Facial expressions in Manga (Japanese) comics. East Asian culture strongly
regulates the expression of emotions, particularly in their impact on other
people. (source)
Humans have had to adapt not only to physical environments (climate,
vegetation, wildlife) but also to cultural environments (diet, language, codes
of behavior, class and family structure, etc.). A culture will thus select for
those mental predispositions and personality types that are most compatible
with it.
This point is made by a recent paper on emotion regulation in East
Asian and Western cultures:
Culture influences
the development of psychological tendencies by presenting specific norms,
practices, and institutions for how to act properly and be a good person […]
culture is not only constrained by genetics but also influences the behavioral
expression of genes and can thus moderate the psychological and behavioral
expressions of genotypes. We propose that genes may affect phenotypic
expression in the form of underlying psychological tendencies, but how and
whether these tendencies are manifested in actual behavioral patterns may be
shaped by sociocultural factors. (Kim et al, 2011)
The authors studied a gene that influences the way we regulate
emotions. This is the oxytocin receptor gene OXTR rs53576, which has two
alleles ‘A’ and ‘G’. The GG genotype is associated with more sensitive
parenting, greater sensitivity to infant crying, greater empathy, less
loneliness, and a more prosocial temperament. These tendencies are less
characteristic of the AA genotype, and the AG genotype produces outcomes that fall
between the two.
The ‘A’ allele is more common among Koreans than among white
Americans, perhaps because its negative effects are buffered by a culture that fosters
empathy, specifically a keen interest in the possible adverse effects of one’s
behavior on others:
[…] in more
collectivistic cultures, the expression of emotions is practiced with concern
for negatively affecting social relations, whereas in more individualistic
cultures, the expression of thoughts and feelings is valued as a sign of an
independent self (Kim et al., 2011)
A more individualistic culture, like the one that prevails in the
U.S., would thus have a weaker capacity to offset the negative effects of the
AA genotype.
Interestingly, culture also influences expression of the GG
genotype, but in a different way. Because people with this genotype tend to be more
attuned to rules of correct behavior, they’re more likely, in an American
context, to express their emotions than are people with the AA genotype,
apparently because white American culture today values the expression of
emotions. Koreans, however, show the opposite pattern:
Emotional suppression
was most clearly observable among Koreans with the OXTR GG genotype, those
characterized as more socioemotionally sensitive, compared to those with AA
genotype. Among Americans, the pattern was reversed, such that those with the
GG genotype engaged in less emotional suppression, compared to those with the
AA genotype. (Kim et al., 2011)
This is actually the reverse of the Baldwin effect. If white
American culture exercises less control over emotions, particularly in their
possible adverse effects on others, there should correspondingly be weaker
genetic control. The same selection pressure should have produced similar cultural
and genetic outcomes. Yet, paradoxically, the actual outcomes are almost poles
apart. Although white Americans are less softwired for empathy and control of
emotions, they seem to be more hardwired in this respect.
Of course, if we were to go back a hundred years, we would see that white
Americans differed less, in this same respect, from East Asians. When I look at
old family photos, I notice that the subjects never smiled for the camera. It
was considered rude to smile at strangers, who might have taken such behavior
the wrong way. Now smiling is normal, even mandatory. A century ago, white
Americans controlled their emotions much more than they do now, especially with
a view to minimizing their impact on other people.
There is another possible answer to the above paradox. Maybe weaker
cultural control led to stronger genetic control, partly as a kind of compensatory
action and partly because a less kin-based society requires more hardwiring of
empathy. As Alan Macfarlane has argued in The
Origins of English Individualism (and also hbd* chick), the English began to
enter a freer and more individualistic cultural environment as far back as the
13th century (see earlier post). Because most social and economic relationships
were no longer with close kin, it became necessary to extend the feelings of
empathy one felt for immediate blood relations to a much larger circle of
people. This psychological substrate would later make possible the rise of a
market economy, i.e., the replacement of kinship by the market as the main
organizing principle of society.
References
Kim, H.S., D.K. Sherman, T. Mojaverian, J.Y. Sasaki, J. Park, E.M.
Suh, & S.E. Taylor. (2011). Gene–Culture Interaction: Oxytocin Receptor
Polymorphism (OXTR) and Emotion Regulation, Social
Psychological and Personality Science, 2,
665-672
http://taylorlab.psych.ucla.edu/2011_Gene-Culture%20Interaction_OXTR%20and%20Emotion%20Regulation.pdf
Macfarlane, A. (1978a). The origins of English individualism: Some
surprises, Theory and society: renewal
and critique in social theory, 6,
255-277.
http://www.alanmacfarlane.com/TEXTS/Origins_HI.pdf
Macfarlane, A. (1978b). The
Origins of English Individualism: The Family, Property and Social Transition,
Oxford: Blackwell.
