A fascinating article with many implications to explore: We Aren’t the World.
In 1995 a young anthropologist tried to do a popular social science experiment with the Machiguenga, an indigenous people who live north of Machu Picchu in the Amazon basin.
When he began to run the game it became immediately clear that Machiguengan behavior was dramatically different from that of the average North American.
…
The potential implications of the unexpected results were quickly apparent to Henrich. He knew that a vast amount of scholarly literature in the social sciences—particularly in economics and psychology—relied on the ultimatum game and similar experiments. At the heart of most of that research was the implicit assumption that the results revealed evolved psychological traits common to all humans, never mind that the test subjects were nearly always from the industrialized West. Henrich realized that if the Machiguenga results stood up, and if similar differences could be measured across other populations, this assumption of universality would have to be challenged.
And so it came about, and that’s what’s fascinating and implication-full.
Economists and psychologists, for their part, did an end run around the issue with the convenient assumption that their job was to study the human mind stripped of culture. The human brain is genetically comparable around the globe, it was agreed, so human hardwiring for much behavior, perception, and cognition should be similarly universal. No need, in that case, to look beyond the convenient population of undergraduates for test subjects. A 2008 survey of the top six psychology journals dramatically shows how common that assumption was: more than 96 percent of the subjects tested in psychological studies from 2003 to 2007 were Westerners—with nearly 70 percent from the United States alone. Put another way: 96 percent of human subjects in these studies came from countries that represent only 12 percent of the world’s population.
Hmmyes but what if what you think is hardwiring is actually culture but culture so buried that it looks like hardwiring? That seems to be the issue here, if I’ve understood it correctly.
As Heine, Norenzayan, and Henrich furthered their search, they began to find research suggesting wide cultural differences almost everywhere they looked: in spatial reasoning, the way we infer the motivations of others, categorization, moral reasoning, the boundaries between the self and others, and other arenas. These differences, they believed, were not genetic. The distinct ways Americans and Machiguengans played the ultimatum game, for instance, wasn’t because they had differently evolved brains. Rather, Americans, without fully realizing it, were manifesting a psychological tendency shared with people in other industrialized countries that had been refined and handed down through thousands of generations in ever more complex market economies. When people are constantly doing business with strangers, it helps when they have the desire to go out of their way (with a lawsuit, a call to the Better Business Bureau, or a bad Yelp review) when they feel cheated. Because Machiguengan culture had a different history, their gut feeling about what was fair was distinctly their own.
That’s the part I’m not sure I understand. Maybe they’re not sure they do either; maybe it’s a process. I’m not sure how psychological tendencies can be handed down (i.e. taught) such that they are universal in a particular culture (and not in others). Also thousands of generations isn’t right; market economies haven’t existed for thousands of generations.
Ethan Watters, the author, meets Heine, Norenzayan, and Henrich for dinner to talk about their work.
I had to wonder whether describing the Western mind, and the American mind in particular, as weird suggested that our cognition is not just different but somehow malformed or twisted. In their paper the trio pointed out cross-cultural studies that suggest that the “weird” Western mind is the most self-aggrandizing and egotistical on the planet: we are more likely to promote ourselves as individuals versus advancing as a group.
That’s the part that makes me wonder too. The next thought is always the familiar worry about human rights – “Western” innovation, individualist, groups are happy, all that. Is it just my weird (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) Americanness that makes me think human rights matter and everyone should have them? Many people outside the “West” also think that but then maybe they’ve been contaminated by the “West.”
I don’t know. But psychology or no psychology, it is a fact that systems that don’t take a human rights approach allow some groups to flourish at the expense of others.
But if those others are fine with that, because of their non-weird psychology, maybe it doesn’t matter that they get the shaft?
Is it only my weirdness that makes me say no, it does matter?
Absolutely fascinating article.
This is fascinating research, and it reminds me of a parallel I became aware of a few years ago. Some in the West insist there is a “god gene” and that believing in supernatural deities is instinctual among human beings, essentially.
Daniel Everett went into Brazil as an Evangelical Christian missionary, intent on converting the Pirahã people, a “stone age” tribe that had thus far proven immune to Christian missionary efforts. Everett was certain that HE could, with the help of God, succeed. He ended up becoming an atheist just like they were, because he realized, in a nutshell, that they were so content and so happy and such good people that he couldn’t offer them any promise of improvement through Christianity – they were already better off. And he felt wrong about attempting to coerce them into religious faith, realizing in the end that Christianity is all about coercion.
Here is the first article from which I learned about his adventure: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/04/16/070416fa_fact_colapinto
This is another good article – an interview: http://ffrf.org/publications/freethought-today/item/13492-the-pirahae-people-who-define-happiness-without-god
This tribe is absolutely, utterly atheist. They have no concept of “god”, and they have no interest in that subject. They are pretty much the most absolute pragmatists and literalists you’ll find (no, I’m not explaining well nor exactly) in that they demand personal experience. If not their own, then yours – and it must be actual and direct (beliefs need not apply). If not your direct experience, they’ll accept your father’s direct experience, but unless that direct experience is there (YOU *saw* it or *heard* it for yourself), they dismiss whatever it is.
It’s quite hilarious – I hope you’ll read it. So much for a “god gene” – that’s entirely a cultural construction just like what’s being described in this post. In fact, it might well be that there are other isolated tribes that are equally atheist – if we could only protect them from the predatory Christian missionaries long enough to learn about their belief systems before they’re destroyed forever!
‘ it is a fact that systems that don’t take a human rights approach allow some groups to flourish at the expense of others.’
And equally that ones that do, surely.
In fact rights can be easily used for just this purpose. What is more threatening to the mice than the rights of the cat?
he realized, in a nutshell, that they were so content and so happy and such good people that he couldn’t offer them any promise of improvement through Christianity – they were already better off
I am filled with doubts. Obviously, to be a christian missionary, he’d already have to be an experienced liar to himself and others. He’d also have to understand the “I will gladly pay you wednesday for a cheeseburger today” equation that the life after death offers. Going there prepared to lie and con people doesn’t prep you for that kind of revelation of common sense.
More like he knew it was bullshit and got some travel in before he had to confront getting a real job.
I’ve heard of the ultimatum game, but not played it myself nor was I aware of the (Western) results. Actually I’m pretty surprised to learn that (Western) subjects rejected inequitable results so often. I’m pretty sure I’d accept any amount offered – I didn’t earn it, I’m not entitled to it so really ANY amount given in inequitable in my favor. Though I might moan about my partner being a cheapo.
“Thousands of generations” is obviously wrong, but 500 years of market economies (more or less) are a long time compared to human life, and more than enough for cultural habits to be transmitted as facts of the world.
See those last 4 paragraphs (after the final block quote)? That’s (one of the reasons) I’ll always continue to read whatever Ophelia writes.
So, some assumptions in regard to universality can be challenged, how far do we take cultural relativism?
Are people outside the West ‘contaminated’, or enlightened by Western concepts of human rights? I find it difficult to believe that most women living lives as chattels in some misogynistic Islamist hell wouldn’t choose Western liberties when given the chance, or that a man about to be executed for ‘blasphemy’ is reconciled to his fate by the knowledge that it’s determined by his society’s rich cultural conditions.
People in the West once endured the misery of closed societies, we escaped from them.
Among the Pirahã people I mentioned in my earlier post to this article, they have a very egalitarian society, with much sharing and group care of the children and elderly. This is typical among hunter-gatherer groups – even their gods (when they have them) are egalitarian with people. When someone wants a favor from one or more gods, he does a certain ritual or sacrifice, and the god(s) is/are then obligated to pony up. And if they don’t, the person is free to curse them and withhold offerings! This is an excellent article on the subject: http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch00.htm
With civilization, which Jared Diamond (of “Guns, Germs, and Steel”) calls “humankind’s greatest mistake”, you finally see the stratification whereby a few individuals can form “kleptocrat classes”, where they, the rulers, nobles, and clergy, exist on the surplus of everyone else’s effort. This deplorable situation with regard to women’s position in society is definitely magnified exponentially by the already-inegalitarian and stratified nature of civilization.
The Bible is, from beginning to end, the product of monarchy-type government – we see this from the very beginning, where, after murdering his brother, Cain walks a little ways – and founds a city! Even Jesus, for all the kind and gentle mythology Christians would like us to accept about this made-up character, had *no problem* with rulers/owners/bosses/masters having all the rights and no one else any at all. In the Parable of the Vineyard, in fact, he describes an owner who hires different people to work for different rates of pay, and when they complain, explains their pay as a function of his own “generosity” and tells them “Take your penny and get out!”, effectively. Republicans have cited this as proof that Jesus would be in favor of employers being able to decide what to pay different employees – bye-bye, equal pay for equal work! There is nothing at all egalitarian about the Bible (except where people are all told they’re equally slaves – 1 Corinthians 7:22) – no statement of basic human rights, and not a single verse that says slavery is wrong. THIS is evidence of its developing from within a mature, entrenched, monarchical civilization where only the powerful got to have rights.
Put aside the question of cultural relativism for the moment: if human cognition varies between ethnic populations that wouldn’t matter any more than if it varied between sexes: it would still be a statistical variation and would have no bearing on the rights of individuals. If one sex was statistically smarter than another – so what? That sex would automatically guarantee access to the best university? Obviously not – it would depend on the ability of the individual.
I mean, if it proves the case that one human population is statistically taller than another – as men are statistically taller than women – you wouldn’t assume that one population should be treated differently. ”This guy’s black – he must be tall. Let’s put him on the basketball team”. Yeah, but what about short black people? What about tall Asians? And we’d still only be talking about a single trait – height – which is neither a necessary nor sufficient attribute for great players.
And if it proves that one group of people statistically think differently, so what? That doesn’t imply cultural relativism in the sense that some people are entitled to rights and others aren’t because the variations within the group are still larger than between groups.
Anyway, the assumption of ‘universality’ isn’t just about assuming ‘Western’ psychology is universal but that neurotypical psychology is universal.
There’s some evidence, for instance, that Aspies like myself play the Ultimatum Game differently:
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0048794
Same goes for psychopaths.
Does that effect our right to universal human rights? No, because we’re still human – and in any case the differences are statistical..
The number of people with Asperger’s varies between cultures and it is an autistic spectrum disorder – which means that there’s no clear cut off between Aspies and neurotypicals. Populations with a large percentage of Aspies might be expected to have a larger percentage of people with non-clinically significant autistic traits and so there’s a very real chance that the results of the Ultimatum Game might vary with populations.
The problem arises because people with clinically recognised autistic spectrum disorders would be considered outliers and excluded from the study leaving the psychologists to study ostensibly neurotypical populations which might still have different numbers of non-clinical autistic traits.
And I’ve just picked on one difference here – ASD. Why assume there are no differences that fall below the difference threshold for ‘disorders’?
Richard E Nisbett’s ‘The Geography of Thought: How Asians & Westerners Think Differently…and Why’ is well worth reading in this connexion. The comparisons are with East Asians – chinese, Japanese & Koreans in the main, and from my experience of living in Japan for forty years I would say Nisbett is largely right.
Incidentally, psychopaths are more likely to accept unfair outcomes in the Ultimatum Game than non-psychopaths.
They’re not fazed by punishments themselves or by the fact someone else might be rewarded more than they are just as long as they ultimately profit themselves.
”Primary” psychopaths (those ”born” with deficits) are also more likely to accept unfair outcomes than ”secondary” psychopaths (those whose psychopathy is environmentally caused).
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20403367
@ 6 AsqJames
Yes, it’s like the antithesis of those guys. ‘Could I be wrong?’ is indeed a cool question to get in the habit of asking.
But I still think the reasoning in “You have to judge” is sound:
Me, earlier:
Incidentally, psychopaths are more likely to accept unfair outcomes in the Ultimatum Game than non-psychopaths.
They’re not fazed by punishments themselves or by the fact someone else might be rewarded more than they are just as long as they ultimately profit themselves.
Which, I think, means Machiguengan decision making is similar to Western psychopaths.
And given that there’s a high incidence of psychopathy in the financial sector it might be worth hiring Machiguengans to invest for you.
“I’m not sure how psychological tendencies can be handed down (i.e. taught) such that they are universal in a particular culture (and not in others)”
Well, as a few other commenters here have noted, “universal” is pushing it – there will always be individual variation. But you can have two populations with widely separate distributions of some tendency. And “taught” is also pushing it, they’re “taught” in the way that spoken language is taught – i.e. not really taught at all (although learning is involved).
I like the amount of press Norenzayan, Heine and Henrich have gotten at FTB over the past few months – I know all of them a little, took one of Henrich’s classes, and Norenzayan was on my thesis committee. Smart cookies, those guys.
Of course, if we behaved rationally we’d accept unfair bids we’d all profit in the long run – and living in a West saturated by economics should have taught us that lesson by experience.
Which suggests there’s more to Western economics than the Ultimatum Game suggests.
Well, as a few other commenters here have noted, “universal” is pushing it – there will always be individual variation.
Not to mention that groups studied tend to be students and so likely to have a similar socio-economic background, reasonably high intelligence, etc.
It’s not like they even represent a cross section of one culture.
Possibly the author is using market economies loosely to mean the whole concept of personal ownership and of standardised values for trading goods. According to wikipedia:
I don’t know anything about the Machiguengans, but my understanding is that the indigenous people in my own country (Australia) had no concept of personal ownership and no system of accounting at all, which led to a lot of friction with the early European settlers. The indigenous people would just help themselves to whatever the Europeans had brought with them or to whatever game they’d caught. As far as the Europeans were concerned, the natives were notorious thieves. But the mindset of the natives was that all tools and equipment were part of the common wealth and anybody who needed them was free to use them. They thought the Europeans were being outrageously selfish.
So maybe when the author talks about thousands of generations of “doing business”, they mean thousands of generations of “this in mine, that is yours; if I give you this, you owe me that” type thinking, which isn’t universal.
That’s the part I’m not sure I understand. Maybe they’re not sure they do either; maybe it’s a process. I’m not sure how psychological tendencies can be handed down (i.e. taught) such that they are universal in a particular culture (and not in others).
Also, if these psychological tendencies are so ingrained they appear innate they’d have to be learnt an extremely early age. The Ultimatum Game doesn’t model baby economics: Baby cries, baby gets fed. The parent isn’t thinking, ‘fuck you, Sprog – what am I getting out of this?’
If anything, most children are born into the ultimate ‘welfare state’. Doesn’t matter if that’s within a post-industrial capitalist society or a tribal one: for the first few years they’re consumers not producers.
When people are constantly doing business with strangers, it helps when they have the desire to go out of their way (with a lawsuit, a call to the Better Business Bureau, or a bad Yelp review) when they feel cheated
Except that’s the opposite of the caveat emptor philosophy of laissez-faire capitalism. The law, consumer rights organizations and reviews in social media hold businesses to account.
I think (can I still use that term?) the authors make a valid point when arguing that the concentration on Western subjects might hide genuine cognitive differences (whether innate or cultural) but overstretched themselves by asserting a causal link between economic systems and apparent cognitive differences.
If the Ultimatum Game adequately modelled capitalist society we’d behave more like the Machiguengans (or psychopaths) because that behaviour is more proffitable.
There’s something much deeper going on.
As Lex Luthor* once said, ‘It’s not enough that I win – everyone else must lose!
*Or was that Ghengis Khan?
“Not to mention that groups studied tend to be students and so likely to have a similar socio-economic background, reasonably high intelligence, etc.”
In the cross-cultural studies that try to investigate this properly, that’s generally not the case. But of course those are a vanishingly small percentage of studies.
“Also, if these psychological tendencies are so ingrained they appear innate they’d have to be learnt an extremely early age.”
No, I don’t think that follows at all. Your native language isn’t learned to a very great degree of competence until age 8 or so, but it certainly becomes pretty ingrained. You’re saying something that I think most people (including most professionals in the field) agree with, but I really think it’s just false. We underestimate just how powerful learned effects can be all the time.
“What is more threatening to the mice than the rights of the cat?”
Bruce K, of course the rights of the cat are threatening to the mice, the same way that “might makes right” and “majority rules” are threatening to those not in those groups.
However, the rights of the mice strike fear into the cat! If you have ever been a pet owner, you may have had the combination of pets to notice that prey animals, when they don’t behave properly, are first astonishing, then alarming, to predators. From my own experience, I had a tame (hand-fed) cockatiel that I would allow out to walk around on the floor (clipped flight feathers). My cats were initially intrigued, but the moment the cockatiel started approaching THEM, they ran away! Same with my bunny – it was only when he was hopping away that they were interested in him. He routinely chased them away just by advancing.
Similarly, I have heard that those who routinely work with large predators such as lions and tigers in a rescue environment are instructed to never, EVER, bend over so as to appear to have all 4 appendages on the ground. If we trade our bipedal silhouette for a four-legged one, the great cats shift into predator mode.
So in conclusion, I think I have missed the point you were trying to make about the mice’s perception of the rights of the cat. Of course those without power are threatened by those with power – that’s Machiavelli 101! Can you please clarify if you meant something more profound? Thanks.
Oh, one more thing, Bruce K. – when I was a teen, I worked volunteer with the local university’s natural history museum’s live snake exhibit. Once a week, we got in mice and rats at all stages of development to feed to our various herps. One week, I decided to bring 3 mice home for our 3 family cats.
Well, as you might have predicted, it was a complete DISASTER! The mice, being tame, approached the cats (instead of fleeing), at which the cats turned and bolted, not having any opportunity to give chase as their instincts required to get the predatory impulse to kick in, and my younger sister was completely distraught and traumatized. *le sigh*
“Of course, if we behaved rationally we’d accept unfair bids we’d all profit in the long run – and living in a West saturated by economics should have taught us that lesson by experience.”
Shatterface, one of the typical criticism of American business is how it has no long-term vision. I think you left out a crucial “if” from the sentence quoted above – was it intended to be as follows?
“Of course, if we behaved rationally we’d accept unfair bids IF we’d all profit in the long run – and living in a West saturated by economics should have taught us that lesson by experience.”
Alas, the US model of competition seems to be immediate gratification above all, even if it means loss in the long run. The Japanese concept of “saving face” has combined with US übercompetitiveness to make cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face the national pastime.
“That’s the part I’m not sure I understand. Maybe they’re not sure they do either; maybe it’s a process. I’m not sure how psychological tendencies can be handed down (i.e. taught) such that they are universal in a particular culture (and not in others). ”
Being old (mid-50s now), I have had many decades to notice various “norms” among children. For example, the children I was raised among in Geneva all knew the song, “Sur le Pont D’Avignon”. Upon moving back to the US, I soon observed that all children were aware of the story of Hansel and Gretel, the story of Cinderella, the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and the story of the Three Little Pigs. This was long before any of these had been made into movies or cartoons, I might add.
If I want to talk about The Goose Girl, by contrast, I need to find someone close to my own age or older. Same with the story of Snow White and Rose Red, or East of the Sun and West of the Moon, or the Shoemaker and the Elves. These are children’s stories of the same vintage as the others that somehow didn’t pass as readily on to the next generation(s).
Now, children are more likely to be knowledgeable about SpongeBob and Ed, Edd, and Eddy, or Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. The generation before (maybe two before) would have been more aware of Scooby Doo, SpeedBuggy, HR PufnStuf, and Sigmund the Seasick Sea Serpent.
Before that, we would have found widespread familiarity with Tom and Jerry, Bugs Bunny, Foghorn Leghorn, the Jetsons, the Flintstones, and Daffy Duck. Each generation has its own fads and trends, in other words.
Are these “universal”, or are they “handed down”, or are they simply absorbed from the surrounding cultural milieu? I think we can examine these and gain valuable insights into the psychological tropes involved.
The article was quite fascinating, particularly in its effect on the social sciences. While this area of study may call for a revamping of economics and sociology, though, I wonder if it will put a fatal bullet through evolutionary psychology (finally). If the things we used to think of as innate are actually cultural, that puts them way out on the edge with the things they’re guessing to be innate.