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Explorations in Dynamics of Symbolic Meaning with Cultural

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CHAPTER 6
Explorations in Dynamics
of Symbolic Meaning
with Cultural Experiments
PAWEL BOSKI
Abstract
To counterbalance the predominantly verbal measures and psychometric
orientation in cross-cultural psychology, this chapter proposes the concept of
cultural experiment. It is a method of sampling normative behavioral scripts,
exploring their inner structures of meaning, and finally designing reversals,
with the expectation of disconfirmation as their ultimate validity test. Pictorial
materials (videos) are the preferred methods in this approach as contextualized
models of existing cultural arrangements or their modifications. Empirical
evidence comes from five cross-cultural research projects spanned over 30 years.
These experiments illustrate contrasts in psychological adaptation to congruent
and incongruent scenarios. They provide answers when new cultural ways meet
with resistance and when novelty is appreciated or tolerated. Three experiments
focus on dynamics of gender role prescriptions from Polish and Scandinavian
perspectives. Another study investigates person perception of culturally familiar
and remote African actors. The last study explores tolerance priming through
religious icons from in-group and out-group cultures.
Key Words: cultural psychology, cultural perception, cultural experiment,
culture-in/congruent gender roles, scripts, moral tolerance
I. INTRODUCTION
The discussion on the role and place of culture in its interface with psychology
has a long history with numerous resurgences in the literature, the latest of
which was the invited paper by Kashima (2016) and discussion that it spurred
in the January 2016 issue of the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology (JCCP).
261
262 Handbook of Advances in Culture and Psychology
Psychological study of culture is the leading theme of this chapter, which pres-
ents my position as a cultural psychologist who believes that there has been a
deficit of culture in cross-cultural psychology (c-cp) and intends to contribute
to its elimination.
The structure of this contribution is as follows: First, I compare the general
designs of cross-cultural and cultural approaches to psychology which appear
in the literature as shorthand formulations of unpackaging culture versus cul-
ture and psyche making each other up. I outline my position as that of a cultural
psychologist studying culture perception and inter-/actions (i.e., meaning
construction, evaluation, and identity) with a methodology of cultural experi-
ments, which are designed around the contrasts between culturally congruent
versus incongruent actors. Studies employing this methodology are reported
in the domains of (1) traditional and non-traditional gender roles and interac-
tions; (2) perception of culturally embedded Nigerian actors; and (3) religious
icons’ regulation of moral tolerance.
Twenty years ago, I wrote a chapter, Cross-cultural psychology at the cross-
roads, or Lake Victoria is not Lake Mwanza, while Cross-Cultural Psychology is
not Cultural (enough), which appeared in the proceedings volume of IACCP
(International Association for Cross Cultural Psychology) Congress in
Pamplona (Boski, 1996). That chapter was the aftermath of a symposium
that I convened at the Congress, and it referred to an ongoing discussion in
our field. I pondered the dubious hyphenated name of our discipline: “cross-
cultural psychology.” Cross-appears only with cultural, not with social, economic,
political, historical, clinical, and so on. Thus, I argued for deleting the “cross-” in
favor of the cultural. By surveying studies by other authors, I found a lack or
insufficient use of cultural characteristics in favor of comparisons that used
country labels as “independent variables” in lieu of cultural variables. As a rem-
edy, I proposed direct measures of culturally situated elements (scripts, sym-
bols, artifacts); few years later (Boski, 2002), similar ideas were repeated.
Almost two decades later, at the XXI IACCP Congress, I convened another
symposium, where JCCP editors discussed the status of the journal and the
discipline at the occasion of its 40th anniversary. As a person responsible for
acculturation on that board, I presented my critical views on that important
research field, where the issue of linguistic-cultural competences and bicultur-
alism was marginally addressed, compared to intergroup attitudes and prefer-
ences (Boski, 2012). Thus, my position has been consistent over a long period
of time; its main ideas can be traced to my handbook Cultural framework of
social behavior (Boski, 2009, in Polish). This chapter’s goal is to convey my mes-
sage for the international reader.
Dynamics of Symbolic Meaning with Cultural Experiments 263
A. Cross-Cultural Psychology: Equivalence and

Unpackaging in Comparative Studies
During the formative years of c-cp, the emerging field’s explicit goal was
to discover cultural universalities (the etic) and differences (the emic) using
comparative studies (Triandis, 1980). Since then, methodology—which has
always been at the forefront of c-cp—has made huge advances. Establishing
measurement equivalence and applying hierarchical modeling to explain
individual-level differences by culture-level dimensions have been the mile-
stone advancements of the last decade.
1. The C-CP Model
The c-cp research paradigm is illustrated in Figure 6.1.

As a rule, cross-cultural studies begin with a universally formulated the-
ory, or an etic assumption (Berry, Poortinga, Segall, & Dasen, 2002) concern-
ing a phenomenon, process, or relationship [1]‌. This hypothesis or theory is
next tested in a large, comparative study, with research samples [3] drawn
from possibly many cultures [2].
Psychometric equivalence. Typically, c-cp belongs to the psychometric
branch of psychology, that is, it uses verbal scales as measurement instru-
ments at the expense of experiments and behavioral observation. Linguistic
translation of these scales [4]‌— which are often constructed in English—is
Macro-level
2 Socio-economic—
Populations
cultural dimensions
Samples of
research Unpackaging
3
participants culture
Culturally
individual level
Universal (etic)
Cross-cultural
psychological
psychological
neutral
hypotheses
outcome
variables
linguistically and
psychometrically
equivalent
measures
1 4 5
FIGURE 6.1: Research Paradigm in Cross-Cultural Psychology.

essential for such cross-cultural research projects. While the issue of (back)
translation was initially a center of attention (Brislin, 1986), establishing
equivalence of such measures across languages has now taken center-stage
(He & van de Vijver, 2012). However, the problem of equivalence is often
approached in an exclusively technical/statistical way, without considering
its contextual cultural meaning. Thus, the idea of a perfect scale in c-cp is
similar to that in natural sciences in that it resembles a thermometer oper-
ating in the Celsius or Fahrenheit system. But while a thermometer operates
according to the universal laws of physics (e.g., mercury contraction—
expansion, due to temperature changes), a scale in psychology is a linguis-
tic tool, and as such it is a product of culture, reflecting its limited range
and limited translatability. It is a contradiction if one attempts to build a
universal science with the help of language-grounded cultural instruments.1
These limitations have to do not only with the multiplicity of languages but
also with historical changes within the language in which a particular test
or questionnaire was originally formulated. It would be naive to believe that
translation between any two languages (let alone numerous) could be abso-
lutely identical and equivalent in meaning (Wierzbicka, 1997, 1999). The
same argument against the universalist claim exploits linguistic changes
over time. Items become outmoded, due to rapid changes in the lexicon and
phraseology of any language. As a linguist (psycho-semanticist), Wierzbicka
does not preclude a possibility of a perfect translation, but she argues that
this should be done through explications formulated in the natural semantic
metalanguage (NSM), and not directly from one language to another, as it is
practiced in cross-cultural psychology. We must conclude then, that the goal
of building a science of universal psychological laws resembling those of nat-
ural sciences, but with the empirical phenomena expressed and measured in
natural languages, is dubious. Linguistic measures render the phenomena
under scrutiny to be culturally bound.
Unpackaging. Suppose however, that the stringent conditions of equiva-
lence, from construct to scalar (He & van de Vijver, 2012) are met, and we can
compare differences (e.g., means or correlations) between study samples drawn
from a number of countries or other population units (#5 in Figure 6.1). One
must then consider macro-level phenomena that differ across those groups and
offer a potential way to explain away the initial differences found at the indi-
vidual level (#5). Let us analyze this process with two examples drawn from the
research on intelligence and values (which are considered as universal psycho-
logical characteristics).
Differences in intelligence measured by Wechsler Intelligence Scale for

Children (WISC) were found in an 11-country study by Georgas, Wiess, van de
Vijver, and Saklofske (2003). Reporting such differences is not enough for cur-
rent criteria of scientific investigation. What is required, is to provide convinc-
ing explanatory cultural mechanisms: Why do Korean children achieve higher
IQ scores in WISC than their peers from Lithuania or Greece? The strategy
of answering such questions has been called “unpackaging culture” (Poortinga,
van de Vijver, Joe, & van de Koppel, 1987). In a statistical sense, this met-
aphoric phrase is practiced as multilevel hierarchical modeling. It allows us
to answer which culture-level characteristics (dimensions) are responsible for
the between-group differences reported in our individual-level measures. The
small but significant differences in WISC scores reported by Georgas and his
colleagues (2003) in their 11-country study were statistically explained by
the GDP and education levels of these countries. Richer and better-educated
countries tended to have youth with higher levels in IQ. After “unpackaging,”
the initial differences between the country samples disappeared.
Another recent example is Schwartz’s (2015) investigation into differences
between major religions (Christian: Protestant, Roman-Catholic, Orthodox;
Jewish, Muslim) and non-believers across European countries (participants
of the ESS) in 10 value types. The effect sizes for the differences between reli-
gious denominations were small but meaningful. When macro-level controls
were included, such as country, GDP, HDI, group minority status, and individ-
ual socio-demographics, religion-related differences practically vanished (were
reduced to fractions of 1% in explained variance).
These examples illustrate the c-cp’s paradoxical assumption that culture
should not be addressed directly, but explained away as a “noise factor,” admit-
ting that it has been more apparent than real. The conception of unpackaging
differs largely from Hempel’s (1963) formulation of explanation by covering
laws (see Boski, 1990).
2. Decontextualization
Decontextualization is another feature of the dominant c-cp research strat-

egy. Ignoring situations may be a practical necessity to running efficiently
large, multinational studies. But the same approach is seen in empirical
work conducted within a more narrow range by single researchers. When
batteries of questionnaires borrowed from studies performed elsewhere are
used (after establishing linguistic and psychometric equivalence), the local
problem that led the author to design her/his study disappears. It becomes
another case of a universally framed relationship. But unlike mercury in

thermometers, whose physical characteristics are invariant over time and
space, the validity of instruments destined to measure values, beliefs, or
practices, requires their grounding in local phenomena, expressed in local
languages.
3. The Group Reference Effect
The group reference effect (see Heine, Lehman, Peng, & Greenholtz, 2002) is
another challenge to cross-cultural research, and supports the notion that
self-report cross-cultural data is much more vulnerable than natural sciences
measurement tools. When scales are at best interval, there is no stable zero in
measures, and responses are based on shifting points of evaluation (Biernat &
Manis, 2007). An intuitive, automatic, and shifting group standard is implic-
itly used as a guide to answering such simple items as “How tall are you?” Here,
it is possible, at least, to take direct measure of height in centimeters or feet
and inches. But with practices/value/belief/attitude items, which are typical
for vast majority of cross-cultural work, there is no escape from contextual
group reference effect. Consider, for example, an item from Schwartz’s popular
PVQ: It is important to her/him to be rich. S/He wants to have a lot of money and
expensive things. The meaning of “a lot of money” and “expensive things” is not
fixed across cultures.
B. Cultural Psychology: Culture

and Psyche Make Each Other Up
1. Cole, Schweder, and the Conceptual Model
This subsection’s title comes from the well-known catchword by Richard
Schweder. For Schweder (1995, 2003) and also for Cole (1995, 1996), cultural
psychology grew out of a dissatisfaction with c-cp. Schweder employs met-
aphoric expression for general psychology whose goal he calls a search for a
Platonic— abstract, universal, context-free— processing mechanism (2003,
pp. 45–46). He quotes the phrase from Segall, Lonner, and Berry (1998), “peel-
ing away the onion skin of culture as to reveal the psychic unity of mankind
at its core” (2003, p. 41), as one of the goals attributed to c-cp to reach this
Platonic ideal.
In his positive formulation, “The mind according to cultural psychology,
is content driven, domain specific, and constructively stimulus-bound; and
it cannot be de-extricated from the historically variable, and cross-culturally
diverse intentional worlds in which it plays a co-constitutional part” (1995,

p. 55). While he does not do so technically, Schweder addresses the issue of
measurement equivalence where culture is considered as “noise”: “For a cul-
tural psychologist, the ‘noise’ is interpreted as a signal about true differences
in cultural meanings and not as something to eliminate or overcome. Indeed,
cultural psychologists are likely to worry if measuring instruments travel eas-
ily and well. . . and display the same psychometric properties” (2003, p. 42).
While Schweder’s elucidations appear somehow “ideological,” Michael
Cole’s conception of cultural psychology becomes more practical. The key con-
cept in his approach is that of “cultural artifact,” which is an ideal or material
cultural object mediating human actions and interactions (1996, pp. 104–
145). According to this author, psychological functioning of humans always
takes place in context, filled with cultural artifacts that are integrated with
our activities as practical tools or ideational symbols of cognition and affect.
Psychological adequacy becomes cultural competence, that is, proper use of
these artifacts in shaping actions and outcomes.
Inspired by Schweder’s and Cole’s earlier works, the cultural psychol-
ogy paradigm has evolved into a large body of literature, represented in the
Handbook of cultural psychology (Kitayama & Cohen, eds., 2008). The essential
elements of this paradigm are illustrated in Figure 6.2.
Here, culture appears as a warehouse of symbols, artifacts and associated
behavioral scripts [1]‌. They are learned/acquired by members of a given cul-
ture [A], shaping those actors’ psyches [2]. But members of unfamiliar culture
[B] are also included in this scheme as observers-visitors, that is, research par-
ticipants in experiments based on Culture A. These experiments are scenarios,
products of mimicry or of cultural scripts transformation [3]. Thus, there is
room for introducing novelties that do not fit to the dominant (traditional)
cultural patterns, or for encounters with a new culture. In both instances, the
meaning (understanding and misunderstanding), emotional responses, and
social consequences of interaction with symbolic elements become of para-
mount importance and research interest [4].
2. Research Examples
Essential for the cultural psychological paradigm is its starting point, which
is not necessarily a psychological theory but most often an analysis of certain
cultural phenomena, through a psychological lens.
Analytical and holistic cognitive styles. In this respect, the work on
analytical-holistic cognitive styles may be regarded as the most successful field
Culture [A]: Artifacts
Symbolic value
Tools
objects
1
Know-how Meaning, script
practices performance
Same Culture [A] Cultural Experiments: Actor

Actor Contextual, symbolic, • Perceptions;
• Catching the sense; script-related stimuli • Interpretations;
• Cognitive style, materials:
• Evaluations/
• Typical (congruent)
2a • Competence and 3 preferences; 4
performance; • Novel
• Identities;
• Values, beliefs; • Modified (incongruent)
• Behavioral
• Interpersonal • Counter-cultural
tendencies
behavior (insidious)
Observer
Other Culture [B]

2b Observer
FIGURE 6.2: Cultural Psychology—a research paradigm.
of cultural psychology over the last twenty years. It started with an observa-
tion that the two great civilizations: Confucian in East Asia, and Greek-Roman
in Europe differed remarkably in their philosophical roots since antiquity
(Nisbett, 2003). While Greek philosophers developed a system of classical
logic, and reasoning; Confucius and Taoists concentrated instead on para-
doxical coexistence of contradictions and web of interconnections between
objects (elements; see also: Peng, Spencer-Rodgers, & Nian, 2006). A large
number of studies on causal thinking and attributions, classification, memory,
perception, and aesthetics were derived from these philosophical premises.
Participants in psychological studies are not philosophers; they may not even
have taken courses in philosophy; yet they have been trained incidentally in
what their cultures regarded as proper ways of reasoning and perceiving reality
in everyday practice.
Culture of honor. Another relevant example is research on the culture of

honor (Nisbett, 1993; Nisbett & Cohen, 1996). In elucidating the culture of
honor, the authors start with psychological analyses of certain culture’s prem-
ises, and not from a psychological theory per se. They detail the conditions
under which culture—which usually inhibits aggression—can spur violence
(e.g., the eco-cultural conditions leading to cattle husbandry in the American
South-West in past centuries). In doing so, they explain how a cultural orienta-
tion toward violence could be functional in that region. Only after addressing
these historical origins, do the researchers turn to contemporary after-effects
of insult and honor defense. With experimental methodology, evidence of
southerners’ affective-behavioral responses to insults/provocations has been
demonstrated.
Social cynicism and its cultural context. We can clearly see the context for
the studies on analytical-holistic styles or culture of honor: variables in these
research designs are derived from cultural analyses; and the methods are exper-
imental, or contextualized. Another illustration, from our studies on social
axioms will further sharpen this idea (Boski, Biłas-Henne, & Więckowska,
2009). Studies on social axioms have been one of the most popular research
topics in c-cp, and have defined social axioms as general, trans-situational, and
shared beliefs about how the human social world is believed to work (Leung &
Bond, 2009). Social cynicism is one such belief system, which emerged from
a large multinational project (Leung & Bond, 2004). It defines human nature
as dominated by ulterior motives, mischief, mistrust, and reciprocally manip-
ulative treatment of others. Social cynicism plays the role of an antecedent
and a consequent of many social relations. The construct is captured by sam-
ple items such as: Kind-hearted people usually suffer losses; To care about societal
affairs only brings trouble to yourself.
The point is whether a scale like this is suitable to measure cynicism in
inter-group relations, especially if such relations are marked by long and diffi-
cult history. Since research participants endorse their personal general beliefs
about other people, the SAS (Social Axioms Survey) seems not to fit well as a
measuring device for cynical interpretation of particular events or situations.
We proposed that cynicism should be generated by the gap between an
actor’s words (e.g., propaganda) and his/her deeds. This discrepancy should
be more experienced by a subordinate or less powerful of two partners.
Accordingly, we predicted level of cynicism in their intergroup relations to
be higher among Poles than Russians. To test this hypothesis we needed a
situation-driven measure of cynicism, rather than a context free SAS scale.
This was accomplished by assigning interpretations to pictures portraying

interactions between well-known Polish and Russian personalities over the
period of second half of 20th century (politicians, sport champions, cosmo-
nauts, etc.). Participants were to choose between cynical and friendly inter-
pretations of these interactions.2 As predicted, cynicism was higher among
Polish participants. More importantly, measures of cynicism grew strong as a
response to the perceived gap between propaganda and reality during a corre-
sponding period of country bilateral relations.
C. Studying Culture as Prescribed Action Process: A

Picture Is Worth a 1000 Words
1. Applications of the Dual Code Theory
It is well recognized in cognitive psychology that our mental representations
exist at two levels: pictorial (imagens) and verbal (logogens; Paivio, 1986). These
representations differ on the dimension of concreteness–abstraction, and on
simultaneous—sequential/hierarchical order of processing. They have mutual
correspondence but are not perfectly isomorphic (e.g., “cat” and “dog” may be
represented at both but “animal” belongs to conceptual level only). Thus, each
theoretical system reflects the dual nature of external reality, which manifests
itself through objects, their actions, and as conceptual elaborations. The dual-
code theory fits ideally to cultural analyses, but it has never been (according to
my knowledge) applied this way. Many profane or sacral proceedings occur at
visual/auditory-behavioral level, though they also have a conceptual (verbal)
representation. But could a tango be adequately described in words? It is doubtful
according to the dual code theory (and to common sense). Similarly, values
(e.g., Justice) or belief systems (e.g., social cynicism as an axiom; the concept of
Universe; etc.) belong to the abstract-verbal level, with a limited potential for
visual expression.
2. Culture Perception
Intercultural communication at the verbal level is only possible by linguistic

translation or by learning a foreign language. This is indeed what c-cp does
when verbal scales are translated for research use. There is no reason, however,
to restrict studies to this one channel only, since much of intra-and inter-
cultural interaction occurs through the visual/pictorial/nonverbal channel
of communication, where translation is not an absolute requirement. Overt
behaviors can be identified beyond the context of the local culture, even if
their deeper conceptual meaning remains hidden for the outsiders.
Knowledge of a local or third language is not necessary for survival in
a foreign country if there are pictures of meals in restaurants, food items at
display in stores, etc. We can watch sports games on TV mute, and be able to
understand what happens on the pitch. Essential in these circumstances is a
familiarity with general cultural scripts, which direct the behavior of cultural
actors (Schank & Abelson, 1995; Wierzbicka, 1994). Since meaning is not fully
inherent to the pictorial code, but also subject to interpretations dependent
on observers cultural programming, there is room for studying validity, mis-
conceptions, and preferences vis-à-vis such materials.
With its emphasis on symbols (Schweder), artifacts (Cole), and scripts
(Wierzbicka), cultural psychology seems ready to exploit the pictorial level of
culture’s manifestation for research purposes. This approach has been sug-
gested by Greenfield (1997, pp. 330–331; Greenfield, 2004), with reference to
video materials which are particularly suitable to portray samples of contex-
tual, script related artifacts and actors’ script behaviors.
The issue of equivalence, essential with verbal research materials, is not
of such vital importance anymore when we employ the more universal pic-
torial code. Even though participants still frame their answers in words but
the scales become very specific, attached to visual images, instead of being
abstract and decontextualized items. Such verbal material is made much closer
to the primitives of Wierzbicka’s natural semantic meta-language (NSM). Thus,
equivalence should also be much easier to be attained in such circumstances.
Compared to scalar psychometric methodology in c-cp, the range of pos-
sible responses to pictures or video-clips is broad. We may be interested in
measuring
1. Cultural perception—accuracy in detection, and identification of

presented materials
2. Meaning/(mis-/)understanding—the sense associated with
cultural artifacts and human actions to which they are integrated
3. Recognition/recall memory
4. Typicality judgments of a given cultural context for ingroup and
outgroup observers
5. Normative appropriateness or inappropriateness by the same
two categories of observers
6. Evaluation of novel or intruding elements into the structure of
existing script
7. Cultural identity with symbolic artifacts and practices

8. Regulatory functions of symbolic priming
9. Cultural competence—overall index of adequate cognitive
representations and behavioral skills in a given context
Most of these domains are covered by the studies reported in this chapter.
The outlined version of cultural psychology does not resist cross-cultural com-
parisons, nor does it advocate qualitative measures as its preferred method-
ology (see Figure 6.2). Indeed, such cross-cultural, comparative context does
appear in all studies reported in this contribution. The difference between the
approach I advocate and mainstream cross-cultural psychology relies essen-
tially in favoring samples of realistic cultural materials rather than using
potentially translatable verbal scales with a minimized cultural context.3
II. THE CONCEPT AND ILLUSTRATION OF

A CULTURAL EXPERIMENT (STUDY #1)
A. The Logic of Culture Confirmation: Sufficient and
Necessary Conditions
A cultural experiment consists of providing evidence for a given normative
rule (script) by intentional designing and introducing its reversal, with the
expectation that this counter-cultural turnaround will be met with behavioral
resistance or correction in an effort to reinstate the norm.
In this context, culture → behavior causality can be demonstrated with
two conditions. The weaker of these two is the sufficient condition, which
is equivalent to confirmation: if C (culture) occurs, then B (behavior) must
follow. In the necessary condition, however, one must ask: Does B’s absence
exclude C’s presence? Thus, the necessary cultural condition is counterfactual,
or creates an à rebours, alternative version of reality. People engaged in their
cultures seem to operate on sufficient condition assumptions, which makes
the sine qua non a more difficult, “academic” type of exercise for them.
Exploiting logical reasoning as a foundation for the concept of a cultural
experiment draws on the well-known studies by Johnson-Laird and Wason
(1985). These authors observed that full validation of any rule (cultural or
otherwise) taking a format of implication [p → q] requires two steps: (1)
confirmation of its antecedent (p), which satisfies sufficient condition; and
(2) disconfirmation of the consequent (~q), which satisfies the necessary con-
dition. Classical studies by Johnson-Laird and Wason have demonstrated
limited power of logics in human reasoning. When a rule was given “If there
is a vowel on one side of a card, an even number is printed on the other,”
participants largely failed with performing disconfirmation trials on a subset
of symbols {D, E, 4, 7}, that is, flipping the “7” to test if there is no vowel on
the other side. Consequently, playing disconfirmation in cultural experiments
may be similarly challenging on cognitive grounds but, unlike this abstract
exercise, also normatively hazardous.4
1. The Request →Compliance Scenario
The first cultural experiment that I present is a {request → compliance} sce-

nario with a gender manipulation. Gender is particularly suitable for running
cultural experiments, because of its dichotomous nature, mimicking the log-
ical true versus false opposition. This makes it easy to create sufficient and
necessary conditions for testing gender culture.
Request scripts are common in any culture; they are necessary for smooth
interaction and subtle cues instruct us which of them are legitimate (the
recipient should comply) while others are odd, or out of place. It seems quite
appropriate, for example, for a senior person in his/her role of a teacher, to ask
student audience, “May I ask two of you to please bring a bench (stand, table, box
etc.) from the hallway to the class? We’ll need it in a moment.” We should expect an
almost universal positive response, such that two students will rise to complete
the task. The scenario involves compliance, which is one of the basic forms
of social influence. “Politeness” or “kindness” are the cultural-psychological
mechanisms that account for such phenomena. A lack of response or a verbal
reaction like “No, please do it yourself, if you deem it necessary,” would be consid-
ered rude and unlikely in this particular situation (Brown & Levinson, 1987;
Holtgraves & Yang, 1990).5
Suppose now, that we want to test validity of this cultural normative
rule: “If moving an object requires exercising of physical strength, then such task is
addressed to, and performed by men, and not by women.” Unlike the gender neu-
tral request (May I ask two of you . . .), this rule is gender specific. It is derived
from Polish cultural traditions assigning to women an elevated, lady-like pos-
ition (Bogucka, 1991; Boski, 1999). Purely on logical grounds, verification of
this rule can be identical to Johnson-Laird and Wason task with numbers and
letters. The four cards of vowel/consonants and even/odd numbers would be
substituted by heavy/light objects and fe-/male names: “Wardrobe” (a heavy
object), “Book” (a light object), “Mary” (F), and “John” (M). “Wardrobe” would
have to be turned over for confirmation, and “Mary” for disconfirmation in
testing validity of the rule. If the latter card had a “Cabinet” (or a “Couch,” etc.)
on its other side, the rule would have been falsified.
2. Reversing the Script. “The May I Ask Two Ladies . . .”

Cultural Experiment
Now, let us move from the card game to behavioral requests. If two men are
requested to carry the task and they comply, the sufficient condition is satis-
fied. Testing the cultural rule this way is as much effective as it is cognitively
sterile. No one would find it interesting to read a report that young males (stu-
dents) respond positively when they are asked to carry a heavy object. When,
however, two ladies are requested to carry a cabinet, the experimenter attempts
to contradict the rule, and our hypothesis holds that the participants who
share it will resist this attempt at violation on the basis of what they judge to
be culturally appropriate: “The cabinet should not be moved by Mary or any
other woman accompanying her.”
Validation by disconfirmation is much less prevalent and much more inter-
esting. It involves a complex process of denying the rightfulness of request, its
reinterpretation, and compliance by the switch of responders. It is this double
behavioral effect: female inaction and male action, which is predicted, on the
grounds of the culture which supports the rule under investigation.
This section’s cultural experiment was conducted through unconventional
means. Its 121 iterations spanned over 19 years (1998–2017), meaning that
some cohorts were almost a generation apart. This is a period when consider-
able cultural change has occurred, as Poland shifted from a post-communist
to pro-Western orientation.6 The vast majority of the trials to date took place
during university classes. The student samples were drawn from four major
Polish cities, with group size ranging from 10 to 150 individuals. Age dif-
ferences were also substantial: from around 20 to over 35 (for students in
part-time, weekend classes). It should be added that gender composition of
psychology classes in Poland might somehow justify this strange request, since
women consist of a vast majority, 80–85% of audience.
In all trials, I followed a simple scenario. It always happened at the begin-
ning of an inaugural class in a semester. After presenting the course syllabus
and ascertaining it was clear, the instructor would address the class with this
request:
“Aaah, . . . well, we’ll need a bench (sofa, stand, wardrobe, etc.) for an exercise that
I want to show you during this lecture. This object is right there, sitting on the hallway,
just at the door. May I ask two ladies, please, to carry it to the class? Please,. . . .
ok . . ., thank you.” [The type of equipment to be brought into the class is decided
before the class, depending what is available inside and outside.]
Of this study’s all trials, 93 drew from Polish samples, including nine aca-
demic conferences or professional training sessions that had professors in
attendance. 11 trials used Swedish samples, 6 used French samples, 1 was
Portuguese, and 10 trials were conducted in Poland using international stu-
dents and professors who had visited for a conference.7 This extension to
cultures other than Polish, and to international audiences, was intended to
provide cross-cultural tests to the script that “carrying physical tasks is a male
job in Poland.” The distribution of results can be seen in Table 6.1.
Descriptive results of this study showed that, of the 93 attempts on var-
ious types of Polish samples, only 5 cases (5.4%) featured a single woman or
two women acting to meet the request. On these rare occasions, when women
rose to do the job, their overt behavior was supplemented with open dissatis-
faction with men’s inaction (see later). In contrast, at all occasions in France
and in Sweden, women responded. The gap in gender behavior between Polish
and non-Polish samples is very powerful, Χ²(1) = 78.04, p <. 0001.
Finally, in international classes recently occurring in Poland and run in
English, there were interesting displays of Western or dual culture action, in
which a Western woman and a Polish or Ukrainian man stood up for the job.
3. Interpreting the “May I Ask Two Ladies . . .” Experiment
The interpretative format of the May I ask two ladies . . . is presented in Figure 6.3.
The outer cultural perspective. The upper part of Figure 6.3 displays the sim-
ple {professor’s request → student compliance} proceedings outside of Poland
(in Sweden and France), and also among exchange students from Western
TABLE 6.1: Cultural experiment May I ask two ladies. Frequencies of confirmation

and disconfirmation trials
Samples K = no. Two men A woman/ Mixed (M

of trials perform two women and F)
perform
Polish samples 93 86 (92%) 5 2
Sweden/France 18 0 17 (100%) 1
Poland- 10 2 5 3
international
M: May I ask two ladies …

[A task of physical effort]
Outside Polish culture
Attention switched on…
Competence to do;
Surface (shallow) Women: YES!
and moral (nor-
comprehension (why not?)
mative) justification
A mistake in request:
slip of tongue
Culturally sensible? – Culture script:

Inside Polish culture
Searching for a sript In this country (generally) men

are expected to carry physical
tasks!
Request is script
inconsistent
Reinterpretation: incorrect
request!
F: it’s not for me, M: I’ll do it, I should,

M: that’s
THAT’S FOR YOU BOYS! that‘s what is
Or: I will do – but shame on you addressed to me
expected from me
FIGURE 6.3: Cultural Experiment: ‘May I ask two Ladies? . . . –Please’.
Europe while in Poland. The message is linguistically processed, considered

as legitimate (though strange), and if there are no physical constraints (e.g., a
physical handicap), women to whom it is addressed, carry it out.
The inner cultural perspective. The lower part of the figure explains the valida-
tion through disconfirmation mechanism among Polish audiences. The request
is attended to, and processed linguistically, but it contradicts the local cultural
script. There are a host of reactions to this mismatch, all of which have been
reported in students’ spontaneous reactions. The first is a verbal denial: “You
have erred, it was a slip of tongue, you meant something different than you said,”
which leads to a redefinition of the request in line with the script. But even, if
such reinterpretation is not done, the script-work is clearly in operation:
(1) On rare occasions when women act, they do it with sneering comments: “What
kind of men we have now? Shame on you boys!”
[A female student at an opening class, rushing to pull down the hangings,

Warsaw, Feb., 2011]
(2) Women push men to stand up and do the job: “Oh, but we have men in the class,
come on boys!” “We need a hand” [Warsaw, Sept. 19, 2015], or—pinching them
physically—“Stand up, what are you waiting for!”
(3) Men [a hilarious, teasing exchange occurs]: “you wanted equal rights, well, go
ahead, you have it!”; or
Men [reacting verbally to the request ]: “But could we, men, do it instead of women?”
[both in Poznań, 2014]
(4) “When she, XY, stood up, it was too much for me. I just could not sit anymore!”
or “I wanted to act, I felt uncomfortable, but I could not, my leg is in cast.”
[men’s comments at the debriefing; Poznań, 2013]
The cognitive reinterpretation has normative-motivational consequences,

such that women do not move up, push men to respond, or comment on their
inaction. Men, on the other hand, respond spontaneously or do it upon wom-
en’s demand. The cultural script prevails over the ostensible attempt to bend
it, and change the culture.
4. A Video Version of the “May I Ask Two Ladies . . .”
In methodological terms, the “May I ask two ladies . . .” is a quasi-experiment.

Jułkowski (2016) has recently developed and tested it as a full factorial design. The
format consists of a 2 (Gender addressed request: F vs. M) * 2 (Gender response: F
vs. M) video material with the same 2 instructors and a group of 15 students serv-
ing as actors-confederates. A male instructor-actor (accompanied by his female
colleague) opened up their workshop class with a request We would like two fe/male
students to bring a stand here, from the hallway, we’ll need it to hang flipcharts later on.”
After a moment of “hesitancy” (looking around, whispering to the neighbor, etc.),
two male or two female students would rise and meet the request.
Participants were observers (M and F) watching one of these four video-
recordings. They rated typicality/normativeness of requests and responses,
and their own motivation to comply under these conditions. The request →
compliance situation was judged most typical, when male students were
addressed and responded. The most atypical (most disturbing) was the sit-
uation when female actors were requested and males responded. Finally, an
interesting triple interaction effect was found for participants’ motivation to
comply. It was lowest among female observers watching male actors respond-
ing positively to requests directed to either gender. It was highest among male
observers watching male actors who responded to females directed request.
In conclusion, observer’s perspective in Jułkowski’s experiment complements
actors’ performance findings in 93 Polish classroom trials. In both situations,
male (request) → male (response) is considered a routine scenario, while
attempts at initiating countercultural requests are resisted by both males and

females, as they cling to the original script.
III. EXPERIMENTS ON CULTURE IN-/ G ROUP

VERSUS OUT-G ROUP AND IN-/C ONGRUENT
SCRIPTS STUDIES #2 AND #3
Two theoretical issues need to be addressed in the introduction to this section.
1. In-outgroup and cultural in-/congruency: Unconfounding the

two axes.
Cultural experiments assume shared normative elements which serve as ref-

erents to their possibly incongruent alternatives. This perspective rests on the
observation that modern cultures become more and more normatively heter-
ogeneous and it would be highly unlikely to expect a total adherence to script
prescriptions, even when some of them are dominant. Since cultures evolve
from traditional toward more open and varied patterns (Schwartz, 2004), this
distinction must be seen as relative and dynamic over time. Another notewor-
thy point is that the appearance of incongruent (counter-cultural) elements
often leads to ideological, political, religious “civil wars” among fellow citizens
(particularly over gender and sexual issues).
Since cultural heterogeneity becomes an ingroup phenomenon, the con-
gruent/incongruent split is quite different from classic ingroup/outgroup dis-
tinction (often based on ascribed, ethno-linguistic categories and loyalties).
There are some suggestions in the literature which support unconfounding
these two axes of categorization. First, Marques, Yzerbyt, and Leyens, (1988)
proposed a black sheep phenomenon, which applies only to formal ingroups
and reflects a negatively evaluated actor.
Next, Sanchez-Burks, Nisbett, and Ybarra (2000) separated actors’ eth-
nicity (Anglo-Americans vs. Latino-Americans or Mexicans), from their
cultural orientation (task vs. relational styles of work). Participants rated
preferences for both styles of conversation occurring between their in-/o ut-
groups. For Anglo-Americans only the style (task orientation) mattered in
actor’s evaluation, while ethnicity did not. For Latinos or Mexicans, ethnicity
was more important: ingroup actors were favored irrespective of their style.
Two cultural experiments reported in this section will demonstrate the
effects of actors’ in-outgroup and cultural in-/congruency characteristics on
observers’ assessment of behavior typicality, evaluation, identity, and his/her
motivation to get engaged in a script behavior.
2. Cultural perception.
The ingroup/outgroup distinction and script in-/congruency need to be

established before their judgmental consequences can be measured. This kind
of information is often explicitly provided or can be easily accessed by verbal/
linguistic means. Otherwise, inferential processes will occur to answer the
basic questions of who? what? where? when? why? These are the basic ques-
tions for cultural perception, as important as largely absent in psychologi-
cal inquiry. While studies on categorization or concept formation make use
of natural stimuli or human-made objects (e.g., animals, furniture), human
meaningful symbols, actions and proceedings, are not given equal attention.
In a broader sense, the concept of cultural perception embraces the mean-
ing of scripts, scenarios, symbols, and practices for which individual actors
are carriers and responders. Also included in this field is the identification of
place location and time. Psychology of place explores cognitive and attach-
ment aspects of localities in autobiographical and symbolic space (Lewicka,
2013); it helps to establish the ingroup/outgroup and in-/congruency of the
perceived cultural world.
A. Culture Perception of Polish Courtesy

Scripts: A Four Culture Experiment
These questions were first addressed in a four-culture study on Polish gender-
role scripts (Boski, van de Vijver, Hurme, & Miluska, 1999). Polish observers’
responses were compared with three outgroups from Finland, Netherlands,
and the United States. Cross-cultural comparisons were designed to test pos-
sible in-/outgroup differences in various aspects of culture perception, and in
the mechanisms behind such differences.
The target culture in our study was Poland with its repertoire of tradi-
tional gender interactions in private and public situations (already referred to
in previous discussion of the May I ask two ladies experiment). Some of these
behaviors, like hand kissing, have a long and well-established history. Bogucka
(1991) found hand kissing and cheek kissing to be prevalent customs of well-
behaved Polish nobility as early as the 16th century. Those customs grew in
strength during the Baroque period, which had its Polish version of showing
off ostentatious splendor called Sarmatism (Boski, 2006, 2012). While hand
kissing is not practiced now with the same frequency, it still is an established
social custom performed publicly by some political leaders. Contemporary
Finnish culture, on the other hand, does not feature hand kissing, and cheek
kiss has been introduced only recently (Hurme, 1988; Korhonen, 1996;
Lassila, 1990). Similarly, Dutch culture, which Hofstede (1998) finds proto-
typical for sex role unimorphism (i.e., social roles overlap, see also Buss et al.
1990), only rarely features these behaviors. Other courtesy behaviors, such as
giving up one’s seat, holding the door for someone, and helping someone take
off their coat were also selected for the study.8
In order to exclude activation of extrinsic cultural knowledge, stereotypes
or prejudice, the Polish context of the video-recordings was neither explicitly
mentioned nor was it suggested, and the interactions remained nonverbal.
This approach also enabled us to measure place and time location, the basic
indices of culture perception.
The study was conducted among student populations, in Warsaw (Poland),
Pittsburgh (United States), Vaasa (Swedish minority in Finland), and Tilburg
(Netherlands); males and females were equally represented in those samples
(ranging from 60 to 90 participants). Three videos, termed Date, Visit, and
Helping/Yielding were recorded. They had a common theme reflecting respect,
courtesy, and chivalry of men actors toward women who expected and accepted
such behaviors as culturally appropriate.
1. Video Materials
Date. This episode contained two actors coming out for a date. The actors
were young (student-aged), and dressed casually in blue jeans. The man was
seen impatiently waiting outdoors for someone at a fast food restaurant. He
checked his wrist-watch and looked expectantly to catch sight of a young and
attractive looking woman who eventually approached in a relaxed and non-
chalant way: she checked her watch too, smiling to herself. The man offered
flowers, kissed his date on the hands, then on the lips, and then the couple
engaged in a tender embrace. Once they sat down, the man ordered soft drinks
and poured two glasses.
Visit. This video began with a fashion conscious hostess in her 40s prepar-
ing the dinner table for her guests. A couple then approached the apartment
and rang the door to be let in. The male host opened the door, and three guests
entered, all dressed in coats. Female guests were more formally dressed than
their accompanying male partner. The hostess was offered flowers, and the
host a bottle of wine. Hand kisses were exchanged in male-female greetings,
and three cheek kisses between females. Men also exchanged cheek kisses
and a bear hug. The host then helped the female guests with their coats, and
escorted them to the dining room, where seats were offered around the table.
The hostess served coffee, and the party displayed a formal, polite style of
interaction.
Helping. The episode was composed of five short outdoors or transporta-
tion clips, all occurring between strangers. The videos depicted men helping
women get a stroller on a bus, holding a door for women, and giving up a seat
on a bus for them.
The three episodes were designed as a series of non-verbal interactions,
supposedly simple enough to answer such questions as: who are the actors
and what are they doing? To fill the empty space resulting from missing verbal
communication, and to hide the country origin of the recordings, background
music thematically focused on women and gender relations, was played on
the sound track (e.g., John Lennon’s Woman, I can hardly express . . .).
Finally, we measured (in three samples, not the American sample)
gender role stereotypical beliefs with Personal Attributes Questionnaire
(Spence, Helmreich, & Stapp, 1974). The PAQ is a 25 item instrument; sam-
ple items: Swearing in women is repulsive; Women should not be sexually intimate
before marriage. The purpose was to provide a convergent validating criterion
for our video-measures.
2. Culture Perception
We first established the accuracy of our videos among participants, asking

them for place and time identification of the episodes. Indices for place accu-
racy were measured at three geographical levels: superordinate = continent
(Europe = 1), basic = country (Poland = 2), and subordinate = city (Poznań = 3);
(Rosch, 1985). Specifying the city of recordings indicated the highest place
accuracy, since it assumed country and continent recognition. Time accuracy
was measured as a difference between 1996, which was the year of study, and
a midpoint of a decade estimated by a participant.
Next, typicality ratings for the recorded episodes in their social environ-
ments were assessed. We also measured participants’ gender role identifica-
tion, operationalized as subject’s own readiness and their imagined partner
expectations for the type of behaviors manifested in videos; last was the gen-
eral script evaluation scale (How much do you approve or disapprove of this epi-
sode on the whole? All scales had the range from –2 to +2. All measures were
assessed three times, separately for each episode. They were aggregated over
the three episodes for the purpose of this presentation.
We wanted first to see if a chain of step-by-step relationships starting with
place location and script approval as outcome variable, could be established.
(A)
Gender role
.466*** Typicality .449*** .662***
identity
Place location Script

.138indir.*** (–.037dir.)
accuracy approval
FIGURE 6.4A: Mediation path from culture perception (place location) to evaluation

(experiment #2).
Notes: *** = p < .001 for effect significance
The analysis performed on z-standardized scores.
The indirect effect of .138 holds for the path with two mediators
Figure 6.4A demonstrates the structure of relations, organized in the format

of a mediation analysis.
There is a singular chain of relations such that significant effects were
obtained only for adjacent variables. Place location accuracy led to higher esti-
mates of script typicality, which in turn was responsible for contextual gender
role identity, finally resulting in the overall script approval. The only significant
indirect effect was the path linking the most distant variables of place accuracy
and script approval through typicality and gender role identity (.138***). Thus,
when the unnamed video-sceneries appeared as familiar places, participants
considered the gender related scripts as typical for their cultural environment.
These culture perception variables led to gender identity preferences and gen-
eral positive evaluation of the episodes, even though there was no direct effect
between place location accuracy as independent, and positive evaluation as
outcome variable.
3. Ingroup and Outgroup Effects
The general mediational model in Figure 4A escapes any effects due to par-
ticipants’ cultures of origin. In fact, there were two such effects. The first is
related to culture perception variables. The sceneries which appeared in the
video episodes were objectively familiar to Polish participants who were able
to recognize them more accurately than the outgroup peers. Respective size
effects were: η2 = .691, for place location accuracy; η2 = .393, for time accuracy);
and η2 = .256, for script typicality estimates. These ingroup enhancing results
could hardly be unexpected.
(B)
Gender role
.107* .611***
identity
–.273***
.434***
Dutch
–.134***
0.97***
[~D = .018/D = .260** ]

Script
Typicality
approval
FIGURE 6.4B: Gender roles script appraisal, a mediation and moderated

mediation model.
Notes: *** = p < .001; ** = p < .01; * = p < .05 for effect significance.
Coefficients italicized and in bold represent a moderated mediation with “Dutch” [D=1;
others=~D=0] as the moderator.
All analyzes were performed with z-standardized variables.
The findings on two evaluation variables differed considerably. They dem-

onstrated outgroup depreciation effect on a foreign culture. Here, Dutch par-
ticipants scored much lower than the three combined groups on gender role
identity, η2 = .110; and on script approval, η2 = .128. At the same time, Dutch
nationality moderated overall relationships within the mediational model by
strengthening the {typicality → gender identity} path and rendering the {typ-
icality → overall script approval} relationship significant. Figure 6.4b illus-
trates all these results.
Why should Dutch participants distinctly reject Polish gender scripts?
We sought an answer to this question by first comparing participants on
the PAQ, which revealed a two factor solution: F1_Egalitarianism: Same
ground for divorce, Merit system without regard to sex (12 items, 25.3% vari-
ance explained); F2_Social dimorphism rejection: It is ridiculous for men to darn
socks, Swearing in women is more repulsive than in men (10 items, 11.4% vari-
ance explained). Women on both scales scored much higher than men, indi-
cating their stronger sensitivity to the issues of gender equality. Also, Dutch
subjects in general scored higher on both scales than the remaining partici-
pants. With F1_Egalitarianism, the effect was marginal (Dutch > Finns), but
in F2_Dimorphism rejection, the differences were larger; here Dutch (and also
Finns) outscored Poles. Thus, Dutch participants presented the most radi-
cal opinions with all measures concerning gender issues. This is in line with
Hofstede’s (1998) opinions on Dutch cultural femininity, defined as leveling

out gender differences and distinctiveness.
When it comes to correlations between two PAQ factors and our exper-
imental measures, they are significant in low negative range only for gender
identity measure:
r(200) = –.149, p < .05 with F1, and r=–.243, p < .001 with F2 (rejection of social
dimorphism).
In the original paper reporting the study (Boski et al., 1999) an attempt
to “unpackage” the cross-cultural differences was undertaken. We found out
that Bond’s human heartedness dimension (e.g., kindness, patience, courtesy; CCC,
1987)—for which the Netherlands scored extremely low—accounted for cross-
cultural differences in gender role identification as measured in our experiment.
Altogether, watching the local script was a familiar and congruent cultural
experience for Poles. The foreign, script-incongruent cultural experiment,
occurred for Dutch participants who rejected the courtesy treatment that Polish
women were offered in their interactions with men.
B. Traditionality, Gender Role Reversals,

and Mortality Salience
The four cultures from the previous study differ largely on the dimensions
of autonomy-embeddedness (Schwartz, 2004), and ingroup collectiveness
(House et al., 2004), where Poland scores high relative to low standings of
Scandinavian countries (Sweden and Finland). The decision to conduct a cul-
tural experiment (i.e., exploring gender role reversals) between these cultural
regions was motivated by this evidence. Since the effectiveness of cultural
experiments should be enhanced in mortality salience conditions, the theo-
retical context of terror management context was introduced.
1. Terror Management Theory: Culture Buffering

Existential Anxiety
Terror Management Theory (TMT) is an important cultural psychological

theory (Pyszczyński, Solomon, & Greenberg, 2003), which has been given
more attention in mainstream outlets than in cross-cultural literature (see
comments by Ma-Kellams & Blascovich, 2012). TMT’s basic assumption
holds that culture serves as a buffer against existential anxiety, and that
cultural norms are endorsed with verve when mortality is salient, in an
effort to fend off death anxiety. However, the theory does not address the
issue of cultural patterns, which are essential for predicting which themes
will be more or less endorsed to buffer existential anxiety across different

cultures. Some studies run and published at the time when ours was con-
ducted found evidence for mortality salience defending worldviews con-
sistent with primed social identities. When made aware of their death,
Australian-Aborigines participants in Halloran and Kashima (2004) study
reduced their endorsement of collectivist values under national identity
prime, or lowered support for individualist values under ethnic identity
prime. These authors reported similar results in Study 2, when student or
Australian identity was primed and led to value endorsement functional for
those identities. Kashima, Halloran, Yuki, and Kashima (2004) were able to
extend this approach to demonstrate differential support for values charac-
terizing Australian versus Japanese cultures. Also, Heine and his colleagues
(2002) found evidence for Japanese defending their national worldviews
when induced by mortality salience. All these studies primed in-group iden-
tity, which is separate from culture-in-action, as scripts and practices can
be called. We unconfounded the two axes in experiment #2 and will do the
same in the current one. Accurately recognized (unnamed) place location
can be regarded as indication of in-/o ut-group but we hypothesized that
cultural adequacy may be of more relevance for the worldview defense, irre-
spective of who the performing actor is.
Accordingly, we hypothesized that mortality salience would affect
Poles’ and Swedes’ opinions about gender roles, though in very different
ways. Specifically, we hypothesized that the initial preference for traditional
gender roles in Poland—but for nontraditional roles in Sweden—should
become more pronounced after a mortality salience induction (for a simi-
lar argument, see Jong, Halberstadt, & Bluemke, 2012, study #1, and their
discussion).
2. Experimental Video-Materials and Results
Our experimental material (Boski, Struś, & Tlaga, 2004) consisted of five epi-
sodes of gender role interactions recorded among the Swedish minority in
Finland (Vaasa). Each of these episodes had a traditional (T) and—reversed—
non-traditional (~T) version. The setting was typical for Scandinavian indoor
and outdoor life, though any conspicuous country symbols were—like in the
previous study—intentionally omitted. Actors were young to middle-aged
European Swedish-Finns. Like in the material reported in the preceding study,
verbal interactions between the actors were not recorded. Rather, soft back-
ground music was edited as a sound track.
1. Parents nurturing their baby. In the T-version of nurturing

episode, the mother was holding her infant baby and preparing
a family meal, while the male partner sat at the dinner table and
did some computer repairs. In the ~T-version, it was the father
who did the parenting and cooking, while his female partner sat
at the table and read a magazine.9
2. Friends’ home visit. During T-version, the hostess did the cooking
in preparation for friends’ visit, while her male partner greeted
the guests at the door and led them to the living room, where the
three chatted while waiting for the meal to be served. These roles
of the hosts were reversed in the ~T version.
3. Getting ready for cross-country skiing. In the T-version of the
skiing episode, a young female was struggling with her ski boots.
A male partner approached her, knelt down, and helped her bind
the boots; a moment later he offered her arm support, since
she was clumsy and could not keep balance. The roles were fully
reversed in the ~T situation.
4. Student-instructor helping. In this video, a male instructor had
problems with the overhead projector in a lecture hall. He was
either helped by a male student in T version of this episode, or
by a female student, in ~T condition.
5. Giving instructions to fe-/male subordinate employee. In the T
version, a female employee (secretary) was called upon and seen
entering the boss’s office with a pile of papers in hand. Then she
was given some instructions regarding these documents and left.
The ~T version presented a role-reversal: A female superior called
for and passed instructions to her male subordinate.
We produced a total of 10 videos, with the five episodes repeated across the
two conditions. Of them, six research tapes were created, each containing two
traditional and two non-traditional versions of separate episodes.10 The combi-
nation of T/~T versions and their order of presentation were rotated in a Latin
square design, and Polish and Swedish participants were randomly allocated to
one of six conditions. Before watching the videos, half of the participants were
primed with mortality salience (Rosenblatt et al., 1989). Since the study was
conducted at the end of 2001, the context of the 9/11 terrorist attacks was
used. Participants were shown the pictures of World Trade Center towers hit
by the airplanes and asked two questions. Imagine your death there: (1) “What
would happen to you as you physically die?” and (2) “What are the emotions that the
thought of your own death arouses in you?” Control group participants proceeded
directly to watch a set of four videos and they responded to a number of ques-
tions at the end of each episode. The questions were similar to those in the
previous study. Culture perception was addressed by place location accuracy
(In which country was the episode video-recorded?); and episode typicality (How
typical would this behavior be in your socio-cultural environment?). Gender role
identity and script general evaluation were measured on five point preference
scales: How comfortable would you feel to behave like the person of your gender in
this episode?; and: To what degree do you approve or do not approve the way these
persons carry their roles in this episode?
Place location accuracy was this time higher among Swedes (74% correct
across all episodes) than among Poles (31.5%; more in Boski, Struś, & Tlaga,
2004; fig. 1 to 3). In-group members have a clear advantage in adequate per-
ception of local culture episodes, even if unnamed. Furthermore, traditional
scripts were approved by Poles at a much higher level than nontraditional
scripts, but Swedes showed no approval preference. Most important, a 3-way
interaction was significant [F(1,124) = 13.35, p < 001, η2 =.175], such that mor-
tality salience polarized the nationality * gender scripts interaction by consider-
ably lowering acceptance of non-traditional scripts among Poles, but increasing
their acceptance among Swedes. Figure 6.5A illustrates these trends.
There are two important conclusions to be drawn from this study. First,
what consists of a culturally felt in-/congruence, varies from one country to
another. In line with the previous studies, Polish cultural in-/congruence in
(A) 0.8
0.6
Approval scale
0.4
0.2
–0.2
POL SVE POL SVE
Control Mortality salience
Trad ~Trad
FIGURE 6.5A: Approval of traditional and non traditional gender role scripts by Poles and
Swedes in control and mortality salience conditions.
the domain of gender relations closely corresponds to their non-/tradition-

alism. Not so in Sweden, where the two cultural formats are more balanced.
In-group identification (by place location) has no bearing for script approval
ratings. Second, the experience of a countercultural scenario is particularly
disturbing when the sense of individual well-being has been shaken by mor-
tality salience. Death awareness has differential effects on defending cultural
worldviews, depending on which cultural themes are dominant or prevail in
a community of participants. Reliance on traditional scripts and values in
one country can be counterbalanced by increased support of non-traditional
themes elsewhere. Or, as Ma-Kellams and Blascovich (2012) have proposed,
mortality salience does not necessarily generate worldview defenses but may
have opening up consequences.
3. Mortality Salience and Cultural Orientations

in the Context of Terrorist Attacks
The effects of tradition and existential anxiety were also investigated in a non-
experimental paradigm (Boski, 2004; Boski et al., 2004), in circumstances of
the 9/11 terrorist attacks. We conducted a study on multicultural orientation
among Polish residents of Warsaw (N = 350). It was initiated in May/June,
and repeated in October/November of 2001. In line with the contextual pic-
torial methodology of this work, we presented to our participants pictures of
ethnic Polish and non-Polish objects in the landscape of Warsaw (e.g., Russian
Orthodox, Jewish, Arab, and Vietnamese temples and restaurants), and we
measured cultural representations of these objects, which consisted of com-
bined indices of perception and valuation. Also, a measure of traditionalism
conceived as belief in revealed religious truth (e.g., Faith provides sense to life)
was used (Borowiak, 2003). We found a general decrease in a multicultural
orientation (not only in the Arab-Muslim sector) during this critical period,
and a simultaneous rise in the approval of Polish artifacts in the city. These dif-
ferences were fully mediated by the measure of cultural traditionalism, which
rose after the 9/11 and contributed to a decline in multicultural orientation
during the six months period, marked by the tragic terrorist attack against the
Word Trade Centers. Figure 6.5B illustrates this mediation.
Two studies reported in this section give evidence that traditionality often
offers a safety net for people facing existential anxiety; Poland, which ranks
high in religiosity (Global Index of Religion and Atheism, 2012; World Values
Survey, 2011) offers a confirming ground. Yet in a secularized and postmodern
Northwestern Europe (e.g., Sweden), new cultural patterns may be enhanced
(B)
.138** Traditionalism –.308***
Mortality Syndrome of
Salience –.042 (–.155**) Multicultural
09/11 Warsaw
Sobel test: Z = –.4.41***
FIGURE 6.5B: Mortality salience, Traditionalism and Multicultural Orientation Syndrome in

Warsaw, 2001.
in such circumstances not unlike in Ma-Kellams and Blascovich’s (2012) stud-

ies on East Asians.
IV. PERCEIVING CULTURALLY IN-/C ONGRUENT

ACTORS FROM INGROUPS AND CLOSE AND
DISTANT OUTGROUPS
A. Familiar versus Distant Outgoups
All the studies presented so far were conducted within the Western, Euro-
American civilization, where—compared to other regions of the world—
cultural distances are relatively small and the meanings of in-/congruent
cultural scripts, relatively familiar. But even there, non-Polish participants in
Study #2 were not able to locate accurately the country of video-recordings.
If so, then an attempt for proper distinctions between representatives of
national/ethnic groups on a different continent appears even a more challeng-
ing task.11 At the same time, such valid in-/out-group distinctions are of vital
importance for survival in ethnically plural African societies. Cultural congru-
ency adds even more complexity to this picture, while it remains essential for
bridging the differences in nation building programs.
The study to be reported in this section started with a theoretical question,
how do Nigerians respond to in-/out-group actors who present themselves in
ethnically in-/congruent ways. The leading hypothesis was that the interaction
of these two axes will determine person perception and evaluation. Specifically,
when congruent in-group actors should receive the most favorable treatment,
a black sheep effect should take place for in-group incongruent cases (Marques,
Yzerbyt, & Leyens, 1988). Reverse predictions hold for out-group actors.
This research design was later extended to include distant observers
(Canadians) of whom one would expect no conceptual knowledge about
Nigerian ethnic groups, let alone their in-/congruent cultures. Research ques-

tion concerning these North Americans was to find out which criteria did
they apply in arriving at judgments about such unfamiliar actors. We explored
whether Canadian observers would be sensitive to any differences between
African actors as a function of ethnicity and culture congruence.
Our study was designed as a 3 (Participants: Hausa, Ibo, Canadians) * 2
(Actor’s ethnicity: Hausa, Ibo) * 2 (Actor’s cultural in-/congruence), between-
subjects cultural experiment. In addition, a sample of Nigerians residing in the
United States was approached to compare their a priori cultural expectations
with actors perceived in the videos (Boski, 1988, 1990).
B. Congruent versus Incongruent Hausa and Ibo

actors: Design and Validity
Hausas and Ibos—are two large ethnic groups (about 20 million each) among
a multitude forming the Federal Republic of Nigeria. They are culturally very
different: Hausa are Muslims and their language belongs to a Chadian group,
related to Arabic. Ibo are predominantly Christian, and their language belongs
to the Niger-Kongo family; Ibo people had a longer period of intensive British
colonization, resulting in deeper acculturation (compared to Hausa). Political
animosities between these two groups led to the Biafran secession war (1967–
1970); recently a new movement serving similar goals, the Indigenous People
of Biafra (IPOB) has been formed. Still, Hausa and Ibo are citizens of one
country-state, they interact daily in public life, for example in business and
universities. Seen from this perspective, they are close outgroups.
Four video-interviews were recorded with Hausa and Ibo students as
actors. Another student, a member of different, minority ethnic group, was
the interviewer.12
Muhamed Sani Yalwa was the Hausa actor. In his culturally congruent
display, he was dressed in a traditional Hausa attire (long embroidered gown,
jalabiya, and a flat round cap). His outlook on life and personal plans were
molded by traditional Muslim values: pilgrimage to Mecca after graduation,
marrying up to four wives, obedience to elders and family traditions, serv-
ing his local community, and believing in Allah’s divine control over all life
events. Culturally incongruent Muhamed was the same physical person, but
he appeared as a culturally distinctive actor. He was dressed in a casual suit,
sipped “beer” offered by the interviewer (the beverage was in fact an apple
juice), and expressed dissenting views in most of his statements. He had plans
to marry a Christian fiancé as a single wife; he enjoyed the party-disco life-style

of Southern Nigeria; he also played down the importance of Christian-Muslim
differences while emphasizing the national unity themes; and he showed an
individualistic, entrepreneurial spirit.
Emeka Njoku was the Ibo actor. In his culture-congruent enactment he
wore a traditional, red gown with a pattern of yellow tigers, and a soft cloth
cap, all in felt-type fabric. Emeka was very serious about his academic work
and particularly about the quality of his grades. He also expressed interest
in business and mentioned his plans to establish one in the near future. He
manifested a strong attachment to Ibo traditional culture: ancestral festivals,
ethnic food, and so on. He felt most comfortable in his extended family home,
and talked about arrangements for his traditional wedding.
As the culture-incongruent actor, Emeka had the same family and roots
in Iboland but with the way he was dressed (particularly the Hausa style cap),
he could rather be taken for a Northerner. The incogruent Emeka presented
himself as a Nigerian patriot: he spoke of his relations with non-Ibo ethnic
cultures, his friends coming from Northern tribes, and he disclosed his plans
to settle down far from his tribal territory.13 Talking about the circumstances
of meeting his fiancé, he revealed a story of friendship between his future
father-in-law and an uncle from Iboland. In that story, the former had saved
his uncle’s life, at the dawn of the Biafran secession (civil) war. Finally, Emeka’s
academic interests were more intrinsic than grade oriented.
From a non-African perspective, congruent actors were salient by their
traditional outfits and by frequent references to their rich ethnic traditions.
In both incongruent versions actors crossed their traditional tribal boundaries
and revealed all-Nigerian, integrated outlooks.
After watching one of these four videos, participants were asked to rate,
on 15 scales, their impressions about the target actor (e.g., hard-work, matu-
rity) and his environment (e.g., family support); they estimated probability of
the actor’s graduation with distinction and how much they liked the actor.
Other than person perception traits, participants were also attempting causal
attributions for actor’s possible graduation with distinction and for the degree
of him being liked. Research subjects were asked, for example, (1) how much of
a hard-working person is Muhamed/Emeka? And, assuming that he succeeded in
achieving a distinction, (2) to what extent was his achievement because of his hard
work? Finally, participants were asked how much was their degree of liking
because of (3) his being a hard working person, etc. Participants were also given
a memory test based on the content of the video.
As expected, Canadians—who were, for the most part, not aware of geo-
graphical, historical, and cultural facts covered in the interviews—scored much
lower on the memory test than Nigerians for both ethnic groups. Also, vid-
eos portraying culture-incongruent characters were better remembered, but
only among Nigerians. These results were also unsurprising, since culturally
incongruent actors countered Nigerian participants’ expectations. To check
the extent to which the construct of congruency was successfully operational-
ized, expectations held before the video projections were compared with per-
ceptions after watching them. This accuracy check was done among Nigerians
residing in the United States (Wichita, Kansas). These analyses showed that
our manipulation was only effective for the Hausa actor, whose culturally con-
gruent perceptions fit expectations at a much higher level (71% on average)
than the incongruent version (only at 28%); the two versions of the Ibo actor
were at the same level of fit (over 60%).
Before testing our basic hypotheses, we constructed person perception
and causal attribution scales, and we checked their cross-cultural equivalence.
A sound scale personal agentic traits/causes emerged from factor analysis (a
compound of four items: hard-work, intelligence, intrinsic motivation, mature
personality had Tucker Φ coefficients >.95 for Canadian, Hausa, and Ibo
participants).
We found interaction effects of actors’ characteristics for Nigerian
observers, such that Emeka (Ibo) was perceived more agentic than Mohamed
(Hausa) but only in their culture congruent (“typical”) conditions; this differ-
ence between the two actors disappeared in incongruent conditions. Another
interaction, of both ethnicities, was responsible for interpersonal liking.
Here, in-group favoritism was revealed but also some evidence for the black
sheep effect among the Hausa, who found their beer-drinking ethnic peer
the least attractive of the four actors [Mc = 75.6 > Mic = 62.1, t(22) = 1.83, p
<.05 one-tailed]. Canadian observers, on the other hand, imbued congruent
actors of both ethnicities with much higher agentic characteristics than they
did with the incongruent personifications [F(1) = 14.92, p < 001, η2 = .25].
An overall model, where S’s nationality is a moderator of actor’s congruence
effect on his agentic causes for success, summarizes previous analyses in
Figure 6.6.
The index of a moderated mediation (.186, t = 2.34, p <. 05) shows that
agentic causal attributions mediate congruent actors’ outcome prediction only
among Canadian participants.
Canadians .450** Achievement

agentic
.414***
causes
(R2 = .11***)
Achievement
Actor outcome
.089 (.192*)
congruency prediction
(R2 = .20***)
[Sobel Z = 2.62**]
FIGURE 6.6: Culturally Congruent Nigerian Actors and Agentic Causes for their
Achievement Outcome Prediction.
Notes: Canadians=1; ~Canadians (Nigerians) = 0; Significance levels of path
coefficients: *** =p < .001; ** =p < .01; *=p < .05
C. Discussion: Salience in Cross-Cultural

Person Perception
The findings of this experiment demonstrate that Nigerian observers consid-
ered a broader spectrum of information in their judgments about the video-
recorded actors. It was an interaction of actor ethnicity and congruence for
agentic causes and an interaction of both ethnicities in determining interper-
sonal liking.
The most intriguing results are those which show Canadians sensitive
to culture congruence in distant Nigerian actors. Although we asked a ques-
tion considering such possibility, the findings which demonstrated higher
agentic traits (Abele, Uchronski, Suitner, & Wojciszke, 2008) and causal
attributions ascribed to tradition embedded actors came as a counterintu-
itive surprise.
To interpret these findings, I will refer to the concept of salience in person
perception (Taylor & Fiske, 1978; Fiske & Taylor, 1991). These early studies
established that an object’s physical salience or social prominence enhances its
perceived impact. Did the culture congruent actors possess any such character-
istics? We note that culturally congruent actors dressed in traditional garb that
must have appeared more conspicuous to Western subjects than the less tradi-
tional dress of the incongruent actors. Culturally congruent actors’ espoused
worldviews might also have seemed more unconventional for Canadians com-
pared to their incongruent counterparts. Finally, the culture congruent actors
were perceived as much more physically attractive than the same actors in the
incongruent condition, [F(1,132) = 18.09, p <. 001, η2 = .121].
Culturally congruent actors appear to distant observers not as pawns
embedded in their traditions, but as salient figures through their attires and
unusual worldviews. The traditional, culturally congruent, Hausa actor stood
for them as the most prominent in his looks and in what he was saying. Such
an individual might have been regarded—from that perspective—as more
incongruent with North American reality than his counterpart who was trying
to break the tribal code of his Nigerian in-group. As perceived by his Nigerian
fellowmen, through the lens of their cultural knowledge, the same traditional
Muslim Hausa was denied high achievement potential, and was considered
educationally backward.
Altogether, the sensitivity to African ethnically congruent actors dis-
played by North American observers is based on superficial attractiveness of
their exotic, tourist postcard type of features, and not on in-depth processing
of cultural information.
V. RELIGION, MORALITY, AND

TOLERANCE: PRIMING EFFECTS OF KALI
AND VIRGIN MARY’S ICONS
With one exception, these studies have served to underscore the importance
of gender in cultural scripts. This theme will be continued in this last empirical
section, with women being represented by female deities. The central research
question can be framed as follows: How will the iconic contact with deities
affect judgments regarding morally controversial issues? In other words: will
religious priming affect tolerance in moral dilemmas? The thread will be con-
tinued by designing another cultural experiment with icons belonging to the
familiar and to the alien culture. Also, the concept and measures of cultural
perception will be of importance in this study.
Although processed at the individual level, moral dilemmas have strong
cultural underpinnings. Recent work by Gelfand et al. (2011) provides us with
convincing evidence that cultures around the world differ in how strict their
normative regulations are formulated and executed. The Tightness-Looseness
scale positions countries and regions of the world along this normative dimen-
sion. The five tightest countries are located in South-Eastern Asia and charac-
terized as traditional and religious: Pakistan, Malaysia, India, Singapore, and
S. Korea. However, the next tightest, Norway, is Western, rich, and secular.
This suggests that tight cultures may originate either from religious-traditional
norms or from a stringent legal system. Similarly, the loose extreme of the
scale was occupied by three post-communist countries (Ukraine, Estonia, and

Hungary), an association that could be related to the normative anomie after
collapse of that regime. However, the equally low scores of the Netherlands,
Brazil, and New Zealand could be attributed to those countries’ highly liberal
outlook.
A. Morality: Secular Tolerance versus

Religious Forgiveness
Accordingly, two separate mechanisms of dealing with non-normative con-
duct are proposed: one is tolerance, as suggested in Gelfand et al. (2011), and
the other is merciful forgiveness (benevolence).
Tolerance refers to differences in worldviews (values, beliefs, practices),
granting other(s) the right to hold these ideas which may happen to be differ-
ent or opposite to majority. Tolerance applies to those domains of life, which
are free from legal regulations: Everything that is not prohibited is permissible.
This leaves freedom of expression to everything that does not infringe upon
the freedom of others.
Merciful forgiveness (indulgence, benevolence) refers to people’s weak-
nesses, shortcomings, unintentional but also intentional, in meeting obliga-
tions, prescribed norms/roles, and social contracts. It is an acceptance of these
shortcomings based on actors plea for mercy (leniency) under the assump-
tion that no one is perfect, and everyone should be humane in forgiving other
human beings.
These two mechanisms have opposite origins. Merciful forgiveness is a
core feature of many religions: God (Allah) is merciful to sinful people, rather
than condemning them for imperfections. The forgiving mercy may be condi-
tional (as a way to self-improvement) or unconditional (due to Lord’s endless
love). In any case, human forgiveness is anchored in divine mercy and mod-
eled after it (see more in Boski, 2012). In this vein, priming a benevolent deity
may make people forgiving of a moral transgression. At the same time, the
merciful God is not tolerant, since S/He does not allow cross-religious worship
and condemns lack of religiosity. The relationship between a deity’s personi-
fied presence and moral behavior/judgment appears to be double edged, since
divine figures are the origins and regulators of moral standards. This account
suggests that religiously primed individuals should become more stricter and
less tolerant toward transgressions. On the other hand, people pray to the
icons for forgiveness of their sins and receive merciful magnanimity. Thus,
being primed with a benevolent deity may make people less condemning of
moral transgressions.
B. Kali’s Tongue: Menon and Schweder’s

Overture to This Study
Kali belongs to the pantheon of Hindi deities; she is recognized as the Great
Mother Goddess of Hinduism (Harding, 1993) and is known also by other
personifications such as Devi, Parvati, Durga (see Figure 6.7).
The symbolic meaning of Kali among the local believers from
Bhubaneshwar in the Orissa State of India became the subject of Menon and
Schweder’s study (1994; see also Schweder, 2003, pp. 156–162). The study,
Kali’s Tongue: Cultural Psychology and the Power of Shame in Orissa, India, is
a perfect example of an empirical work in cultural psychology. First, it was
FIGURE 6.7: Kali of Bhubaneshwar.

concerned with the perceptual aspect of symbolic meaning (What is it that you
see?). Second, it considers human psychological functioning in relation to the
surrounding cultural artifacts: Symbols encapsulate the essence of cultural
beliefs, but also they have important modeling effects on the population to
which they appeal.
Kali’s tongue appears under the theme of culture and emotions, repre-
senting the indigenous affect of lajya (or lajja). Recently, Bhawuk (2017, in
press) has provided deep cultural interpretation of lajja. He traces its concep-
tual roots in the classical Sanskrit text of Bahagavatgita and defines lajja as
an affect connected with dharma (moral duty), preventing one from perform-
ing an inappropriate act and guiding her/him to perform what is considered
appropriate. In Menon and Schweder’s study, “lajya is a divinely sanctioned
antidote to destructive anger, expressed by biting her tongue” (1994, p. 266).
Lajya, they continue, is a culturally normative emotion of embarrassment. It
is good to feel lajya, as it reflects one’s sensitivity to the community and to
social role obligations (being shy, modest, and deferential). Adequate interpre-
tation (“perception”) of lajya is impossible without culture competence in the
story behind the icon. One can’t, in other words, perceive it directly from the
picture (or a photograph). For people outside of Hindu culture and ignorant
of it, the meaning of the icon is next to none, which does not stop them from
jumping into some shorthand impressions.14 Thus, lajya is a clear example of
an indigenous affect, out of the range of universal emotions and their cultural
display rules (Markus, Kitayama, & Heiman, 1996; Matsumoto, Hee-Yoo, &
Fontaine, 2008).
Menon and Schweder interviewed cultural experts who lived in close
vicinity to the Lingaraj Temple in Bhubaneshwar and worshipped Kali. Even
among such highly selected sample, the authors were able to establish three
hierarchical levels of expertise. Level #1 consisted of proper identification of
the icon’s content, level #2 was an account of the mythological story behind
the icon’s content, and level #3 included a philosophical sense of the myth,
beyond the factual correctness.
C. Kali and Virgin Mary: Contact with the Devine Icon

and Its Impact on Moral Tolerance—Experiment #5
Icons play instrumental roles in the religious practices of their worshipers: they
concretize an otherwise abstract deity(s), and focus attention on prayers and
other rituals. In short, they remind one of divine presence and through such
priming, help one to remain a good believer.
1. Extending Menon and Schweder’s Work on Kali’s Tongue
Menon and Schweder suggested an extension of their work with Kali to the
field of Christian symbolism, and this study represents such an extension.
First, we exposed non-Hindu participants to the symbolism of Kali’s icon.
Since the three levels of cultural expertise were found even among the local
believers from Bhubaneshwar, it seemed reasonable to broaden the scope
of cultural perception to distant cultures, such as those in Europe. Next, we
added a Christian/European equivalent to Kali. To ensure some level of func-
tional equivalence, it was decided to employ an icon of Virgin Mary, who—as
the mother of Jesus Christ—deserves too, the title of Great Mother Goddess.
Indeed, she is considered as a divine figure in Roman Catholicism and has
been venerated, particularly in Poland, as a national queen.
2. Icon Contact, Benevolence, and Observer’s Tolerance
The cultural experiment reported next was designed to test these compet-
ing hypotheses: Would individuals become more or less morally tolerant in
the divine presence symbolized by the icons of Kali and Virgin Mary (VM)?
Furthermore, would this effect be pancultural, or would it be contingent
upon the icon itself, its attributable characteristics, and participants’ religion/
ethnicity?
The project was conducted in three countries: France, India, and Poland.15
The Indian sample was drawn from college students in Puri and Bhubaneshwar,
where the initial study by Menon and Schweder had been conducted; they
were all Hindus. The Polish sample consisted of local parishioners in a Roman
Catholic Church in Warsaw, wherefrom the icon of Virgin Mary was used.
A further sample of Indian immigrants to Poland was added. All but one were
Hindu. Finally, a sample of students from Université Lyon-2 in France was
added (59% declared Roman Catholicism as their family religion and 30%
were nonreligious). Indian and Polish samples provided a contrast between
Hinduism and Catholicism, symbolized by the icons of Kali and Virgin Mary.
While France is also a country with Catholic tradition, it has been highly secu-
larized during the last 100 years and remains a bastion of anticlerical feelings
in Europe (see World Values Survey, 2011 for positions of the three countries
on their cultural map of the world).
Participants of all ethnic/denominational groups were assigned to one
of the three experimental conditions: Kali, Virgin Mary, or control (no icon).
Those in either icon condition were first requested to watch the picture and
then to freely describe what (whom) they saw or recognized. Next, they fil-
led out the Deity Benevolence Scale. Control subjects went directly to fill out
Moral Tolerance Scale, which was distributed to all participants. The Polish
version of the questionnaire was back translated to French and to English (for
the use of Anglophone Indian students).
3. Icons and Research Materials
The icon of Goddess Kali, originally used in Menon and Schweder (1994; see
Figure 6.7), was also adopted in this project. A proper selection of a Virgin
Mary16 icon was a difficult task. There are thousands of her personifications;
almost each parish has its own version. An intuitive choice would be the
Black Madonna of Częstochowa (Matka Boska Częstochowska), considered as the
patroness and queen of Poland. However, in her motherly role, she seemed
too distant from the bellicose icon of Kali. Since Virgin Mary is also a military
patroness (of Polish army), we searched for that type of her personification.
Such icon was finally found at the church dedicated to God Mother—the Queen
of Polish Martyrs. The icon was photographed for the use in this study (see
Figure 6.8).
The Queen of Polish Martyrs does not make an appearance on the battle-
ground, as is the case with Kali. But she is wounded in her cheek with a sword-
like weapon, and there are some other elements signaling aggression (e.g.,
barbed wires from Auschwitz); the martyrs can be recognized as well known
figures in history of Poland.
Cultural perception. In measuring cultural perception, we followed the
qualitative approach of Menon and Schweder (1994). When giving their per-
ceptions and interpretations of the icons, participants were guided by the fol-
lowing seven questions: Whom and what do you see on this picture? Can you
tell any story behind this picture? What does this picture symbolize? What
personal meaning does this picture carry for you? What is the expression seen
of the face of the central figure? Do you meet such facial expressions around
you? Could the central figure be an inspirational model for your, or other peo-
ple’s, conduct?
A five-point scale of cultural perception validity was constructed following
Menon and Schweder’s work, where: 0 = no central figure(s) identification or
wrong identification; 1 = identification of Kali (and/or Siva) or Virgin Mary;
2 = identification of a broader context surrounding the central figure’s activity
or state; 3 = cultural/religious interpretation of the message depicted by the
icon (e.g., interpretation of layja as Kali’s emotion or sadness and martyrs’
FIGURE 6.8: Virgin Mary (the Queen of Polish Martyrs).

Source: Reproduced with permission from Krystyna Borowicz-Żmijewska.
protection by Virgin Mary); 4 = an expert icon interpretation in the breadth

(context) and depth (historical, moral) of the story. Three pairs of trained
students (for English, French, and Polish linguistic versions) ascribed code
numbers to participants’ answers; their overall congruence level was very
high (.877). Separately, we coded specific interpretations of Kali’s tongue and
Virgin Mary’s facial compassionate sadness (sorrow), which are considered as
valid cultural expressions of their emotions, respectively.
Deity benevolence scale. The sixteen-item Deity benevolence scale was con-
structed for the purpose of this research project. All items were nine-point
bipolar adjective scales (example items were: Ruthless—Merciful; Demanding—
Indulgent; Insensible—Wise; Rejecting—Tutelary). After initial factor analysis,
four items were dropped for not meeting a pancultural factor loading or equiv-
alence criteria. A single factor emerged from an analysis performed on the
remaining twelve-item pool, explaining 50.91% of common variance (the
range of factor loadings was between .864 to .416). Measurement equivalence
was established with target rotation of each four samples solutions to that
pancultural solution. Tucker Φ coefficients in all four samples were better than
satisfactory: Hindus/India = .98; Hindus/Poland = .99; Poles = .98; French = .96.
Moral tolerance. Moral tolerance was operationalized through seven-
teen global “hot moral topics.” Most of the items concerned sexuality, life
and death, and multicultural issues (e.g., alternative sexual orientation;
abortion; euthanasia; atheism; surgical sex change; marriage with a per-
son of different race/religion; multi/-ethnic/-religious society). For each of
these items, participants rated their degree of approval (from 1 = strongly
disapprove, to 5 = strongly approve) for the non-traditional solutions. One
pancultural factor emerged from an exploratory analysis on these fifteen
items, explaining 40.42% of their common variance (factor loadings dif-
fered from .744 for same-sex marriages to .444 for immigration and immi-
grants). Measurement equivalence was established using the procedure of
target rotation of each sample factor to the pancultural solution. Tucker
Φ coefficients were high: Hindus/India = .99; Hindus/Poland = .91; Poles = .99;
French = .96.
4. Results
Culture knowledge and perception. Results showed an effect of cultural distance

on icon symbolic knowledge such that participants were more competent with
the artifacts belonging to their own culture. Hindus had the highest scores on
Kali’s icon [F(3,134) = 41.51, p <. 0001, η² = .482], and Poles on Virgin Mary’s
icon [F(3,134) = 27.25, p <. 0001, η² = .379]. The scores in the Virgin Mary con-
dition are higher than those in the Kali condition [F(1,134) = 15,56, p <.0001,
η² = .258]. This indicates a more universal aspect (better cultural knowledge) of
Christianity than Hinduism. All these results are depicted in Figure 6.9.
Emotion perception. The original research emphasized the role of Kali’s
tongue as the crucial element in the icon. Surprisingly, Europeans (Poles and
French) paid more attention to the protruded/bitten tongue than Hindus,
Χ2(1) = 20.88, p <. 001. But more important are the large cross-cultural dif-
ferences in interpretation of this feature of facial expression. For Poles and
French viewers, the tongue adds to generally negative (devilish, horrifying,
monstrous) image of Kali: it frightens (P3); it is repulsive (P16), insulting (P39);
as if she would like to poison others with this tongue (P21); looks like a clown—“I
3.5
2.5
2
Scale
1.5
0.5
0
Hindus_India Hindus_Pol Poles French
Kali 2.137b 2.689a 0.254c 0.325c
Virgin Mary 0.873c 1.616b 3.184a 1.03c
FIGURE 6.9: Icon perception in four ethno-religious groups.

Note: Means (in rows) with different subscripts are different at p <. 05 or better.
will show you!”; with this tongue she shows she is satisfied, proud with what she did
(F25, F26, F42); greed (F29); arrogance and derision (F32); provocation (F30);
naughty children behave this way (F34).17 To the contrary, Hindus mentioned
the tongue positively, with expressions of self-reflection, and a sense of mis-
take or guilt: The Goddess realized her mistake and that is why her tongue came out
(HP47); When she put her leg on God Shankar, she realized her mistake and took her
tongue out of her mouth (HP64); She steps on Shiva. Because of that she bites her
tongue. It expresses repentance (HP78); By chance, she stepped on Siva and that is
why she stuck out her tongue (HI121).
In many instances, even when the tongue is not mentioned, it seems to
be assumed as part of Kali’s frame of mind: that of regaining self-control, and
of coming to realization about one’s wrongdoing. The Hindus recognize the
battlefield between the evil and virtuous forces, of which Kali is an important
actor; and also they reported similar expressions appearing on their family
members’ or neighbors’ faces, after a moral transgression has been committed.
While the bitten tongue and lajya are considered pivotal in Kali’s icon, so
is sadness (sorrow, suffering) regarded as prototypical expression in Virgin
Mary’s icon (at least in Polish tradition). Indeed, this emotion was dominant
in all four ethnic/religious groups in our study, and its frequency did not differ
between them [Χ2(3) = 4.80, ns]. Yet sadness as one of basic emotions is often
presented and measured in a context-free way. Since the indigenous context
in VM icon is so rich, and recognized mainly by Poles, their perception of this
basic emotion was contextualized too. For example, two thirds of the Polish
sample participants used a term that has no exact English synonym: zatros-
kana (≈careworn≈caring/worrisome≈ concerned/suffering). VM is zatroskana
because her faithful martyrs depicted on the picture are suffering: Her sad eyes,
worrisome-concerned, no smile, because she has problems with all those who come to
her. And she is equally concerned if someone parts away. Patience for everyone (P2).
Her face is sad, filled with pain because of the martyrs’ suffering (P3).
This interpretation stood in contrast to responses by French partici-
pants, for whom the Virgin Mary’s sadness appeared as an impersonal mood
or was related to respondent’s atheist orientation: This picture evokes a feeling
of disappointment because of mental limitations of current punitive orientation in
Catholicism. Her eyes are moist, and she is not happy. It’s a kind of sadness.(F48).
Religious totalitarianism. It’s a history of Mary being sad with how these people
wasted religion.(F50).
Thus, cultural competence to interpret the context of either icon has dra-
matically changed the perception of the emotions manifested in facial expres-
sions of both deities.
The level of benevolence ascribed to Virgin Mary was universally much
higher than that of Kali F(1,144) = 159.43, p <.0001, η² = .525; but these
ratings differed across groups F(3,144) = 12.11, p <.0001, η² = .201. Poles
made extreme ratings, finding the Virgin Mary to be the most benevolent
and Kali to be the most malevolent deity. Figure 6.10 demonstrates these
specific effects.
–1
–2
–3
Hindus_Ind Hindus_Pol Poles French
Virgin Mary 0.952c 1.803a,b 2.622a 0.077d
Kali –1.083b,c –0.433c –2.278a –1.349b
FIGURE 6.10: Deity benevolence. Comparing Virgin Mary and Kali in four ethno-religious
groups.
Note: Means for samples with different subscripts are different at p <. 05 or better.
Interestingly, too, the adequacy of culture perception is highly correlated

with the level of benevolence attributed to each goddess: Kali, r(71) = .461,
p <.001; Virgin Mary, r(74) = .504, p <. 001.
Next, tolerance was compared between national samples and experimental
conditions. Since tolerance was negatively and highly correlated with declared
religiosity, r(230) = –.527, p <.001, and we found large sample differences
in religiosity, F(3, 226) = 31.64, p <.0001, η² = .30 [(PL=HPol) >**HInd >***FR],
religiosity was used as a covariate in subsequent analyses. Country/culture
appeared as a strong factor in tolerance, F(3,217) = 24.45, p <.001, η² = .253,
where French participants showed the highest levels of tolerance, followed by
Hindus, and then Poles, who were the least tolerant (just a reversed order to
religiosity of these samples). An interaction effect was also observed, revealing
that the experimental conditions affected tolerance differentially across the
four groups. Indeed, icon exposure affected the level of tolerance only among
Poles, F(2, 217) = 6.59, p = .002, η² = .057, such that those participants who
were exposed to the Virgin Mary reported less tolerance than those who were
exposed to Kali or were in the control condition. Similarly, cross-cultural dif-
ferences were stronger among participants assigned to Virgin Mary icon, com-
pared to control condition. Whereas among Poles, being in contact with the
icon of Virgin Mary significantly decreased the level of tolerance, French par-
ticipants became slightly more tolerant after viewing the Virgin Mary. These
results are displayed in Figure 6.11.
The next step in analyses was most important to answer the theoretical
question regarding the relationship between deity’s benevolence and believer’s
4
3.5
3
Tolerance scale
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
Hind_Indb Hind_Polb Polesc Frencha
Control 3.197 3.255 3.017 3.703
Virgin Mary 3.281 3.15 2.327 3.804
Kali 3.289 3.259 2.75 3.584
FIGURE 6.11: Tolerance at four national samples and icon experimental conditions

(religiosity as covariate).
moral tolerance. For this purpose moderated regressions were performed

such that icon and nationality were the moderators of {Deity benevolence →
Tolerance} relationship, controlling for religiosity. Results for French partici-
pants contrasted with others (dummies) are presented in Figure 6.12.
The overall negative impact of deity benevolence on participants’ toler-
ance (–.54****) was decomposed into three interaction effects. This main effect
was qualified by the icon (.335****), such that participants who ascribed the
A. Virgin Mary
5
4.5
4
Tolerance
3.5
2.5
2
Low_Benev Mid_Benev High_Benev
Not_French French
B. Kali
5
4.5
4
Tolerance
3.5
2.5
2
Not_French French
FIGURE 6.12: Combined effects of deity benevolence, icon exposure, and nationality
(French) on tolerance (controlling for religiosity). A. Virgin Mary; B. Kali.
most benevolence to the VM also reported the least tolerance, while partici-
pants’ tolerance ratings increased as a function of how much benevolence they
ascribed to Kali. Finally, as suggested by the three-way interaction, the afore-
mentioned effects were only culture-specific: They reached significance for
combined Poles and Indians (VMeffect = –.275**** and Kaliefffect = .161**) but not
for French, who reported similar tolerance regardless of their religious icon
condition.
Similar analyses were performed to contrast both Hindu groups with the
Europeans (see Figure 6.13). The powerful differential effect of icon exposure
and its ascribed benevolence on tolerance (.411****) was decomposed again
to a negative effect of VM’s benevolence on tolerance (stronger among the
Europeans, E = –.295**** vs. H = –.153*), and a universal positive effect of Kali’s
benevolence on tolerance (E = .116* vs. H = .257***).
5. Discussion
To conclude, tolerance partly depended on stable characteristics such as religi-

osity and ethnicity; Polish Catholics scored the lowest, while French the high-
est. For French, who have lived in a highly secularized culture, contact with
religious symbols had no effect on their tolerance. Religious priming seemed
to influence behavior and attitudes only among religious people, for whom
experimentally arranged contact with deity primed moral judgment. When
deity benevolence was high, and associated with the icon of Virgin Mary,
religious participants became less tolerant to behaviors not accepted by the
Catholic doctrine. But when Kali was the target icon, with her image becoming
more indulging (less malevolent) to viewers, they showed higher tolerance,
particularly among the Hindu believers. It should be understood that most of
moral issues addressed in the tolerance scale are considered as sins in Roman
Catholicism, and contact with VM may have had a priming effect on believers,
such that they became sensitized to acts not sanctioned by their religion. VM’s
benevolence may also have been seen as a concern over people’s immoral acts,
with the same negative impact on believers’ tolerance. It is of interest though,
that even among the Hinduists, a brief contact with the icon of VM led to the
same consequences as among Poles, who have been exposed to the Catholic
doctrine from their early childhood. With increased benevolence attributed
to her, they became less tolerant. Thus, the power of universal icons extended
over their cultural realm.
A. Virgin Mary
5
4.5
Tolerance 4
3.5
2.5
2
Not_Hindus Hindus
B. Kali
5
4.5
4
Tolerance
3.5
2.5
2
Not_Hindus Hindus
FIGURE 6.13: Combined effects of deity benevolence, icon exposure, and nationality
(Hindus) on tolerance (controlling for religiosity). A. Virgin Mary; B. Kali.
Why, then, does attributing benevolence to Kali also prime ratings of toler-
ance? Kali is a Hindu deity, and Hindu culture is normatively tight. The Indian
subjects’ comments on Kali were marked by a high level of reflexivity on psy-
chologically complex situation that the Goddess was confronted with, and on
her ambivalent conduct. As Tadmor, Hong, Chao, Wiruchnipawan, and Wang
(2012) have demonstrated, reflexivity may foster tolerance through lowering
the need for cognitive closure. But why is this effect observed not only among
Hindus, but also among Europeans who were largely ignorant of Kali? It should
be remembered that their ignorance bred a particularly negative (devilish)
image of Kali. Thus, we may speculate that milder scores represent not just
benevolence but less extreme judgment of her villain character, which might
itself be indicative of a tolerant orientation.
VI. GENERAL DISCUSSION

Rather than present a set of research findings verifying a rigorous theory,
the chapter has strongly advocated a general cultural psychological paradigm.
This paradigm is an alternative (or complementary) approach to the domi-
nant trend in cross-cultural psychology of the last decade, which capitalizes
on establishing psychometric invariance of scales used in comparative, con-
text free research. In this author’s view, culture largely disappears when this
strategy is set in motion, and researchers pursue painstaking procedures to
confirm equivalence of measures at the expense of solving interesting theo-
retical or applied problems. Formal criteria for such equivalence are set high,
while the realistic hopes for their full accomplishment (e.g., scalar equivalence
which is considered necessary for the mean scores comparisons) are low. How
could it be otherwise, when the ideal of universal “psychological thermom-
eters” modeled after natural sciences is not based on the objective laws but on
language-to-language translations “performed by bilingual collaborators?” The
whole issue of translation has been approached in cross-cultural psychology as
a practical “cook book” exercise, and not as an important linguistic problem of
its own (Wierzbicka, 1997).
If we assume that people across the world differ in their values, beliefs,
and concepts regarded as the building blocks of their social life, how can we
expect that such research objectives can be met with the use of simple items,
initially framed or phrased in one language, and for the purpose of studying
inhabitants of that socio-linguistic domain?
A. Main Conclusions Emerging from

the Reported Studies
1. Culture as Context and Meaning
In the studies reported here—which span a period of 30 years—culture is
the object of research. More precisely, we study culturally loaded situations,
scripts manifested in behaviors/interactions, and symbols to which actors

respond. In other words, we study culture as it is practiced daily—and often
automatically—by its members, and as it actually appears to visitor-observers.
This approach is modeled after the realistic encounters into which people
enter routinely, and the unusual situations from which the concept of a cul-
tural experiment has originated. People love or dread such situations, and dis-
cuss them vividly.
It is paradoxical that the dominant psychometric approach in cross-
cultural psychology shuns situations. Research participants answer scales
concerning their values, opinions, beliefs, judgments or preferences, general-
ized over the multitude of concrete situations. Although the rationale for this
strategy is to avoid “noise” and to obtain manageable data, it ignores that most
of the human processes and functions are situation bound. Integrating situ-
ations into research designs requires cultural competence in selecting or pre-
paring them as meaningful and authentic scenarios. Such situations comprise
artifacts (symbols, tools) and actors interacting with them, and characterize
the paradigm of cultural psychology.
Across all the reported studies, we emphasize using pictorial stimuli to rem-
edy the problems faced by typical cross-cultural work. First, using such stimuli
addresses culture directly, rather than “unpackaging” it through statistical anal-
yses with extrinsic variables. Second, it largely bypasses the problem of equiv-
alence in translations, since verbal tasks in these investigations are not framed
in an abstract, context-free manner, but are attached to much simpler concrete
stimuli within the research materials. Scales and their equivalence metrics were
used in the studies reported in this chapter. They were however always attached
to concrete objects appearing in cultural experiments, rather than referring
to general, context free conditions. Scales used at this level of concreteness
may satisfy the criteria specified for linguistic universals in Natural Semantic
Metalanguage (Wierzbicka, 1999). Hence, items revolve around such issues as,
“How often does it happen around you, like this?” “What do you think about
it?” “Do you like it?” Third, this approach avoids group reference effects. Fourth,
it provides some objective grounds for the validity check for participants’ regis-
tered responses. Finally, this approach lends to more effectively designing cul-
tural experiments (than if they were in verbal code).
In short, cultural psychology, as practiced in the reported studies, meas-
ures perceptions of cultural situations, in contrast to cross-cultural psychol-
ogy, with its concentration on context free psychometric methodology.
2. Cultural Experiments: Responses to Internal and External

Diversity and Transgressions
Cultures of our times are not stable, and are subjected to internal and external
pressures (Hermans & Kempen, 1998). Furthermore, people encounter cul-
tural differences when they interact with members of other groups. Cultural
psychology responds to these challenges by designing studies that mimic
these processes.
Concepts such as cultural in-/c ongruence; traditional/novel scripts, and
script validation; transgression and tolerance, permeate this chapter. The cul-
tural experiment is the method to study these problems.
The May I ask two ladies experiment offers powerful evidence for culture
resistance against attempts to change its scripts. Such attempts are consid-
ered as errors and subject to immediate corrective steps (similar to linguistic
mistakes). On logical-methodological grounds, they embody a procedure that
is designed to test cultural arrangements by disconfirmation. Although the
first goal of cultural experiments is to test consequences of incompatibility
within their indigenous context, establishing the range of their validity cross-
culturally is also important. Thus, preference for egalitarianism or even gender
role reversal, instead of Polish scripts of courtesy for women, is what we found
in other West European countries (studies #2 and #3). Consequently, oppo-
site scripts may be used in various cultures, as “weapons” to buffer existential
anxiety.
The Nigerian-Canadian study (#4) showed the usefulness of unconfound-
ing two axes in actor perception: the classical in-group/out-group and culture
in-/congruence. Interaction of these two characteristics determines actor’s
fate in the eye of familiar observer. Unexpected was the effect of culturally
congruent (traditional) actors on their agentic perception among unfamiliar
observers. The degree of novelty and perceptual salience displayed by such
actors may be responsible for these paradoxical results.
Cultural experiments should not be seen as intellectual exercises sus-
pended in the safety of a laboratory atmosphere. They reflect complexities of
a growingly multicultural world, where changes have been occurring faster
than people’s ability to adjust. They are also more often performed by satirists
than by psychologists. Charlie Hebdo is an example of a large-scale cultural
experiment run by cartoonists over time for research-unrelated purposes. The
consequences have been tragic: when religious caricatures are interpreted as
sacrilege, terrorist retaliation may occur.18 To understand this process, I am
currently conducting studies on acceptance-rejection of Charlie Hebdo’s carica-

tures in various ethno-religious groups.
On more optimist grounds, there has been another way of designing cul-
tural experiments where two separate cultures are mixed in one display (video,
PowerPoint presentation, trailers, etc.), with convincing results that such
duality has beneficial consequences for diversity acceptance (Tadmor et al.,
2012). We have a recent study that affirms this trend, finding high approval
rates for a Black African actor, talking in impeccable Polish about her African
heritage, compared to lower ratings for uni-cultural Polish or African actors
(Baran & Boski, 2016). It should be pointed out though, that contrary to cari-
catures, studies advocating beneficial outcomes of culture mix operate on non-
confrontational themes.
3. Culture Perception: Its Dimensions and Validity
Perception is a classic research topic in cross-cultural psychology. But whether

it is optical illusions (Segall, Dasen, Berry, & Poortinga, 1990, ch.4) or color
perception (Roberson, 2012), the field operates at the level of basic processes,
which do not address more complex issues such as the meaning of objects,
artifacts or human interactions. This latter definition of cultural perception
appears in every study discussed in this contribution to represent (a) place
and time accuracy (where and when?); (b) icon or actor recognition (who and
what?), (c) interpretation of facial expression, (d) level of typicality, and most
importantly, (e) understanding of cultural message. These are all legitimate
research problems, yet rarely are they studied in a culturally oriented psy-
chology. The main issue at stake is the chain of information processing which
starts at the level of purely descriptive identification and ends up at evaluative
judgments. Essential in this process is cultural knowledge (competence) which
drives recognition and evaluation. Cultural knowledge was directly measured
in experiments #2 (Polish gender roles) and #5 (Kali vs. Virgin Mary), and it
showed a range from faulty or vague ideas to expert’s precision and depth of
understanding.
In study #2, accuracy of place perception led to a higher estimate of script
typicality, which in turn facilitated higher gender role identity, and final script
approval. Similar results were obtained with very different data in experiment
#5, where a more adequate level of icon recognition was highly correlated with
goddess’s benevolence (both for Kali and for Virgin Mary). What is unfamiliar
and poorly recognized becomes less positively evaluated.
4. Responding to Moral Issues: Tolerance versus Forgiveness
Confronting cultural diversity and change opens up difficult problems, which

have religious or ideological foundations and biases. New ideas and move-
ments regarding sexuality, life and death (abortion, euthanasia), family, and
multiculturalism challenge traditional moral norms. In this sense, we have
studied the factors that underlie openness to moral change. The religious
worldview, which operates through the concept of moral sin, has been often
deemed a conservative barrier for cultural change (or progress). But the con-
cepts of mercy and forgiveness are also firmly present in religions, and may be
primed in believers through contact with deities. This issue was addressed in
experiment #5. Results showed that the least religious groups (and individu-
als), French, were the most tolerant, and for them, contact with deity had no
effect on tolerance. As for believers (Hindus and Poles), the contact with icons
and benevolence attributed to the deities had diverging effects for tolerance.
Participants became more tolerant after exposure to Kali, and less tolerant
after being exposed to the Virgin Mary. This latter result was also replicated
with other important figures in the pantheon of Catholic Church (e.g., the late
Pope, St. John Paul II).
Forgiveness is an alternative method to tolerance of coping with unwanted
acts, needs more research attention. Within a secular worldview, tolerance
does not imply forgiveness. For Christianity and other religions, contact with
benevolent figures should promote forgiveness and lessen rigidity. The line of
conduct paved by pope Francis suggests this possibility. Still, the mechanisms
of tolerance and mercy may differ.
B. Further Extensions, Applications, and Limitations

Cultural psychology, as presented here, has many applications that have not
(or have marginally) been covered in this chapter. The one that I consider the
most important is the field of acculturation; where I proposed a model that is
a direct extension of the current work (Boski, 2008, 2013).
1. A Case for Psychology of Acculturation
In a nutshell, acculturation is understood as process of becoming a bicultural

person by acquisition of competences in a new culture, including language and
other systems of symbolic meaning, as well as behavioral scripts adequate for
a multitude of social situations. With reference to the research reported in
this chapter, an individual acculturated to Polish culture will, in its situational
contexts, (1) respond actively to a request “may I ask two ladies . . .” if he

were male or sit still if she were female; (2) understand and know how to fol-
low expectations to behave in a courteous way toward women (studies #2
and #3); (3) understand religiosity focused on the cult of Virgin Mary and its
consequences for moral judgments (not necessarily sharing them). Someone
acculturating to multiethnic Nigeria will acquire practical understanding of tra-
ditional Muslim Hausa and Southern Ibo cultures, as well as non-traditional
(incongruent) deviations from each culture’s core values (study #4). Someone
else in the process of acculturation to India will acquire elementary knowledge
of Hinduism, and if a resident of Bengal, she or he will interpret adequately
the mythology of Kali, including her tongue.
The only result in this chapter factually related to acculturation is that
Indian immigrants in Poland start resembling Catholic Poles in their (in)toler-
ance patterns: they find VM more benevolent and this makes them less toler-
ant. Interestingly, such adaptation is taking place without religious conversion.
With these examples, the reader will clearly appreciate the difference
between the approach I propose, and what has become a standard in this field,
known as Berry’s model of four acculturation strategies (see Sam & Berry,
2006). The main difference when comparing these two theories rests on a dis-
tinction between cultural preferences (Berry) and competences (Boski). Berry
and his colleagues investigate domain preferences defined by country labels;
e.g., I like listening to Canadian music, and/or to Chinese music (also: cuisine, hav-
ing friends, celebrating traditions, etc.). Competence testing does not appear as
a research goal in that approach.19
2. Limitations
Every theoretical and methodological approach needs to realize its range

of applications and not move beyond it. The project of cultural psychology
presented in this chapter is no exception. By no means is it restricted to
single-culture analyses as some authors claim (Berry, 2000). Cross-cultural
comparisons are necessary when we run cultural experiments. But it would
be unrealistic and not practical to design large pan-cultural research programs
here, commensurate to those on values, beliefs, or subjective well-being.
Cultural experiments are particularly useful to investigate the psychological
consequences of specific cultural arrangements operating in a given region
and to compare them with conditions when such arrangements are absent.
They also offer promising prospects to study novel and counter-cultural trends
occurring both within a culture and in an intercultural contact. This is how
I understand and implement the famous phrase by Schweder about culture

and psychology making each other up.
3. Final Conclusion
Cultural psychology proposed in this contribution does not worry how to

eliminate the variation of meaning from the measuring scales and later to
unpackage differences obtained in comparative studies. It draws, instead, from
the richness offered by our own and more distant cultures, molding research
designs from these raw materials. Such research designs are not culture free
but culture rich. Research problems focus on how people construe the mean-
ing of familiar and unfamiliar; congruent and incongruent situations; when
they defend cultural arrangements and when they are ready to open up for
novelties; what is conducive to accept or to reject the differences.
Let it be hoped that such psychology should not only pave an interest-
ing field of research but also proves itself useful in applications for improving
intercultural relations.
NOTES
1. This argument would lose its power had c-cp relied heavily on the neuroscience
instrumentation. But it clearly is not the case, and our discipline is regarded as
part of social psychology (e.g., JCCP is considered as a journal of that list).
2. On a street welcome photo, where two communist leaders were seen mixing with
residents of Warsaw, the cynical interpretation consisted of attributing to Soviet
secretary Brezhnev the following inner thoughts directed to his Polish counter-
part: A good attempt of yours, Gierek! These Polacks greet me as a tsar, and this is what
they should be doing! They seem to have enough brains to know who their real boss is!
The alternative, friendly version had this format: These Poles are a really hospitable
and cordial nation. I am feeling touched by their showing me so much heart.
3. A phrase of a minimal culture paradigm (alluding to Tajfel’s minimal group par-
adigm) can also be used to portray the dominant research strategy in cross-
cultural psychology.
4. The logic of disconfirmation provides a neutral, cognitive base for designing
cultural experiments; it should be noted though, that such set-ups are not
neutral in a normative-evaluative sense, but are suggestive of a provoca-
tion or manipulation. “Experimental manipulation” is a close term. Yet cul-
tural experiment is a very specific type of manipulation, one that is explicitly
counter-cultural in a given milieu.
5. Equally inappropriate in some (egalitarian) cultures would be a teacher’s
request that students bring him/her foodstuff or beverage from a grocery store.
6. In all cases the author was the experimenter. It may be seen as a limitation
(experimenter not being blind to the hypothesis) but important aspects of the
procedure are kept constant. Also, 18 years mark a long interval, when a per-
son is aging (that is, not remaining the same).
7. One of the last occasions occurred during an international conference on Social
influence and social dynamics in Warsaw, with some world leading scholars in
attendance. The theme of my talk was on cultural factors in social influence
and the idea was to supplement it with a fresh experiential example. The result
was successful as usual: one Polish man together with a Dutch colleague, who
was prompted by his Polish wife (!), stood up and did the job.
8. In a different cultural context, these video scripts could be seen as representa-
tive for benevolent sexism (Glick and Fiske, 2001). I do not accept this concept
though, as I find it ethnocentrically biased.
9. No full role reversal between female and male actors occurred in this episode.
Relevant decisions were taken by the local collaborators based on their sense
of cultural realism rather than on purely rational arguments.
10. It was decided during the piloting that the fifth episode, Superior—

Subordinate would not be used in the final study; mainly because the actors
appeared in Friends’ home visit episode (2). Also, a balanced design required a
combination of two traditional and two non-traditional episodes.
11. In Poland, surveys on intergroup closeness and prejudice use names of
European nationalities but also broader categories such as “Black Africans”
or “Arabs” for those who belong to other civilizations. A distinction between
Nigerians, Cameroonians, and Ghanaians would be impossible for a vast
majority of respondents.
12. All three were my student assistants, majoring in psychology at University of
Jos. The recordings took place in 1983. English was the language of interviews
and of the whole research. Although English was spoken Nigerian way, the
videos were sufficiently comprehensible for Canadians to allow them a mean-
ingful participation.
13. He chose to live in a region that has become today (30 years later) the heart-
land of Boko-Haram terrorist operations.
14. Before initiating the project, I used the icon of Kali during my class discus-
sions on Culture and Emotions for seven years in Warsaw, Poland; but also in
other European countries such as France or Sweden. The tongue, which is the
essential element of the picture, has not been noticeable at all. A majority of
students were able to give a proper geo-cultural location of the Icon, but very
few of them (around 5%) identified Kali; the most typical response was an
impression of some “horrifying, demonic, and destructive spirits.” As students
in psychology and culture, my class participants should be considered non-
representative for the general population.
15. I am indebted to Ms. Halina Koprowska, who found the icon and was respon-
sible for running the Polish part of the study for partial fulfillment of her MA
in psychology under my supervision (Koprowska, 2006). I wish to express

my gratitude to Dr. Azzam Amin, then at University of Lyon-2, who was my
research assistant at that university in France; to Dr. Aneta Chybicka (then at
University of Gdańsk) and Dr. S. Sinha from University of Puri for helping in
data collection in Bhubaneshwar.
16. Throughout this chapter I am using the name “Virgin Mary,” which is the col-
loquial term for St. Mary, God Mother (Matka Boska—in Polish). From the
Catholic cultural/religious perspective, this English language name is grossly
inadequate, because Virgin Mary is a devalued format of God Mother. Bearing
this in mind, let the linguistic tradition prevail.
17. Capital letters F, H, or P followed by a number after a quote identify French,
Hindu, or Polish participants.
18. Recent dramatic events show how violent a response to such “modified” cul-
tural symbols can be. Caricatures are examples of such modifications, when
a symbol or a highly positioned individual is portrayed in a non-serious way,
stripped of sanctity or charisma. Such caricatures of prophet Mohammed
which were appearing in French Charlie Hebdo magazine led to bloody assas-
sination when 12 members of the editorial body were shot dead in their
office in Paris by Muslim terrorists (January 7, 2015). Two months later, a
Russian politician Boris Nemcov was gunned down in Moscow, apparently by
Chechen terrorists, deeply offended by his support to Charlie Hebdo (je suis
Charlie).
19. As an AE/reviewer of manuscripts on acculturation, over the years, I found it
very difficult to get a common ground of understanding with the, when criti-
cally commenting on their choices of research methods. A typical case of that
methodology looked this way: “The acculturation scale that was initially devel-
oped for the study of Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union (. . .) was
employed, with the ‘Jewish’ changed to ‘Korean’ and ‘Russian’ to ‘American’ ”.
The point is that from a cultural psychological perspective such substitutions
are not legitimate.
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Explorations in Dynamics of Symbolic Meaning with Cultural

Chapter · May 2018

Cultural psychology View project

A Cross Cultural Comparison of Food Preferences of Immigrants in Poland View project

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A. Cross-​Cultural Psychology: Equivalence and

1. The C-​CP Model

The c-​cp research paradigm is illustrated in Figure 6.1.

FIGURE 6.1: Research Paradigm in Cross-​Cultural Psychology.

Differences in intelligence measured by Wechsler Intelligence Scale for

Decontextualization is another feature of the dominant c-​cp research strat-

another case of a universally framed relationship. But unlike mercury in

3. The Group Reference Effect

B. Cultural Psychology: Culture

diverse intentional worlds in which it plays a co-​constitutional part” (1995,

2. Research Examples

Culture [A]: Artifacts

Same Culture [A] Cultural Experiments: Actor

Other Culture [B]

FIGURE 6.2: Cultural Psychology—​a research paradigm.

Culture of honor. Another relevant example is research on the culture of

This was accomplished by assigning interpretations to pictures portraying

C. Studying Culture as Prescribed Action Process: A

2. Culture Perception

Intercultural communication at the verbal level is only possible by linguistic

1. Cultural perception—​accuracy in detection, and identification of

7. Cultural identity with symbolic artifacts and practices

II. THE CONCEPT AND ILLUSTRATION OF

1. The Request →Compliance Scenario

The first cultural experiment that I present is a {request → compliance} sce-

2. Reversing the Script. “The May I Ask Two Ladies . . .”

3. Interpreting the “May I Ask Two Ladies . . .” Experiment

TABLE 6.1: Cultural experiment May I ask two ladies. Frequencies of confirmation

Samples K = no. Two men A woman/​ Mixed (M

Polish samples 93 86 (92%) 5 2

M: May I ask two ladies …

Attention switched on…

Culturally sensible? – Culture script:

Searching for a sript In this country (generally) men

F: it’s not for me, M: I’ll do it, I should,

FIGURE 6.3: Cultural Experiment: ‘May I ask two Ladies? . . . –​Please’.

Europe while in Poland. The message is linguistically processed, considered

[A female student at an opening class, rushing to pull down the hangings,

The cognitive reinterpretation has normative-​motivational consequences,

4. A Video Version of the “May I Ask Two Ladies . . .”

In methodological terms, the “May I ask two ladies . . .” is a quasi-​experiment.

attempts at initiating countercultural requests are resisted by both males and

III. EXPERIMENTS ON CULTURE IN-​/ ​G ROUP

1. In-​outgroup and cultural in-​/​congruency: Unconfounding the

Cultural experiments assume shared normative elements which serve as ref-

The ingroup/​outgroup distinction and script in-​/​congruency need to be

A. Culture Perception of Polish Courtesy

1. Video Materials

2. Culture Perception

We first established the accuracy of our videos among participants, asking

Place location Script

FIGURE 6.4A: Mediation path from culture perception (place location) to evaluation

Figure 6.4A demonstrates the structure of relations, organized in the format

3. Ingroup and Outgroup Effects

[~D = .018/D = .260** ]

FIGURE 6.4B: Gender roles script appraisal, a mediation and moderated

The findings on two evaluation variables differed considerably. They dem-

A. Cross-Cultural Psychology: Equivalence and

1. The C-CP Model

The c-cp research paradigm is illustrated in Figure 6.1.

FIGURE 6.1: Research Paradigm in Cross-Cultural Psychology.

Decontextualization is another feature of the dominant c-cp research strat-

diverse intentional worlds in which it plays a co-constitutional part” (1995,

FIGURE 6.2: Cultural Psychology—a research paradigm.

1. Cultural perception—accuracy in detection, and identification of

Samples K = no. Two men A woman/ Mixed (M

FIGURE 6.3: Cultural Experiment: ‘May I ask two Ladies? . . . –Please’.

The cognitive reinterpretation has normative-motivational consequences,

In methodological terms, the “May I ask two ladies . . .” is a quasi-experiment.

III. EXPERIMENTS ON CULTURE IN-/ G ROUP

1. In-outgroup and cultural in-/congruency: Unconfounding the

The ingroup/outgroup distinction and script in-/congruency need to be

2. Experimental Video-Materials and Results

1. Parents nurturing their baby. In the T-version of nurturing

the domain of gender relations closely corresponds to their non-/tradition-

in such circumstances not unlike in Ma-Kellams and Blascovich’s (2012) stud-

IV. PERCEIVING CULTURALLY IN-/C ONGRUENT

Nigerian ethnic groups, let alone their in-/congruent cultures. Research ques-

to marry a Christian fiancé as a single wife; he enjoyed the party-disco life-style

C. Discussion: Salience in Cross-Cultural

scale was occupied by three post-communist countries (Ukraine, Estonia, and

FIGURE 6.9: Icon perception in four ethno-religious groups.

scripts manifested in behaviors/interactions, and symbols to which actors

currently conducting studies on acceptance-rejection of Charlie Hebdo’s carica-

Perception is a classic research topic in cross-cultural psychology. But whether

Berry, J. W. (2000). Cross-cultural psychology: A symbiosis of cultural and com-

Global Index of Religion and Atheism. (2012). WIN-Gallup International global