Personality

and
Culture

Instructor: Sam Mathew MD., MS.,

School of Health Sciences
 Introduction

 Individual personality and biology, influences a

person’s cultural values

 There is a constant interplay between culture,

individual personality, biology, and experience

 Knowledge of an individual’s culture will provide

information of the personal characteristics
 Personality and Culture
 Personality, which reflects the self, exists in every culture
and can be recognized regardless of the collective cultural
characteristics
 Personality is an individual’s characteristic pattern of thoughts,
emotions, and behaviors, along with psychological mechanisms
behind those patterns (Funder, 1997)
 Personality development occurs through interplay of individual
and sociocultural factors
 Social constructivists suggest that culture dictates individual
behavior and interpersonal interactions, and that self does not
truly exist but only represents the culture
 Others believe that self is distinct and that choice is inevitable
cross-culturally
 Biology and Behavior
 Biological and behavioral predispositions are based on genetic factors
and prenatal influences
 Prenatal influences alters behavior before external environment
impacts. e.g. alcohol
 In addition, maternal stress, nutrition, and hormonal levels affect
behavior
 Parents’ reaction to their children are influenced by both the gender
and the personality characteristics of children
 Gender differences also play a role in the brain function (e.g. “right
brain” is creative and feminine, while “left brain” is analytic and male)
 Gender identity is formed before social influences affect
 Gender influences behavior but this is greatly as a consequence of
culturally defined patterns
Individual Factors in Personality Development

 Factors influencing personality development are:

 Genetics
 Pre- and post-natal mechanisms, e.g. birth order,
parental influence, learning, environmental
conditions
As events occur interpersonal processes get
transformed into intrapersonal ones and vice
versa, e.g. rituals
Cultural Factors in Personality Development

 Individual personality is molded by surrounding

environment
 In some cultures like Chinese, strong emotions are
not considered appropriate and suppression or
masking of feelings are encouraged
 Cultural molding occurs initially by parents and
continues up to adolescence
 Domains of autonomy among cultures are variable;
what is considered personal in some cultures may be
a societal or family responsibility in others
 Interaction of Personal and Cultural Factors

 Behavior is molded by an interaction between

personal and cultural factors
e.g. In Indian and Herero (southern Africa) cultures adult
children should respect and care for their aging parents
 Strong societal messages on this value are sent forth
but individual personality has an impact on the
children's behavior towards this value
 Fundamental human choices thus depend on the
interaction between individual personality, cultural
values taught by the family, cultural characteristics of
career or profession, as well as environmental factors
 Cultural Force on Individual
 Afghanistan:
 Taliban’s rules on status of women
 USA:
 Dominant culture’s notions on life
 These expectations can remain relatively stable in a given
culture but may or may not reflect the actual behavior of
majority
 Although culture prescribes these values and beliefs, they
are strongly mediated by individual characteristics over
time, like education, personal experiences, living conditions
are other factors
 Hence, there could be variations within cultures
 Multicultural Strands Within Individuals

 People exist in more than a single culture, e.g.

Thanksgiving celebrations
 Cultures include not only those to which one is born
into, or by nationality and ethnicity, but also by other
issues, such as professional cultures
 Interaction of cultures is fascinating in a culturally
diverse place like US
 Assignment: Try to collect some news stories that
discuss the effects of minority culture presence in the
US or international communities
 Cultural Stereotypes
 Stereotypes are generalizations or categorizations about a
particular group based on common features like appearance,
ethnicity, gender, etc.,
 It begins from infancy and continues throughout life
 Categorizations is a useful method to cope with varied stimuli
 However, acting on the basis of stereotypes is dangerous, as
some may not apply at all to the group member that is being
attended to
 Stereotyping is useful because they speed up cognitive
processing but their limitations must be acknowledged and
understood
 It can cause significant problems in clinical settings
List some commonly held beliefs (stereotypes)
about members of the following groups:

White people Black people

French Mormons
Ethiopians Texans
Jews Gay men
Chinese
Costa Ricans

1. Think on the basis on which your stereotypes are formed –

e.g. personal observations, popular media depictions,
parental comments, readings?
2. What role did your own cultural sensitivities play?