A Particular Cultural World

1
A Particular Cultural World

• Southern Culture of Honor
• An Experimental Ethnography
• (Cohen, Nisbett, Bowdle, Schwarz, 1996)

2
Overview

• Changing the unit of analysis
• from a large geographic region (i.e., country) to
  a small geographic region (i.e., Southern United
  States).
• North-South differences in violence
• Culture of Honor A culture in which small
  disputes become contests of reputation and social
  status
• Southern cultures seem to hold such norms

3
Historical background

• What is it about the historical processes of the
  south that make its members more tolerant to
  violence by adopting a culture of honor?
• In the past, economy of the south was based on
  herding
• According to anthropologists, herding cultures
  are more approving of certain forms of violence.
• Settlers in the South primarily came from herding
  societies of Europe, where law enforcement was
  limited.
• Herdsmen must be willing to use force to protect
  themselves and their property.
• Hence, they were forced to be self-reliant in
  their pursuit of justice and brought with them
  this tradition as they settled in the South
• A seemingly minor affront can be viewed as a
  threat to reputations, face, relative social
  status, and enduring relationships.

4
Characteristics of a culture of honor

• The norm is to be polite to each other.
• Violence in general is not endorsed
• But violence can used to protect (right to defend
  property) or to answer an affront (fight back
  when being bullied).
• Those who do not respond with violence when
  reputation is at stake are more likely to be
  stigmatized by others.
• The approval of violence seems to be produced by
  culture of honor norms.

5
Experimental Ethnography

• Can we observe the cognitive, emotional,
  behavioral, and physiological reactions of those
  who subscribe to culture of honor norms?
• If so, northerners and southerners should respond
  differently to an insult.
• The southerners should respond with more
  aggressive and dominant behaviors after being
  insulted than the northerners.

6
Experiment 1

• Examining effect of insult on the immediate
  emotional reaction and subsequently expressed
  hostility.
• Procedure
• Insult situation
• Behavioral observation of emotional reaction
• Hostility measures
• Word-completion task
• Face-rating task
• Neutral scenario completion task
• Hostile scenario completion task

7
Experiment 2

• Physiological measures
• Cortisol levels hormone associated with high
  levels of stress
• Testosterone levels hormone associated with
  aggressive and dominance behaviors
• Opportunity to demonstrate toughness
• Electric shock stress test
• Interpreting ambiguous scenario
• Can be construed as hostile or not
• What happens after someone cuts another off as
  they are driving down the road?

8
Experiment 3

• Examining whether a southerner would perceive an
  insult as damaging to their status and reputation
  (less masculine and tough).
• Facilitate participant to engage in a chicken
  game (observation for aggressive behavior)
• How does he greet the witness of the insult?
  (evaluation of domineering behavior)
• Guessing what a witness of the insult is
  thinking about the participant (examining
  perceived damage to status and reputation)
• Macho characteristics Cowardly-courageous,
  strong-weak, and manly-not manly

9
Conclusions

• Southerners were not accustomed to rudeness as
  are northerners.
• Southerners were made more upset by the insult
  (rise in cortisol levels)
• Southerners tended to believe the insult damaged
  their masculine status and reputation
• Southerners were more cognitively primed for
  aggression (attempted kiss script)
• Southerners were more likely to show
  physiological preparedness for dominance or
  aggressive behaviors (rise in testosterone
  levels)
• Southerners were more likely to behave in
  aggressive ways (take on the challenge of the
  chicken game) subsequent to being insulted
• Southerners were more likely to behave in
  domineering ways in interpersonal encounters
  subsequent to an insult.

10
The importance of the cultural frame

• Tolerance and exhibition of violence amongst
  southerners arise under circumstances that
  threaten ones property, status, and reputation
  (culture of honor).
• A specific cultural-historical process is
  involves here.
• This study showed that southerners did not create
  a generalized hostility or perceived threat to
  self that colored everything they thought or did.