Around the Globe

Recognizing Emotions

Emotions are universal. The ability to recognize emotions, though, seems to vary from country to country. Markham and Wang (1996) studied the ways Chinese and Australian Caucasian four-, six-, and eight-year-old children identify emotions from pictures. First, the children looked at a set of photographs of adult Chinese or Caucasian faces and answered questions like: "Show me the one who had just seen something yucky." Then, the children were shown different photographs and asked to say in their own words why that person was making that face, in statements like: "This person has just seen a big snake." The Chinese children were more accurate at identifying emotions than the Australian children at all tasks at all age levels.

Chinese children may recognize emotions well because Chinese society emphasizes belonging to a group over individual achievement; it may be important for Chinese children to learn how to read others' emotions well in order to "fit in." On the other hand, China also has a one-child policy. Most of the Chinese participants were only children, while the Australian subjects generally had brothers or sisters. As Markham and Wang note, other studies have shown that only children are better at recognizing emotions than other children.

Motivation and Lying

Most people don't lie for fun. When they lie, they lie about important information, to protect someone from harm. Knowing just who someone is "protecting" can reveal a lot about a person's hierarchy of motives.

Aune and Waters (1994) asked Samoan and North American adults why they had lied in the past. Samoans stated that they would lie for the good of their families or to please an authority figure. North Americans reported that they would lie about things they considered private or to protect another person's feelings—in other words, if they felt that the damage would be their fault. Samoan culture is more "collectivistic" than North American; Samoan children are taught to put the groups' needs ahead of their own. By Maslow's hierarchy of motives, the Samoans rate "Love and Belongingness" above "Self- Actualization." To Samoans, Maslow's pyramid looks upside-down.