Study Guide

Cross-Cultural Psychology

Exam 2

  1. What is the difference between sex and gender? What are gender vs. sex roles, sexual vs. gender identity, and gender stereotypes?
  2. Describe and explain Hofstede’s dimension “masculinity v. femininity.” How does this dimension related to a culture’s sexual behavior and religious values?
  3. Describe the gender differences in aggression. How does biology influence gender differences in aggression? How does our culture play a role in these differences? What is social role theory (p.159)?
  4. Describe the gender differences in the regulation of sex and sexuality? How do traditional vs non-traditional cultures differ?
  5. What are the gender differences in mate selection and jealousy?
  6. How are chores in the house divided between men and women? How might this be related to the biological differences between the sexes? Are there differences in the division of household labor across cultures?
  7. What are some common gender stereotypes for men and women? Are these universal across cultures? Are there differences in the traits that are considered desirable across cultures?
  8. What are some obstacles to promoting equal rights and opportunities for men and women around the world?
  9. What is the World Health Organization’s definition of health? Why is this definition important? What are some other definitions of health (i.e. biomedical model vs. biospychosocial model vs. balance)?
  10. How have the causes of mortality changed in the US over the last century? How do the causes of mortality around the world differ based on income?
  11. What are the three main indicators of health worldwide? How do these indicators differ between countries? Why are vaccinations important? How does subjective well-being relate to national income (GDP)? How do Latin American and ex-communist countries deviate from this model? Why might countries differ on these indicators?
  12. Are there genetic influences on disease? Could this explain all the differences we see in health between cultures?
  13. What is stress and how can we measure it? How does stress relate to health? How is income level related to stress? Where does social support fit in?
  14. How is culture related to health, specifically the cultural dimensions individualism vs. collectivism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity? Is one type of culture better for health than another?
  15. What is acculturation? Is it better for health to be more acculturated? Use latino acculturation as an example.
  16. Are there differences in body image, body dissatisfaction, obesity, and eating disorders between different cultures? Describe and explain.
  17. How are is suicide viewed in different cultures?
  18. Describe how government intervention in health care delivery systems related to equity in access to healthcare. Where does the US fit in?
  19. What are emotions? How are emotions adaptive? What are the basic emotions? What are some self-conscious emotions?
  20. Are the facial expressions we use to display basic emotions culturally universal or specific? What about emotions is universal across cultures?
  21. How does culture affect the basic emotion system? Describe and explain front-end and back-end calibration.
  22. What are some cultural differences in how we perceive emotions, specifically negative emotions? What are decoding rules and how do we learn them? What is the ingroup advantage?
  23. How is individualism/collectivism related to socially engaging or disengaging emotions? What is emotional complexity and how is it related to dialectical thinking?
  24. How might our thoughts about emotions relate to how we experience and describe emotions (hypercognize vs. hypocognize emotions)?
  25. How do temperament/personality and cultural values relate to our:
  26. Actual affect (feelings)
  27. Ideal affect
  28. What is communication? What are some key components of the definition? Describe the process of communication including: encoding, message, channel, decoding, noise, and barriers?
  29. What is the bee dance? How is animal communication different from human communication?
  30. What is language? Describe and explain the different parts of language (i.e. phonemes, morphemes, syntax and grammar). Also define and explain the terms lexicon, semantics, phonology, and pragmatics.
  31. How do we learn language? What is a critical period and why is it important for our recognition of phonemes?
  32. How do cultures differ in their self-other referents? Use the US and Japan as an example.
  33. How do cultures differ in pragmatics? What is the difference between a high-context and low-context culture in their use of pronouns?
  34. How are thought and language related? Do we need to have language to think? What evidence is there?
  35. What type of information is most often conveyed non-verbally? Describe the cultural differences in the following forms of non-verbal communication”
  36. Gestures (speech illustrators vs. emblems)
  37. Gaze
  38. Voice (expressive vs. less expressive cultures)
  39. Personal space and touch
  40. How are the encoding and decoding steps of the communication process related to culture?
  41. What are some obstacles to intercultural communication and how can we improve intercultural communication?
  42. How does having two languages affect people? What is code frame switching? Describe the priming and fish study with bilingual Chinese American students.
  43. How might the fact Americans frequently speak only English affect their attitudes and perceptions of other cultures?
  44. What is personality? What are traits and national character?
  45. What is the lexical hypothesis? Describe the “Big 5” personality factors. Do they relate to real world behaviors and outcomes?
  46. What are the two main methods for measuring personality across cultures? When the big 5 inventory is translated into a different language, is there evidence for the big 5 across cultures? How do the big 5 differ across cultures?
  47. How does culture affect how traits are expressed?
  48. What are our perceptions of national character? Are they accurate?
  49. Where do we get our personality? Is it genetic? What is the fox domestication study and the monkey study? What do they tell us?
  50. What are some other personality traits? (i.e. interpersonal relatedness)
  51. When personality structure is developed within each culture separately, are there always 5 factors? What are some other factors that have been found?
  52. Describe and explain locus of control and autonomy and how they differ cross-culturally.
  53. What is the indigenous perspective of personality?
  54. What aspect of personality seems to be rooted in biology and which part is influenced more by culture?