PSYC14H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 12: Acculturation, Coronary Artery Disease, New Culture Movement
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Chapter 12: Living in Multicultural Worlds
Difficulties in Studying Acculturation
- Acculturation: the process by which people migrate to and learn a culture that is
different from their original/heritage culture.
- Few commonalities occur for all acculturating individuals and this makes it
challenging to identifying common patterns.
- Migrants: those who move from a heritage culture to a host culture and include those
who intend to stay only temporarily (sojourners) and those who intend to move
permanently (immigrants).
What Happen When People Move to a New Culture?
- Changes in attitudes toward the host culture
Honeymoon Stage: initially, people tend to view their experiences in new
cultures to be pleasant and exciting (tourists).
Crisis of Culture Shock: the earlier thrill of having novel experiences wears off
and these experiences become tiring and difficult (recent migrants experience
homesickness).
Culture Shock: the feeling of being anxious, helpless, irritable and homesick that
one experiences on moving to a new culture.
Adjustment: after the crisis stage, most people start to adjust and begin to enjoy
their experiences more (tends to extend over a number of years).
○Reverse Culture Shock: find themselves puzzling over why they do not
quite feel at home any more in their home country.
○In homogenous societies (Japan), the adjustment phase takes longer than
heterogeneous countries (US).
- Who adjusts better?
Cultural Distance: the difference between two cultures in their overall ways of
life.
○The more cultural distance someone travels, the more difficult that person
will acculturate.
○Language and establishing interpersonal relationships with members of the
host culture are some predictors of ease of acculturation.
○People do not have to leave their country to be confronted with the need to
acculturate to new set of values (different cultures in different areas).
Cultural Fit: the degree to which an individual’s personality is more similar to the
dominant cultural values in the host culture.
○The greater the cultural fit of a person with the host culture, the more easily
he should acculturate to it.
○People with more independent self-concepts would be a better cultural fit in
individualistic societies (US).
Integration Strategy: attempting to fit in and fully participate in the host culture
while at the same time striving to maintain the traditions of one’s heritage
culture.
○Most common strategy people pursue (best of both worlds).
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○The strategy that results in the lowest degree of acculturative stress.
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