Cultural variations in interdependence and autobiographical memory: Lessons from Korea, China and India and the United States, by Leichtman, M. D., Wang, Q., & Pillemer, D. B. In R. Fivush & C. A. Haden (Eds.), Autobiographical memory and the construction of a narrative self: Developmental and cultural perspectives (pp. 73-98). Mahwah, NJ: Laurence Erlbaum Associates.
Citation
Abstract
Research over the past two decades has documented powerful effects of culture on human performance across a sweeping array of social and cognitive tasks. For example, how people process stimuli, reason about the causes of events, and describe themselves varies as a function of the culture in which they live. This chapter focuses on one fascinating aspect of this growing portrait of cross-cultural influences, namely emergent differences in autobiographical memory. Our goal is to review recent empirical work that indicates significant differences in the content and style of autobiographical memories of people raised in different cultures. The central question we pose is how the social environment in which a child grows up influences the establishment and maintenance of long-term event memories. What cross-cultural variations in autobiographical memory exist during childhood and adulthood, and what mechanisms are likely to be responsible for them? One particularly useful distinction in this regard is the difference between independently and interdependently oriented social environments. This distinction, which refers in part to environments that encourage different degrees of focus on the self versus other people, appears to predict several important aspects of what and how children remember. Thus, throughout our discussion, we return to this paradigm for conceptualizing cross-cultural findings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)