Richard A. Shweder, PhD - US grants

There are three major theories about the nature and ontogenetic origins of moral codes; moral universalism, moral developmentalism and moral relativism. The three theories differ dramatically in what they have to say about a) the presence or absence of conscience, guilt and the superego at different ages and in different cultures; b) the rational vs. arbitrary foundations of judgments about what's a vice and what's a virtue; and c) the extent to which moral codes are either products of socialization or examples of self-constructed knowledge. The goal of the proposed research is to determine what's universal, what's relative and what develops in moral codes. This will be done a) by documenting the presence or absence of the moral sentiment at different ages in India and the United States; b) by examining the rational and non-rational ideas underlying the moral codes of children and adults in those two cultures; and c) by assessing the role of socialization processes in the ontogeny of moral understandings. Focusing on household sets, the proposal describes a cross-cultural developmental design for identifying points of agreement and disagreement in the moral codes of children (ages 4-6, 8-10, 12-14) and adults in India and the United States. India and the United States have been selected for comparison because their cultural traditions radically contrast in ways directly relevant to the study of superego formation and the origins of self. The proposal describes a series of methods for investigating moral codes including iterative ethnographic interviewing and the sociolinguistic analysis of accusations and excuses in "situations of accountability." The project traces the origins in children of the sentiments and understandings that distinguish normal conscience ridden functioning from the functioning of the clinical psychopath.

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposal seeks continuation of the NIMH training program in "Culture and Mental Health Behavior" in the Committee on Human Development at the University of Chicago. During the past decade the Committee has emerged as an internationally renowned and leading center for training and research on the cultural psychology of mental health and suffering. The NIMH training program in "Culture and Mental Health Behavior" has been a centerpiece of efforts to promote mental-health-relevant cultural research and culturally relevant mental health research. The program has two primary aims: 1) to train students who show special promise of contributing in their research and applied careers to understanding sociocultural and environmental predictors of mental health behavior and illness, and 2) to further the growth of the mental health sciences through interdisciplinary training in cultural psychology. The theoretical rationale for the Program grows out of the emerging interface between cultural psychology and clinically relevant anthropological research in understanding environmental contexts of well being, suffering, and healing. The Program trains students in the theory, methods, data collection, and analyses necessary to conduct research on similarities and differences in psychological functioning (whether it be emotional, motivational, moral, or cognitive functioning) across culturally diverse populations and ethnic communities. Various issues in multicultural health are at the core of the training program. As the United States becomes more heterogeneous ethnically, the need to adapt health care research and delivery to this diversity has become increasingly urgent. Likewise, the increasing international scope of mental health research efforts requires attention to cultural issues. Trainees in the "Culture and Mental Health" program are schooled in the theory, methods, data collection and analytic procedures necessary to conduct primary research on psychological functioning and mental health within and across diverse cultures and ethnic communities.

University of Chicago doctoral student, Jacob Hickman, with the guidance of Dr. Richard A. Shweder, will investigate how immigrants' cultural models interact with both individual subjective experience and the competing models of the majority groups in resettlement contexts. The focus of the research will be beliefs of morality and personhood held by Laotian Hmong who have immigrated to Thailand and to the United States. The researcher will compare these different resettlement communities in order to understand how daily living, cultural practices, and interactions with institutions in Thailand and the United States shape immigrants' beliefs about morality and personhood. Morality and personhood were chosen as domains for this ethnographic comparison because of their fundamental importance for understanding oneself and one's relationships with others.

Taking advantage of the natural experiment afforded by having immigrants from one place settle in two different countries, the researcher will undertake nine months of fieldwork in Thailand and nine months in the United States. Using a person-centered research methodology, he will conduct person-centered interviews, undertake continuous ethnographic observation, and carry out a systematic survey of one community in each research site. Interviews and observations will focus on intra-familial intergenerational comparisons, in order to gauge how changes in personhood and morality differ across two generations that have entered the different resettlement contexts at different points in the life course.

This project is significant because it will illuminate the processes of change that migrants experience from resettling in different social contexts, including interactions with both formal and informal institutions. The analysis of a group that originated in one location and migrated to two distinct locations for more or less random reasons constitutes a unique comparative framework for investigating how people both react to and are shaped by their social and cultural milieu. This knowledge will offer a better understanding of the nature of "assimilation," a social, economic, and political concern for receiving countries. The research also supports the education of a social scientist.