two-tiered approach, combining the study of texts (all reified meanings in circulation) and cultural practices (all repeatable actions that involve the production, dissemination or transmission of meanings), thus making it possible to re-link anthropological and sociological study of culture with the tradition of textual theory.

Cross-cultural psychology

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cross-cultural psychology is the scientific study of human behavior and mental processes, including both their variability and invariance, under diverse cultural conditions. Through expanding research methodologies to recognize cultural variance in behavior, language, and meaning it seeks to extend and develop psychology. Since psychology as an academic discipline was developed largely in North America and Europe, some psychologists became concerned that constructs accepted as universal were not as invariant as previously assumed, especially since many attempts to replicate notable experiments in other cultures had varying success. Since there are questions as to whether theories dealing with central themes, such as affect, cognition, conceptions of the self, and issues such as psychopathology, anxiety, and depression, may lack external validity when "exported" to other cultural contexts, cross-cultural psychology re-examines them using methodologies designed to factor in cultural differences so as to account for cultural variance. Although some critics have pointed to methodological flaws in cross-cultural psychological research and claim that serious shortcomings in the theoretical and methodological bases used impede rather than help the scientific search for universal principles in psychology, cross-cultural psychologists are turning more to the study of how differences (variance) occur, rather than searching for universals in the style of physics or chemistry.

While cross-cultural psychology represented only a minor area of psychology prior to WWII, it began to grow in importance during the 1960s. In 1971, the interdisciplinary Society for Cross-Cultural Research (SCCR) was founded, and in 1972 the International Association of Cross-Cultural Psychology (IACCP) was established. Since then, this branch of psychology has continued to expand as there has been an increasing popularity of incorporating culture and diversity into studies of numerous psychological phenomena.

Cross-cultural psychology is differentiated from cultural psychology, which refers to the branch of psychology that holds that human behavior is strongly influenced by cultural differences, meaning that psychological phenomena can only be compared with each other across cultures to a limited extent. In contrast, cross-cultural psychology includes a search for possible universals in behavior and mental processes. Cross-cultural psychology "can be thought of as a type [of] research methodology, rather than an entirely separate field within psychology". In addition, cross-cultural psychology can be distinguished from international psychology which centers around the global expansion of psychology especially during recent decades. Nevertheless, cross-cultural psychology, cultural psychology, and international psychology are united by a common concern for expanding psychology into a universal discipline capable of understanding psychological phenomena across cultures and in a global context.

Definitions and early work

Two definitions of the field include: "the scientific study of human behavior and its transmission, taking into account the ways in which behaviors are shaped and influenced by social and cultural forces" and "the empirical study of members of various cultural groups who have had different experiences that lead to predictable and significant differences in behavior". Culture, as a whole, may also be defined as "the shared way of life of a group of people." In contrast to sociologists, most cross-cultural psychologists do not draw a clear dividing line between social structure and cultural belief systems.

Early work in cross-cultural psychology was suggested in Lazarus and Steinthal's journal Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft [Journal of Folk Psychology and Language Science], which began to be published in 1860. More empirically oriented research was subsequently conducted by Williams H. R. Rivers (1864–1922) who attempted to measure the intelligence and sensory acuity of indigenous people residing in the Torres Straits area, located between Australia and New Guinea. The father of modern psychology, Wilhelm Wundt, published ten volumes on Völkerpsychologie (a kind of historically oriented cultural psychology), but these volumes have had only limited influence in the English-speaking world. Wundt's student Franz Boas, an anthropologist at Columbia University, challenged several of his students such as Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead to study psychological phenomena in nonwestern cultures such as Japan, Samoa, and New Guinea. They emphasized the enormous cultural variability of many psychological phenomena thereby challenging psychologists to prove the cross-cultural validity of their favorite theories.

Etic v. emic perspectives

Other fields of psychology focus on how personal relationships impact human behavior; however, they fail to take into account the significant impact that culture may have on human behavior. The Malinowskian dictum focuses on the idea that there is a necessity to understand the culture of a society in its own terms instead of the common search for finding universal laws that apply to all human behavior. Cross-culture psychologists have used the emic/etic distinction for some time. The emic approach studies behavior from within the culture, and mostly is based on one culture; the etic approach studies behavior from outside the culture system, and is based on many cultures. Currently, many psychologists conducting cross-cultural research are said to use what is called a pseudoetic approach. This pseudoetic approach is actually an emic based approach developed in a Western culture while being designed to work as an etic approach. Irvine and Carroll brought an intelligence test to another culture without checking whether the test was measuring what it was intended to measure. This can be considered pseudoetic work because various cultures have their own concepts for intelligence.

Research and applications

Geert Hofstede and the dimensions of culture

The Dutch psychologist Geert Hofstede revolutionized the field doing worldwide research on values for IBM in the 1970s. Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory is not only the springboard for one of the most active research traditions in cross-cultural psychology, but is also cited extensively in the management literature. His initial work found that cultures differ on four dimensions: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity-femininity, and individualism-collectivism. Later, after The Chinese Culture Connection extended his research using indigenous Chinese materials, he added a fifth dimension - long-term orientation (originally called Confucian dynamism) - which can be found in other cultures besides China. Still later, after work with Michael Minkov using data from the World Values Survey, he added a sixth dimension - indulgence versus restraint.

Despite its popularity, Hofstede's work has been seriously questioned by McSweeney (2002). Furthermore, Berry et al. challenge some of the work of Hofstede, proposing alternative measures to assess individualism and collectivism. Indeed, the individualism-collectivism debate has itself proven to be problematic, with Sinha and Tripathi (1994) arguing that strong individualistic and collectivistic orientations may coexist in the same culture (they discuss India in this connection).

Counseling and clinical psychology

Cross-cultural clinical psychologists (e.g., Jefferson Fish) and counseling psychologists (e.g., Lawrence H. Gerstein, Roy Moodley, and Paul Pedersen) have applied principles of cross-cultural psychology to psychotherapy and counseling. Additionally, the book by Uwe P. Gielen, Juris G. Draguns, and Jefferson M. Fish titled "Principles of Multicultural Counseling and Therapy" contains numerous chapters on the application of culture in counseling. Joan D. Koss-Chioino, Louise Baca, and Luis A. Varrga are all listed in this book (in the chapter titled "Group Therapy with Mexican American and Mexican Adolescents: Focus on Culture) as working with Latinos in their way of therapy that is known to be "culturally sensitive". For example, in their therapy they create a "fourth life space" that allows children/adolescents to reflect on difficulties they may be facing. Furthermore, in the book it is stated that various countries are now starting to incorporate multicultural interventions into their counseling practices. The countries listed included: Malaysia, Kuwait, China, Israel, Australia, and Serbia. Lastly, in the chapter titled "Multiculturalism and School Counseling: Creating Relevant Comprehensive Guidance and Counseling Programs," Hardin L. K. Coleman, and Jennifer J. Lindwall propose a way to incorporate cultural components into school counseling programs. Specifically, they emphasize the necessity of the counselor's having multicultural competence and the ability to apply this knowledge when working with persons of varying ethnic backgrounds. In addition, several recent volumes have reviewed the state of counseling psychology and psychotherapy around the world while discussing cross-cultural similarities and differences in counseling practices.

Five-factor model of personality

Can the traits defined by American psychologists be generalized across people from different countries? In response to this questions, cross-cultural psychologists have often questioned how to compare traits across cultures. To examine this question, lexical studies measuring personality factors using trait adjectives from various languages have been conducted. Over time these studies have concluded that the factors of Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness almost always appear, yet Neuroticism and Openness to Experience sometimes do not. Therefore, it is difficult to determine whether these traits are nonexistent in certain cultures or whether different sets of adjectives must be used to measure them. However, many researches believe that the FFM is a universal structure and can be used within cross-cultural research and research studies in general. However, other cultures may include even more significant traits that go beyond those traits included in the FFM.

Emotion judgments

Researchers have often wondered whether people across various cultures interpret emotions in similar ways. In the field of cross-cultural psychology, Paul Ekman has conducted research examining judgments in facial expression cross-culturally. One of his studies included participants from ten different cultures who were required to indicate emotions and the intensity of each emotion based upon picture of persons expressing various emotions. The results of the study showed that there was agreement across cultures as to which emotions were the most and second most intense. These findings provide support for the view that there are at least some universal facial expressions of emotion. Nevertheless, it is also important to note that in the study there were differences in the way in which participants across cultures rated emotion intensity.

While there are said to be universally recognized facial expressions, Yueqin Huang and his colleagues performed research that looked at how a culture may apply different labels to certain expressions of emotions. Huang et al. (2001) in particular compared Chinese versus American perceptions of facial emotion expressions. They found that the Chinese participants were not as skilled as the American participants at perceiving the universal emotional expressions of people coming from a culture different than their own. These findings show support for the notion that cross-cultural differences exist in emotional judgement. Huang et al. (2001) suggest that Asians may use different cues on the face to interpret the emotional expression. Also, because every culture has different values and norms, it is important to analyze those differences in order to gain a better understanding as to why certain emotions are either interpreted differently or not at all. For example, as Huang et al. (2001) point out, it is common for ‘negative emotions’ not to be welcomed in many Asian cultures. This important information may be critical in recognizing the cross-cultural difference between Asian and American judgments of the universal emotional expressions.

Differences in subjective well-being

The term "subjective well-being" is frequently used throughout psychology research and is made up of three main parts: 1) life satisfaction (a cognitive evaluation of one's overall life), 2) the presence of positive emotional experiences, and 3) the absence of negative emotional experiences. Across cultures people may have differing opinions on the "ideal" level of subjective well-being. For example, Brazilians have been shown in studies to find positive emotions very desirable whereas the Chinese did not score as highly on the desire for positive emotions. Consequently, when comparing subjective well-being cross-culturally it appears important to take into account how the individuals in one culture may rate one aspect differently from individuals from another culture. It is difficult to identify a universal indicator as to how much subjective well-being individuals in different societies experience over a period of time. One important topic is whether individuals from individualistic or collectivistic countries are happier and rate higher on subjective well-being. Diener, Diener, and Diener, 1995, noted that individualist cultural members are found to be happier than collectivist cultural members. It is also important to note that happier nations may not always be the wealthier nations. While there are strong associations between cultural average income and subjective well-being, the "richer=happier" argument is still a topic of hot debate. One factor that may contribute to this debate is that nations that are economically stable may also contain various non-materialistic features such as a more stable democratic government, better enforcement of human rights, etc. that could overall contribute to a higher subjective well-being. Therefore, it has yet to be determined whether a higher level of subjective well-being is linked to material affluence or whether it is shaped by other features that wealthy societies often possess and that may serve as intermediate links between affluence and well-being.

How different cultures resolve conflict

Grossmann et al. use evidence to show how cultures differ in the ways they approach social conflict and how culture continues to be an important factor in human development even into old age. Specifically, the paper examines aging-related differences in wise reasoning among the American and Japanese cultures. Participants' responses revealed that wisdom (e.g., recognition of multiple perspectives, one's limits of personal knowledge, and the importance of compromise) increased with age among Americans, but older age was not directly associated with wiser responses amongst the Japanese participants. Furthermore, younger and middle-aged Japanese participants illustrated higher scores than Americans for resolving group conflicts. Grossmann et al. found that Americans tend to emphasize individuality and solve conflict in a direct manner, while the Japanese place an emphasis on social cohesion and settle conflict more indirectly. The Japanese are motivated to maintain interpersonal harmony and avoid conflict, resolve conflict better, and are wiser earlier in their lives. Americans experience conflict gradually, which results in continuous learning about how to solve conflict and increased wisdom in their later years. The current study supported the concept that varying cultures use different methods to resolve conflict.

Differences in conflict resolution across cultures can also be seen with the inclusion of a third party. These differences can be found when a third party becomes involved and provides a solution to the conflict. Asian and American cultural practices play a role in the way the members of the two cultures handle conflict. A technique used by Korean-Americans may reflect Confucian values while the American technique will be consistent with their individualistic and capitalistic views. Americans will have more structure in their processes which provides standards for similar situations in the future. Contrary to American ways, Korean-Americans will not have as much structure in resolving their conflicts, but more flexibility while solving a problem. For Korean-Americans, the correct way may not always be set but can usually be narrowed down to a few possible solutions.

Gender-role and gender-identity differences and similarities

Williams and Best (1990) have looked at different societies in terms of prevailing gender stereotypes, gender-linked self-perceptions, and gender roles. The authors found both universal similarities as well as differences between and within more than 30 nations. The Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology also contains a fine review on the topic of Sex, Gender, and Culture. One of the main findings overall was that under the topic of sex and gender, pan-cultural similarities were shown to be greater than cultural differences. Furthermore, across cultures the way in which men and women relate to one another in social groups has been shown to be fairly similar. Further calls have been made to examine theories of gender development as well as how culture influences the behavior of both males and females.

Cross-cultural human development

This topic represents a specialized area of cross-cultural psychology and can be viewed as the study of cultural similarities and differences in developmental processes and their outcomes as expressed by behavior and mental processes in individuals and groups. As presented by Bornstein (2010), Gielen and Roopnarine (2016) and Gardiner and Kosmitzki (2010), researchers in this area have examined various topics and domains of psychology (e.g., theories and methodology, socialization, families, gender roles and gender differences, the effects of immigration on identity), human development across the human life cycle in various parts of the world, children in difficult circumstances such as street children and war-traumatized adolescents, and global comparisons between, and influences on, children and adults. Because only 3.4% of the world's children live in the United States, such research is urgently needed to correct the ethnocentric presentations that can be found in many American textbooks (Gielen, 2016).

Berry et al. refer to evidence that a number of different dimensions have been found in cross-cultural comparisons of childrearing practices, including differences on the dimensions of obedience training, responsibility training, nurturance training (the degree to which a sibling will care for other siblings or for older people), achievement training, self-reliance, and autonomy; Moreover, the Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology Volume 2 contains an extensive chapter (The Cultural Structuring of Child Development by Charles M. Super and Sara Harkness) on cross-cultural influences on child development. They stated that three recurring topics were shown to consistently come up during their review: "how best to conceptualize variability within and across cultural settings, to characterize activities of the child's mind, and to improve methodological research in culture and development."

Future developments

The rise of cross-cultural psychology reflects a general process of globalization in the social sciences that seeks to purify specific areas of research which have western biases. In this way, cross-cultural psychology (together with international psychology) aims to make psychology less ethnocentric in character than it has been in the past. Cross-cultural psychology is now taught at numerous universities located around the world, both as a specific content area as well as a methodological approach designed to broaden the field of psychology.

Humanistic psychology

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Humanistic psychology is a psychological perspective that rose to prominence in the mid-20th century in answer to the limitations of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory and B. F. Skinner's behaviorism. With its roots running from Socrates through the Renaissance, this approach emphasizes individuals' inherent drive towards self-actualization, the process of realizing and expressing one's own capabilities and creativity. 

It helps the client gain the belief that all people are inherently good. It adopts a holistic approach to human existence and pays special attention to such phenomena as creativity, free will, and positive human potential. It encourages viewing ourselves as a "whole person" greater than the sum of our parts and encourages self exploration rather than the study of behavior in other people. Humanistic psychology acknowledges spiritual aspiration as an integral part of the psyche. It is linked to the emerging field of transpersonal psychology.

Primarily, this type of therapy encourages a self-awareness and mindfulness that helps the client change their state of mind and behaviour from one set of reactions to a healthier one with more productive self-awareness and thoughtful actions. Essentially, this approach allows the merging of mindfulness and behavioural therapy, with positive social support.

In an article from the Association for Humanistic Psychology, the benefits of humanistic therapy are described as having a "crucial opportunity to lead our troubled culture back to its own healthy path. More than any other therapy, Humanistic-Existential therapy models democracy. It imposes ideologies of others upon the client less than other therapeutic practices. Freedom to choose is maximized. We validate our clients' human potential."

In the 20th century, humanistic psychology was referred to as the "third force" in psychology, distinct from earlier, even less humanistic approaches of psychoanalysis and behaviorism. In our post industrial society, humanistic psychology has become more significant; for example, neither psychoanalysis nor behaviorism could have birthed emotional intelligence.

Its principal professional organizations in the US are the Association for Humanistic Psychology and the Society for Humanistic Psychology (Division 32 of the American Psychological Association). In Britain, there is the UK Association for Humanistic Psychology Practitioners.

Origins

One of humanistic psychology's early sources was the work of Carl Rogers, who was strongly influenced by Otto Rank, who broke with Freud in the mid-1920s. Rogers' focus was to ensure that the developmental processes led to healthier, if not more creative, personality functioning. The term 'actualizing tendency' was also coined by Rogers, and was a concept that eventually led Abraham Maslow to study self-actualization as one of the needs of humans. Rogers and Maslow introduced this positive, humanistic psychology in response to what they viewed as the overly pessimistic view of psychoanalysis.

The other sources of inspiration include the philosophies of existentialism and phenomenology.

Conceptual origins

The humanistic approach has its roots in phenomenological and existentialist thought). Eastern philosophy and psychology also play a central role in humanistic psychology, as well as Judeo-Christian philosophies of personalism, as each shares similar concerns about the nature of human existence and consciousness.

Carl Rogers (1902–1987), one of the founders of humanistic psychology.

As behaviorism grew out of Ivan Pavlov's work with the conditioned reflex, and laid the foundations for academic psychology in the United States associated with the names of John B. Watson and B.F. Skinner, Abraham Maslow gave behaviorism the name "the second force". Historically "the first force" were psychologists like Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, Erik Erikson, Carl Jung, Erich Fromm, Karen Horney, Melanie Klein, Harry Stack Sullivan, and others.

In the late 1930s, psychologists, interested in the uniquely human issues, such as the self, self-actualization, health, hope, love, creativity, nature, being, becoming, individuality, and meaning—that is, a concrete understanding of human existence, included Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, and Clark Moustakas, who were interested in founding a professional association dedicated to a psychology focused on these features of human capital demanded by post-industrial society.

The humanistic psychology perspective is summarized by five core principles or postulates of humanistic psychology first articulated in an article written by James Bugental in 1964 and adapted by Tom Greening, psychologist and long-time editor of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology. The five basic principles of humanistic psychology are:

1. Human beings, as human, supersede the sum of their parts. They cannot be reduced to components.
2. Human beings have their existence in a uniquely human context, as well as in a cosmic ecology.
3. Human beings are aware and are aware of being aware - i.e., they are conscious. Human consciousness always includes an awareness of oneself in the context of other people.
4. Human beings have the ability to make choices and therefore have responsibility.
5. Human beings are intentional, aim at goals, are aware that they cause future events, and seek meaning, value, and creativity.

While humanistic psychology is a specific division within the American Psychological Association (Division 32), humanistic psychology is not so much a discipline within psychology as a perspective on the human condition that informs psychological research and practice.

Practical origins

WWII created practical pressures on military psychologists, they had more patients to see and care for than time or resources permitted. The origins of group therapy are here. Eric Berne's progression of books shows this transition out of what we might call pragmatic psychology of WW II into his later innovation, Transactional Analysis, one of the most influential forms of humanistic Popular Psychology of the later 1960s-1970.

Orientation to scientific research

Humanistic psychologists generally do not believe that we will understand human consciousness and behavior through Cartesian-Newtonian scientific research. The objection that humanistic psychologists have to traditional research methods is that they are derived from and suited for the physical sciences and not especially appropriate to studying the complexities and nuances of human meaning-making.

However, humanistic psychology has involved scientific research of human behavior since its inception. For example:

• Abraham Maslow proposed many of his theories of human growth in the form of testable hypotheses, and he encouraged human scientists to put them to the test.
• Shortly after the founding of the American Association of Humanistic Psychology, its president, psychologist Sidney Jourard, began his column by declaring that "research" is a priority. "Humanistic Psychology will be best served if it is undergirded with research that seeks to throw light on the qualities of man that are uniquely human" (emphasis added).
• In May 1966, the AAHP release a newsletter editorial that confirmed the humanistic psychologist's "allegiance to meaningfulness in the selection of problems for study and of research procedures, and an opposition to a primary emphasis on objectivity at the expense of significance." This underscored the importance of research to humanistic psychologists as well as their interest in special forms of human science investigation.
• Likewise, in 1980, the American Psychological Association's publication for humanistic psychology (Division 32 of APA) ran an article titled, What makes research humanistic? As Donald Polkinghorne notes, "Humanistic theory does not propose that human action is completely independent of the environment or the mechanical and organic orders of the body, but it does suggest that, within the limits of experienced meanings, persons as unities can choose to act in ways not determined by prior events...and this is the theory we seek to test through our research" (p. 3).

A human science view is not opposed to quantitative methods, but, following Edmund Husserl:

1. favors letting the methods be derived from the subject matter and not uncritically adopting the methods of natural science, and
2. advocates for methodological pluralism. Consequently, much of the subject matter of psychology lends itself to qualitative approaches (e.g. the lived experience of grief), and quantitative methods are mainly appropriate when something can be counted without leveling the phenomena (e.g. the length of time spent crying).

Research has remained part of the humanistic psychology agenda, though with more of a holistic than reductionistic focus. Specific humanistic research methods evolved in the decades following the formation of the humanistic psychology movement.

Development of the field

These preliminary meetings eventually led to other developments, which culminated in the description of humanistic psychology as a recognizable "third force" in psychology (first force: psychoanalysis, second force: behaviorism). Significant developments included the formation of the Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP) in 1961 and the launch of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology (originally "The Phoenix") in 1961.

Subsequently, graduate programs in Humanistic Psychology at institutions of higher learning grew in number and enrollment. In 1971, humanistic psychology as a field was recognized by the American Psychological Association (APA) and granted its own division (Division 32) within the APA. Division 32 publishes its own academic journal called The Humanistic Psychologist.

The major theorists considered to have prepared the ground for Humanistic Psychology are Otto Rank, Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers and Rollo May. Maslow was heavily influenced by Kurt Goldstein during their years together at Brandeis University. Psychoanalytic writers also influenced humanistic psychology. Maslow himself famously acknowledged his "indebtedness to Freud" in Towards a Psychology of Being Other psychoanalytic influences include the work of Wilhelm Reich, who discussed an essentially 'good', healthy core self and Character Analysis (1933), and Carl Gustav Jung's mythological and archetypal emphasis. Other noteworthy inspirations for, and leaders of the movement include Roberto Assagioli, Gordon Allport, Medard Boss, Martin Buber (close to Jacob L. Moreno), James Bugental, Viktor Frankl, Erich Fromm, Hans-Werner Gessmann, Amedeo Giorgi, Kurt Goldstein, Sidney Jourard, R. D. Laing, Clark Moustakas, Lewis Mumford, Fritz Perls, Anthony Sutich, Thomas Szasz, Kirk J. Schneider, and Ken Wilber. Carl Rogers was trained in psychoanalysis before developing humanistic psychology.

Counseling and therapy

Diagram illustrating the "hierarchy of needs" theory of Abraham Maslow (1908–1970). Click to enlarge.

The aim of humanistic therapy is usually to help the client develop a stronger and healthier sense of self, also called self-actualization. Humanistic therapy attempts to teach clients that they have potential for self-fulfillment. This type of therapy is insight-based, meaning that the therapist attempts to provide the client with insights about their inner conflicts.

Approaches

Humanistic psychology includes several approaches to counseling and therapy. Among the earliest approaches we find the developmental theory of Abraham Maslow, emphasizing a hierarchy of needs and motivations; the existential psychology of Rollo May acknowledging human choice and the tragic aspects of human existence; and the person-centered or client-centered therapy of Carl Rogers, which is centered on the client's capacity for self-direction and understanding of his or her own development. Client-centered therapy is non-directive; the therapist listens to the client without judgement, allowing the client to come to insights by themselves. The therapist should ensure that all of the client’s feelings are being considered and that the therapist has a firm grasp on the concerns of the client while ensuring that there is an air of acceptance and warmth. Client-centered therapist engages in active listening during therapy sessions.

A therapist cannot be completely non-directive; however, a nonjudgmental, accepting environment that provides unconditional positive regard will encourage feelings of acceptance and value.

Existential psychotherapies, an application of humanistic psychology, applies existential philosophy, which emphasizes the idea that humans have the freedom to make sense of their lives. They are free to define themselves and do whatever it is they want to do. This is a type of humanistic therapy that forces the client to explore the meaning of their life, as well as its purpose. There is a conflict between having freedoms and having limitations. Examples of limitations include genetics, culture, and many other factors. Existential therapy involves trying to resolve this conflict.

Another approach to humanistic counseling and therapy is Gestalt therapy, which puts a focus on the here and now, especially as an opportunity to look past any preconceived notions and focus on how the present is affected by the past. Role playing also plays a large role in Gestalt therapy and allows for a true expression of feelings that may not have been shared in other circumstances. In Gestalt therapy, non-verbal cues are an important indicator of how the client may actually be feeling, despite the feelings expressed.

Also part of the range of humanistic psychotherapy are concepts from depth therapy, holistic health, encounter groups, sensitivity training, marital and family therapies, body work, the existential psychotherapy of Medard Boss, and Positive Psychology.

Most recently Compassionate Communication, the rebranding of Nonviolent Communication of Marshall Rosenberg seems to be the leading edge of innovation in this field because it is one of very few psychologies with both a simple and clear model of the human psyche and a simple and clear methodology, suitable for any two persons to address and resolve interpersonal conflict without expert intervention, a first in the field.

George Kelly's humanistic theory is based on Fundamental Postulate, where a person acts on anticipation of future events. Stating that a person's actions are based on expectation of possible events and interpretation from past circumstances.

Empathy and self-help

Empathy is one of the most important aspects of humanistic therapy. This idea focuses on the therapist’s ability to see the world through the eyes of the client. Without this, therapists can be forced to apply an external frame of reference where the therapist is no longer understanding the actions and thoughts of the client as the client would, but strictly as a therapist which defeats the purpose of humanistic therapy. Included in empathizing, unconditional positive regard is one of the key elements of humanistic psychology. Unconditional positive regard refers to the care that the therapist needs to have for the client. This ensures that the therapist does not become the authority figure in the relationship allowing for a more open flow of information as well as a kinder relationship between the two. A therapist practicing humanistic therapy needs to show a willingness to listen and ensure the comfort of the patient where genuine feelings may be shared but are not forced upon someone. Marshall Rosenberg, one of Carl Rogers' students, emphasizes empathy in the relationship in his concept of Nonviolent Communication.

Self-help is also part of humanistic psychology: Sheila Ernst and Lucy Goodison have described using some of the main humanistic approaches in self-help groups. Humanistic Psychology is applicable to self-help because it is oriented towards changing the way a person thinks. One can only improve once they decide to change their ways of thinking about themselves, once they decide to help themselves. Co-counselling, which is an approach based purely on self-help, is regarded as coming from humanistic psychology as well. Humanistic theory has had a strong influence on other forms of popular therapy, including Harvey Jackins' Re-evaluation Counselling and the work of Carl Rogers, including his student Eugene Gendlin; as well as on the development of the Humanistic Psychodrama by Hans-Werner Gessmann since the 80s.

The ideal self

The ideal self and real self involve understanding the issues that arise from having an idea of what you wish you were as a person, and having that not match with who you actually are as a person (incongruence). The ideal self is what a person believes should be done, as well as what their core values are. The real self is what is actually played out in life. Through humanistic therapy, an understanding of the present allows clients to add positive experiences to their real self-concept. The goal is to have the two concepts of self become congruent. Rogers believed that only when a therapist was able to be congruent, a real relationship occurs in therapy. It is much easier to trust someone who is willing to share feelings openly, even if it may not be what the client always wants; this allows the therapist to foster a strong relationship.

Non-pathological

Humanistic psychology tends to look beyond the medical model of psychology in order to open up a nonpathologizing view of the person. This usually implies that the therapist downplays the pathological aspects of a person's life in favour of the healthy aspects. Humanistic psychology tries to be a science of human experience, focusing on the actual lived experience of persons. Therefore, a key ingredient is the actual meeting of therapist and client and the possibilities for dialogue to ensue between them. The role of the therapist is to create an environment where the client can freely express any thoughts or feelings; he does not suggest topics for conversation nor does he guide the conversation in any way. The therapist also does not analyze or interpret the client’s behavior or any information the client shares. The role of the therapist is to provide empathy and to listen attentively to the client.

Societal applications

Social change

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  Virginia Satir
  
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  Erich Fromm
  
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  R. D. Laing
  
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  Alfred Adler
  
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  Wilhelm Reich

While personal transformation may be the primary focus of most humanistic psychologists, many also investigate pressing social, cultural, and gender issues. In an academic anthology from 2018, British psychologist Richard House and his co-editors wrote, "From its very outset, Humanistic Psychology has engaged fulsomely and fearlessly with the social, cultural and political, in a way that much of mainstream scientific, 'positivistic' psychology has sought to avoid". Some of the earliest writers who were associated with and inspired by psychological humanism explored socio-political topics. For example:

• Alfred Adler argued that achieving a sense of community feeling is essential to human development.

• Medard Boss defined health as an openness to the world, and unhealth as anything in the psyche or society that blocked or constricted that openness.

• Erich Fromm argued that the totalitarian impulse is rooted in people's fear of the uncertainties and responsibilities of freedom – and that the way to overcome that fear is to dare to live life fully and compassionately.

• R. D. Laing analyzed the political nature of "normal", everyday experience.

• Rollo May said that people have lost their values in the modern world, and that their health and humanity depends on having the courage to forge new values appropriate to the challenges of the present.

• Wilhelm Reich argued that psychological problems are often caused by sexual repression, and that the latter is influenced by social and political conditions – which can and should be changed.

• Carl Rogers came to believe that political life did not have to consist of an endless series of winner-take-all battles, that it could and should consist of an ongoing dialogue among all parties. If such dialogue were characterized by respect among the parties and authentic speaking by each party, compassionate understanding and – ultimately – mutually acceptable solutions could be reached.

• Virginia Satir was convinced that her approach to family therapy would enable individuals to expand their consciousness, become less fearful, and bring communities, cultures, and nations together.

Relevant work was not confined to these pioneer thinkers. In 1978, members of the Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP) embarked on a three-year effort to explore how the principles of humanistic psychology could be used to further the process of positive social and political change. The effort included a "12-Hour Political Party", held in San Francisco in 1980, where nearly 1,400 attendees discussed presentations by such non-traditional social thinkers as Ecotopia author Ernest Callenbach, Aquarian Conspiracy author Marilyn Ferguson, Person/Planet author Theodore Roszak, and New Age Politics author Mark Satin. The emergent perspective was summarized in a manifesto by AHP President George Leonard. It proffered such ideas as moving to a slow-growth or no-growth economy, decentralizing and "deprofessionalizing" society, and teaching social and emotional competencies in order to provide a foundation for more humane public policies and a healthier culture.

There have been many other attempts to articulate humanistic-psychology-oriented approaches to social change. For example, in 1979 psychologist Kenneth Lux and economist Mark A. Lutz called for a new economics based on humanistic psychology rather than utilitarianism. Also in 1979, California state legislator John Vasconcellos published a book calling for the integration of liberal politics and humanistic-psychological insight. From 1979–1983 the New World Alliance, a U.S. political organization based in Washington, D.C., attempted to inject humanistic-psychology ideas into political thinking and processes; sponsors of its newsletter included Vasconcellos and Carl Rogers.

In 1989 Maureen O'Hara, who had worked with both Carl Rogers and Paolo Freire, pointed to a convergence between the two thinkers. According to O'Hara, both focus on developing critical consciousness of situations which oppress and dehumanize. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Institute of Noetic Sciences president Willis Harman argued that significant social change cannot occur without significant consciousness change. In the 21st century, humanistic psychologists such as Edmund Bourne, Joanna Macy, and Marshall Rosenberg continued to apply psychological insights to social and political issues.

In addition to its uses in thinking about social change, humanistic psychology is considered to be the main theoretical and methodological source of humanistic social work.

Social work

After psychotherapy, social work is the most important beneficiary of the humanistic psychology's theory and methodology. These have produced a deep reform of the modern social work theory and practice, leading, among others, to the occurrence of a particular theory and methodology: Humanistic Social Work. Most values and principles of the humanistic social work practice, described by Malcolm Payne in his book Humanistic Social Work: Core Principles in Practice, namely creativity in human life and practice, developing self and spirituality, developing security and resilience, accountability, flexibility and complexity in human life and practice, directly originate from the humanistic psychological theory and humanistic psychotherapy practice.

Also, the representation and approach of the client (as human being) and social issue (as human issue) in social work is made from the humanistic psychology position. According to Petru Stefaroi, the way humanistic representation and approach of the client and his personality is realized is, in fact, the theoretical-axiological and methodological foundation of humanistic social work.

In setting goals and the intervention activities, in order to solve social/human problems, there prevail critical terms and categories of the humanistic psychology and psychotherapy, such as: self-actualization, human potential, holistic approach, human being, free will, subjectivity, human experience, self-determination/development, spirituality, creativity, positive thinking, client-centered and context-centered approach/intervention, empathy, personal growth, empowerment.

Creativity in corporations

Humanistic psychology's emphasis on creativity and wholeness created a foundation for new approaches towards human capital in the workplace stressing creativity and the relevance of emotional interactions. Previously the connotations of "creativity" were reserved for and primarily restricted to, working artists. In the 1980s, with increasing numbers of people working in the cognitive-cultural economy, creativity came to be seen as a useful commodity and competitive edge for international brands. This led to corporate creativity training in-service trainings for employees, led pre-eminently by Ned Herrmann at G.E. in the late 1970s.

Humanistic psychology concepts were embraced in education and social work, peaking in the 1970s-1980s in North America. However, as with whole language theory, training practice were too superficial in most institutional settings. Though humanistic psychology raised the bar of insight and understanding of the whole person, professionally it is primarily practiced today by individual licensed counselors and therapists. Outside of that humanistic psychology provides the foundation for virtually every method of Energy Medicine; but little coherence exists yet in this field to discuss it easily.