Elements of culture

Artifacts: The physical objects or creations that a society makes and uses. This includes tools, technology, clothing, and art.

How Culture Impacts Cognition 🧠

Culture influences cognition, or how we think, by shaping our perception, schemas, and problem-solving styles.

Perception: Culture trains our brains to notice certain things over others. For example, people from individualistic cultures (like the U.S.) tend to have an analytic cognitive style, focusing on individual objects and their properties. In contrast, people from collectivistic cultures (like those in East Asia) tend to have a holistic style, focusing on the context and the relationships between objects.

Schemas: Schemas are mental frameworks that organize knowledge and guide our understanding of the world. The content of these schemas is culturally specific. Someone from a pastoral community, for instance, might have an extensive and detailed schema about different types of cattle that a city dweller would lack.

Problem-Solving: The way we approach problems is often culturally taught. Some cultures emphasize a linear, cause-and-effect approach, while others may favor a more dialectical approach that seeks to find a balance between seemingly contradictory ideas.

How Culture Influences Feelings (Affective Domain) 💖

Culture doesn't determine what emotions we feel, but it profoundly influences how we express, interpret, and experience them.

Display Rules: These are culturally specific rules about when, where, and how it's appropriate to express emotions. In some cultures, outward displays of emotion like crying or anger might be encouraged, while in others, they may be suppressed to maintain social harmony.

Ideal Affect: This concept describes the emotions that a culture values and encourages. For example, some cultures may value high-arousal emotions like excitement and enthusiasm, while others prefer low-arousal emotions like calm and serenity. This influences the emotional states people strive for and how they regulate their own feelings.

Interpretation of Emotion: We learn to interpret and categorize emotional experiences based on cultural scripts. While basic emotions may be universal, how we understand and label them is shaped by our language and social context.

How Culture Shapes Behavior 🧍

Culture is the primary blueprint for behavior, guiding our actions through shared norms and expectations.

Norms and Social Coordination: Culture provides us with a set of norms that dictate acceptable behavior in social situations, from greeting rituals (e.g., handshakes vs. bows) to dining etiquette. These rules help people coordinate their behaviors and interact successfully.

Values and Goals: Cultural values shape our individual and group goals. In an individualistic culture, behaviors that promote personal achievement and independence are valued, whereas in a collectivistic culture, behaviors that benefit the group and maintain harmony are prioritized.

Sample Answer

Culture is the shared set of beliefs, values, norms, symbols, and behaviors that characterize a particular group. These elements define how people in a society think, feel, and act.

Main Elements of Culture 🌍

The main elements of culture are:

Symbols: These are objects, gestures, sounds, or images that represent something else and have a shared meaning within a culture. A flag is a symbol of a nation's identity, for example.

Language: A system of communication using sounds or gestures that have understood meanings. It's the most powerful tool for transmitting culture from one generation to the next.

Values: These are a society's deeply held ideas about what is good, bad, right, or wrong. Values guide behavior and are the foundation of a culture's norms.

Norms: The formal and informal rules of conduct for a given society. These can be folkways (less important customs, like table manners) or mores (moral norms with serious consequences, like taboos).