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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Keyword
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- Cross cultural (4)
- Childhood (3)
- Gender differences (3)
- Sex differences (3)
- Chiapas (2)
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- Children (2)
- Kenya (2)
- Moral development (2)
- Socialization (2)
- Zinacantan (2)
- Cross-cultural (1)
- Cultural context (1)
- Funeral ceremonies (1)
- Kohlberg's stages (1)
- Luo of Kenya (1)
- Ngecha (1)
- Peer relationships (1)
- Play (1)
- Sibling caregiving (1)
- Six Cultures Study (1)
- Toddler period (1)
- Weaning (1)
- Women and Economic Development (1)
Articles 1 - 10 of 10
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Children’S Social Behaviors And Peer Interactions In Diverse Cultures, Carolyn P. Edwards, Maria Deguzman, Jill Brown, Asiye Kumru
Children’S Social Behaviors And Peer Interactions In Diverse Cultures, Carolyn P. Edwards, Maria Deguzman, Jill Brown, Asiye Kumru
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This chapter lays out five principles to guide research on peer relationships in cultural context that reflect both current and earlier bodies of research literature: (1) Cultural scripts for socialization in peer relationships are evident in early childhood. (2) Both across and within cultural communities, children’s own active role in the socialization process becomes increasingly evident as they grow older. (3) Because children are active agents in their own socialization, they can not only make choices, they can also negotiate, deflect, and resist socializing attempts by others. (4) Children’s choices and preferences (self-socialization) during middle childhood have measurable and lasting …
Socialization Of Boys And Girls In Natural Contexts, Carolyn P. Edwards, Lisa Knoche, Asiye Kumru
Socialization Of Boys And Girls In Natural Contexts, Carolyn P. Edwards, Lisa Knoche, Asiye Kumru
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
Socialization is the general process by which the members of a cultural community or society pass on their language, rules, roles, and customary ways of thinking and behaving to the next generation. Sex role socialization is one important aspect of this general process. The goals of earlier work were to understand how, why, and at what age girls and boys begin to vary behaviorally along such dimensions as "nurturance," "aggression," and "dependency," including determination of how sex-typical dispositions are influenced by cultural factors. This chapter presents a new approach seeking to answer such questions as the following. How are different …
Evolving Questions And Comparative Perspectives In Cultural/Historical Perspective: Lessons From Research In Ngecha, Kenya, Carolyn Pope Edwards
Evolving Questions And Comparative Perspectives In Cultural/Historical Perspective: Lessons From Research In Ngecha, Kenya, Carolyn Pope Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
In studying human development in cultural-historical context, we must integrate multiple levels of analysis and strive to identify culture’s imprint inside the contexts of socialization. Issues of methodology are complex. This paper argues that both comparative and historical-interpretive studies are valuable and indeed generative for each other, using as an example an international, collaborative research project focused on East African women and changing childrearing values. The site was Ngecha, a Gikuyu-speaking community in the Central Province of Kenya, during a period of rapid social change from an agrarian to a wage earning economy shortly after national independence (1968-1973). The experiences …
Play Patterns And Gender, Carolyn P. Edwards, Lisa Knoche, Asiye Kumru
Play Patterns And Gender, Carolyn P. Edwards, Lisa Knoche, Asiye Kumru
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This cross-cultural analysis examines the gendered patterns of play seen in children worldwide. Play is a culturally universal activity through which children explore themselves and their environment, test out and practice different social roles, and learn to interact with other children and adults. Early in life, children identify themselves as a “girl” or a “boy,” and this basic self-categorization lays a foundation for their developing beliefs about with whom, what, how, and where they will play. Children play an active role in their own and their peers’ “gender socialization” (the process by which they come to acquire the knowledge, values, …
Behavioral Sex Differences In Children Of Diverse Cultures: The Case Of Nurturance To Infants, Carolyn P. Edwards
Behavioral Sex Differences In Children Of Diverse Cultures: The Case Of Nurturance To Infants, Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This chapter draws on the data from the Children of Different Worlds study (Whiting & Edwards, 1988) to consider the origin of sex differences in children’s behavior worldwide, in particular: (1) how different kinds of social behavior are elicited by different contexts of socialization (defined by the sex, age, status, and kinship of social interactants, ongoing activities, and other potent dimensions of setting); (2) how these contexts of socialization are distributed across cultures and associated with various adult subsistence strategies, family structures, household patterns, and forms of social networks; and (3) how boys and girls of each age in diverse …
The Transition From Infancy To Early Childhood: A Difficult Transition, And A Difficult Theory, Carolyn P. Edwards
The Transition From Infancy To Early Childhood: A Difficult Transition, And A Difficult Theory, Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
The transition from infancy to early childhood was observed in households in rural Zinacanteco households in the Highlands of Chiapas, Mexico, in 1968-1969, and found to be a fairly lengthy period of upset, disturbance, listlessness, and apathy for the children, leading eventually to their accepting a new position in the family. The transition involved three abrupt and harsh changes: (1) abrupt weaning from the mother’s breast; (2) simultaneous change in sleeping arrangements from lying next to the mother to sleeping with siblings; and (3) more gradual transfer of the child’s primary care from the mother to older siblings or courtyard …
Another Style Of Competence: The Caregiving Child, Carolyn P. Edwards
Another Style Of Competence: The Caregiving Child, Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This chapter discusses child and sibling caregiving as an opportunity for the learning of nurturance and responsibility. The argument is based on case examples from ethnographic material, that children in multiage dyads or groupings negotiate constantly with one another and thereby reveal their reasoning about rational and conventional moral rules. The observational material is drawn from the work of Carol R. Ember (1970, 1973) who studied children in a Luo community of about 250 people in the South Nyanza district of Kenya. This community, referred to as Oyugis (actually the name of the market town 2.5 miles away, is one …
Societal Complexity And Moral Development: A Kenyan Study., Carolyn P. Edwards
Societal Complexity And Moral Development: A Kenyan Study., Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This study examines the moral judgment levels (as measured by Kohlberg’s 6-stage moral judgment interview) for two Kenyan samples. The first sample includes a culturally and racially group of 35 young men and 17 women studying at the University of Nairobi, while the second sample consists of 44 males and 14 females living in seven communities in the Central and Western Provinces of Kenya who were interviewed by a cadre of trained University students on their school vacation. The moral judgment interview included four hypothetical moral dilemmas and a standard set of probing questions. Three of the dilemmas were standard …
A Cross-Cultural Analysis Of Sex Differences In The Behavior Of Children Aged Three Through 11, Beatrice Whiting, Carolyn P. Edwards
A Cross-Cultural Analysis Of Sex Differences In The Behavior Of Children Aged Three Through 11, Beatrice Whiting, Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This paper uses the cross-cultural, systematic child observations of the Six Culture Study, led by John and Beatrice Whiting of Harvard University, to investigate the validity of the stereotypes of sex differences about nurturance, aggression, compliance, dependency, and other behaviors. The children aged 3 – 11 years, were observed in natural settings in seven different parts of the world. The analysis indicates that there are universal sex differences in the children’s behavior, but the differences are not consistent nor as great as the studies of American and Western European children would suggest. Furthermore, socialization pressure in the form of task …
The Funeral Ceremony In Zinacantan, Carolyn P. Edwards
The Funeral Ceremony In Zinacantan, Carolyn P. Edwards
Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications
This thesis, supervised by Professor Evon Z. Vogt, presents findings from research conducted as part of the Harvard Chiapas Project. The thesis was based on interviews with informants in Zinacantan, Chiapas, Mexico, included Chep of Apas. The topics covered are: the funeral; the Zinacanteco funeral as a rite of passage; comparison between the funeral and the curing ceremony; comparison between the funeral and the All Souls Ceremony; and comparison between the funeral and the ceremonies of birth and marriage.