ISBN-13: 9780805838404 / Angielski / Miękka / 2003 / 392 str.
ISBN-13: 9780805838404 / Angielski / Miękka / 2003 / 392 str.
How is it that cultures come into existence at all? How do cultures develop particular customs and characteristics rather than others? How do cultures persist and change over time? The purpose of this book is to provide answers to the emergence and continuing evolution of cultures past, present, and future. The authors show how questions about the origins and evolution of culture can be fruitfully answered through rigorous and creative examination of fundamental characteristics of human cognition, motivation, and social interaction. They review recent theory and research that, in many different ways, points to the influence of basic psychological processes on the collective structures that define cultures. These processes operate in all sorts of different populations, ranging from very small interacting groups to grand-scale masses of people occupying the same demographic or geographic category. The cultural effects - often unintended - of individuals' thoughts and actions are demonstrated in a wide variety of customs, ritualized practices, and shared mythologies. well beyond the disciplinary constraints of psychology. By taking a psychological approach to questions usually addressed by anthropologists, sociologists and other social scientists, it suggests that psychological research into the foundations of culture is a useful - perhaps even necessary - complement to other forms of inquiry.