The Concealment,manifestation And Value Of Culture In Psychological Research

There are two trends in the development of psychology in the new century: one is the combination of cognitive neuroscience and psychology;the other is the combination of cultural research and psychology.This is related to the nature of psychology as both a natural science and a social science.The focus of this thesis is on the whole process of combining cultural research with psychology,through which researchers can fully understand the evolution of academic theories and methods in this field.Besides,by analyzing the significance and value of culture in psychological research,it provides an epistemological and methodological reference for the future development of this field and even the entire psychology.Based on the definition of culture by anthropologists and psychologists,this thesis divides psychology into “culture-excluded” psychology and “culture-included”psychology by focusing on individual/group,meaningless/meaning,element/overall,and short/long period.This also constitutes the concealment and manifestation of culture in psychological research.The “culture-excluded” psychology is embodied in the aspects of individual as the research focus,the avoidance of meaning,the attention to elements,and the absence of long-term orientation.It reflects the natural science attribute of psychology,is the“naturalization” of psychological phenomena,and emphasizes the objectivity,accuracy,and value neutrality of scientific research.It tries to eliminate the interference of social and cultural factors on the psychological process and tries to find the general law about the mind.From the founder of scientific psychology,Wundt,to the subsequent constructivism,behaviorism,cognitive psychology and even the recent cognitive neuroscience,they all belong to the psychology of natural science orientation,which is also the mainstream of psychology.Although these psychologies are evasive about cultural factors,they still make a lot of contributions in highlighting the scientific nature of psychology in their respective fields.Compared with “culture-excluded” psychology,the “culture-included” psychology pays more attention to group,meaning,person as a whole,and long period.It puts mind back into the context of social culture and explores the relationship between cultural factors and the mind.It reflects the social science attribute of psychology,which is also the focus of this thesis.The development of “culture-included”psychology is divided into three stages.The first stage was the early development of“culture-included” psychology,which mainly included the “unconscious” discussion of culture by individual psychologists,and their attention to cultural phenomena from the perspective of psychology based on their own theoretical interests.The second stage was the further development of “culture-included” psychology,in which psychologists and anthropologists interested in psychological factors began to form schools to analyze the relationship between culture and mind.The third stage is the gradual prosperity of “culture-included” psychology.In this stage,psychologists begin to use scale method to conduct cross-cultural psychological comparison and experiment method to explore the causal relationship between culture and mind.Some psychologists begin to integrate psychological researches of different orientations.In addition,non-western psychologists begin to combine psychological research with local cultural research and develop psychological theories in line with local cultural characteristics.The cultural implications of psychological research are further highlighted,promoting the more comprehensive and in-depth development of“culture-included” psychology.Why is there a division between “culture-excluded” psychology and “culture-included”psychology within the field of psychology? In general terms,this related to the complexity of psychological phenomena,which are both natural and social,enabling researchers of different orientations to work in this field.Specifically,the influence of different knowledge backgrounds,research methods and research ideologies on researchers determines whether they choose to engage in “culture-included”psychology or “culture-excluded” psychology.Besides,the external social environment also affects the researchers' academic tendency.What is the significance and value of introducing cultural factors into psychological research? Firstly,the introduction of cultural factors into psychological research can endow the research with “meaning”,to some extent make up for the neglect of culture by psychology oriented by natural science and the disconnection from reality brought by the reduction analysis of psychological phenomena.Secondly,the introduction of cultural factors can expand the thinking dimension of psychology about time and space.Thirdly,the wholeness and tolerance of culture make it a bridge to communicate psychologists with different orientations and promote the integrated development of psychology with different research orientations.