Perspectives on Culture and Concepts

Abstract

The well-respected tradition of research on concepts uses cross-cultural comparisons to explore which aspects of conceptual behavior are universal versus culturally variable. This work continues, but it is being supplemented by intensified efforts to study how conceptual systems and cultural systems interact to modify and support each other. For example, cultural studies within the framework of domain specificity (e.g., folkphysics, folkpsychology, folkbiology) are beginning to query the domains themselves and offer alternative organizing principles (e.g., folksociology, folkecology). Findings highlight the multifaceted nature of both concepts and culture: Individuals adopt distinct conceptual construals in accordance with culturally infused systems such as language and discourse, knowledge and beliefs, and epistemological orientations. This picture complicates questions about cognitive universality or variability, suggesting that researchers may productively adopt a systems-level approach to conceptual organization and cultural epistemologies. Related implications for diversity in cognitive science are discussed.

Typicality: Stable structures and flexible functions

“…Ojalehto and Medin (2015) define culture as Ba way of life, often equated with shared knowledge or what one needs to know to live successfully in a community^(p. 250). Ojalehto and Medin (2015) argue that conceptual structure is inseparable from culture; culture seeps into our experience, and our experience forms our concepts. Culture influences how a person engages with her environment, thereby influencing what her goals, and therefore her ideals, are.…”

The fear gasping face as a threat display in a Melanesian society

“…On the one hand, recent evidence from cognitive science shows that basic psychological processes previously assumed to be universal may be deeply affected by culture (1)(2)(3)(4). On the other hand, common wisdom continues to assume that facial movements effectively communicate accurate messages that are decoded in the same way by recipients whatever their culture (5).…”

Iranian Herbalists, But Not Cooks, Are Better at Naming Odors Than Laypeople

“…However, we find that expertise outweighs experience alone in boosting both odor perception and naming: Despite overall effects of familiarity and frequency, there were few differences in the performance of cooks and laypeople, whose daily experience with herbs and spices differs greatly. Our findings suggest that structure in the world alone is not sufficient to structure cognition (Berlin, 2014); cultural and institutionalized knowledge are critical (e.g., ojalehto & Medin, 2015). In a nutshell, daily experience is no substitute for formal expertise in accurately naming odors.…”

“…These explanations typically overlook the fact that while odor naming is difficult, it is not impossible. As has been shown in a variety of other arenas (e.g., Bailenson, Shum, Atran, Medin, & Coley, 2002;Medin, Lynch, Coley, & Atran, 1997;Ross, Medin, Coley, & Atran, 2003;Wolff, Medin, & Pankratz, 1999; for review see ojalehto & Medin, 2015), culture shapes olfactory cognition (Majid, 2015). Systems of categorization are, in fact, maintained at multiple levels: individual experience, cultural convention, and institutionally formalized convention (Glushko, Maglio, Matlock, & Barsalou, 2008).…”