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Assignment Prompt & Instructions

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**files (5)**

– ## DiscussionBoard.docx

– ## CULTPSY3_Chapter13_PDFHandout.pdf

– CULTPSY3_Chapter11_PDFHandout.pdf
– CULTPSY3_Chapter12_PDFHandout.pdf
– CULTPSY3_Chapter14_PPT.pdf

**## DiscussionBoard.docx**

**Discussion Board**

You will be required to participate in the eight discussion prompts posted on the Canvas Discussion Board throughout the course of the semester. These will relate to assigned course materials. Your responses should incorporate course content assigned during that week and should be approximately 250 words (total, for both prompts).

Please select and reply to two of the prompts below

1. “It is valid to suggest that some cultures are morally superior to others.” Do you agree or disagree with this statement? Explain your conclusion by basing it on evidence from one of the moral psychological models discussed in your textbook.

2. Create a diagram that shows how the different levels of Kohlberg’s model of moral reasoning, Shweder’s different codes of ethics, and the five different moral intuitions are related to each other.

3. An orthodox religious adherent is debating with a progressive religious adherent about abortion. They each provide a certain number of justifications for their perspectives. In the space below, for each religious adherent, graph out how many statements one would expect to correspond to each moral intuition based on the relationship between codes of ethics and moral intuitions.

4. In trying to summarize research on punishment and cooperation for your supervisor, you decide to draw a line graph that separately predicts cooperation within a culture based on a culture’s willingness to engage in (a) antisocial punishment and (b) altruistic punishment. Draw such a line graph.

5. You are surveying computer stores in individualistic and collectivistic cultures to determine what system they use to pay their sales employees. System 1 is to pay based on meritocracy. System 2 is to pay everyone the same amount of money each month. Draw a bar graph that portrays the proportion of individualistic companies and collectivistic companies that use each salary system.

**## CULTPSY3_Chapter13_PDFHandout.pdf**

1

Lecture PowerPoint
Slides

By
Benjamin Cheung

Cultural Psychology
Third Edition

Steven J. Heine

Chapter 13—Physical Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Discuss various biological variations across different cultural
populations

• Explain the process of culture-gene coevolution

• Provide examples of culture-gene coevolution

• Discuss various acquired physical variations across different
cultural populations

• Understand explanations that account for the physical variations
across different cultural populations

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

2

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Explain how cultures differ in sleep and perceptions of sleep

• Discuss how socioeconomic status predicts physical health

• Explain how ethnicity predicts physical health

• Explain the epidemiological paradox

• Discuss cultural variation in the metaphors used to conceptualize
medicine

• Discuss the distribution of laypersons’ and doctors' medical
attitudes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Overriding Theme
in This Chapter

 Despite the notion that physical health is a
biological issue, it is still strongly related to
many psychological variables.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Human Biological Variability

 Human biology varies across cultures, and
such variability has two different
explanations/mechanisms:
• Innate biological differences = result of

selection pressures

• Acquired biological differences = cultural
effects on one’s biology, independent of
genes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

3

Innate Biological Variability

 Humans, like all organisms, evolve due to
selective pressures in their environments.

 Different environments have different
selection pressures, leading different
populations to evolve different traits.

 The most salient example of genetic
variability of humans across different
populations is skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color strongly correlates with
ultraviolet radiation (UVR) that reaches
different parts of the globe.
• Light skin allows sufficient UVR to synthesize

Vitamin D.

• Dark skin prevents over-absorption of UVR,
and prevents breakdown of folic acid.

 Much evidence shows that UVR levels
across the globe correlate strongly with
skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color is an example of geographical
influences on population variation in the
human genome.

 Cultural factors can also influence
genomic variation.
• For example, cow domestication has led to

the development of a mutation that allows us
to process milk.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

4

Innate Biological Variability

 Another example of this is when people
began farming yams in Africa.
• Required the clearing of forests  standing

pools of water  malaria-carrying mosquitoes

• This cultural practice of yam farming ended up
leading to the biological adaptation of
resistance to malaria.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological Variability

 Moken young children swim underwater to
retrieve seafood.

 They have thus developed twice the
underwater visual acuity as European
children.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Normal pupil

Moken pupil
under water

5

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Source: Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, CDC.

Obesity Trends* Among U.S. Adults
BRFSS, 1990, 2000, 2010

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

1990 2000

2010

No Data <10% 10%–14% 15%–19% 20%–24% 25%–29% ≥30%

(*BMI 30, or about 30 lbs. overweight for 5’4” person)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Some explanations include:
• Greater reliance on high-calorie foods (e.g.

fast foods, sodas)

• Larger portion sizes

• More sedentary lifestyle

• Suburban lifestyle—more driving, less
exercise

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

6

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Within the West, there is considerable
variation in obesity rates.

 France has one-fifth the obesity rate of the
United States.
• This despite French food being high in fat and

sugars

• French have higher blood cholesterol than
Americans but less heart disease.

• Why?
© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 French still eat significantly less calories a
day than Americans.
• This is due to the cultural environment that

affects portion sizes and attitudes toward food.

 People eat what’s given to them, portioned.

 Indeed, in comparison to portion sizes in the
France:
• U.S. yogurt containers are 80% larger.

• McDonald’s serves 70% more fries in the United
States per container.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

7

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Late 19th Century Today

5'8" (1.73 m)

5'5" (1.65 m)

5'10" (1.78 m)

6'1" (1.85 m)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

 Economic wealth of a country has close
ties with the height of its people.
• More wealth brings healthier diet (more

vitamins and nutrients), especially at ages
when growth spurts occur.

• Fluctuations of countries’ heights across time
have coincided with broad societal changes
that have an impact on diet.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

8

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Before electric lighting, people’s sleeping
cycle actually had two phases.
• First, people went to sleep for a few hours a

little after sunset.
» They woke up in the middle of the night, during

which they engaged in some leisurely activities.

• Then they slept for a few hours again until
around dawn

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

 Socioeconomic Status (SES).

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

9

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Psychosocial variables :
• Personality characteristics

» Hostility and pessimism

» Sense of hostility and pessimism leads to poorer
health

• Cognitive resources
» Poverty preoccupies people with having to make

difficult choices and trade-offs for survival.

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 One important variable is stress, which
affects health in two ways:
• Stress leads people to engage in unhealthy

habits.

• Stress weakens the immune system.

 Some environments can induce more
stress.
• E.g. New York City has been shown to make

people more stressed.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

10

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Low
SES
Low
SES

Low
Control

Low
Control

Poor HealthPoor Health

High
SES
High
SES

High
Control

High
Control

Good HealthGood Health

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 Ethnicity is also a factor implicated in the
link between SES and health

 In the United States, African Americans
and Hispanic Americans have been
studied extensively in terms of their health
outcomes compared to European
Americans.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

11

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 This unexpected pattern has been called
the epidemiological paradox.

 One explanation is that Hispanic
Americans engage in healthier behaviors
then European Americans.

» Drinking and smoking less

» More social support from large communities

» High level of positive affect

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Medicine varies greatly by culture
• Non-Western societies making use of

traditional medicine agreeing that diseases
are due to supernatural causes, such as
witches, demons, or ghosts.

• Modern Western medicine relies on the
scientific method, using controlled
experiments that are shared internationally,
and not considering supernatural causes to
be good explanations for illness.

12

Medicine and Culture

 Differences in Western medicine
• In France, the metaphor of the body is the “terrain,”

which emphasizes a sense of balance.
» French doctors prescribe more long rests and spa visits.

» Dirt and germs can strengthen one’s terrain; thus, there is
less emphasis on daily bathing.

• The U.S. metaphor of the body is a machine.
» American doctors are more likely to do surgery (to fix

malfunctioning parts).

» Germs are key threat to health; thus, doctors prescribe more
antibiotics than anywhere else.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

 Both geographical and cultural variables
have an impact on one’s biology (both
genotypic and phenotypic).

 Such impact can have profound
consequences, as in the cases of obesity
and mortality rates.

 Even the profession of medicine is not
immune to the effects of culture.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

**CULTPSY3_Chapter11_PDFHandout.pdf**

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**CULTPSY3_Chapter12_PDFHandout.pdf**

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**CULTPSY3_Chapter14_PPT.pdf**

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**CULTPSY3_Chapter14_PPT.pdf**

This file is too large to display. [View in new window](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/cultpsy3-chapter14-ppt-pdf)

**## DiscussionBoard.docx**

**Discussion Board**

You will be required to participate in the eight discussion prompts posted on the Canvas Discussion Board throughout the course of the semester. These will relate to assigned course materials. Your responses should incorporate course content assigned during that week and should be approximately 250 words (total, for both prompts).

Please select and reply to two of the prompts below

1. “It is valid to suggest that some cultures are morally superior to others.” Do you agree or disagree with this statement? Explain your conclusion by basing it on evidence from one of the moral psychological models discussed in your textbook.

2. Create a diagram that shows how the different levels of Kohlberg’s model of moral reasoning, Shweder’s different codes of ethics, and the five different moral intuitions are related to each other.

3. An orthodox religious adherent is debating with a progressive religious adherent about abortion. They each provide a certain number of justifications for their perspectives. In the space below, for each religious adherent, graph out how many statements one would expect to correspond to each moral intuition based on the relationship between codes of ethics and moral intuitions.

4. In trying to summarize research on punishment and cooperation for your supervisor, you decide to draw a line graph that separately predicts cooperation within a culture based on a culture’s willingness to engage in (a) antisocial punishment and (b) altruistic punishment. Draw such a line graph.

5. You are surveying computer stores in individualistic and collectivistic cultures to determine what system they use to pay their sales employees. System 1 is to pay based on meritocracy. System 2 is to pay everyone the same amount of money each month. Draw a bar graph that portrays the proportion of individualistic companies and collectivistic companies that use each salary system.

**## CULTPSY3_Chapter13_PDFHandout.pdf**

1

Lecture PowerPoint
Slides

By
Benjamin Cheung

Cultural Psychology
Third Edition

Steven J. Heine

Chapter 13—Physical Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Discuss various biological variations across different cultural
populations

• Explain the process of culture-gene coevolution

• Provide examples of culture-gene coevolution

• Discuss various acquired physical variations across different
cultural populations

• Understand explanations that account for the physical variations
across different cultural populations

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

2

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Explain how cultures differ in sleep and perceptions of sleep

• Discuss how socioeconomic status predicts physical health

• Explain how ethnicity predicts physical health

• Explain the epidemiological paradox

• Discuss cultural variation in the metaphors used to conceptualize
medicine

• Discuss the distribution of laypersons’ and doctors' medical
attitudes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Overriding Theme
in This Chapter

 Despite the notion that physical health is a
biological issue, it is still strongly related to
many psychological variables.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Human Biological Variability

 Human biology varies across cultures, and
such variability has two different
explanations/mechanisms:
• Innate biological differences = result of

selection pressures

• Acquired biological differences = cultural
effects on one’s biology, independent of
genes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

3

Innate Biological Variability

 Humans, like all organisms, evolve due to
selective pressures in their environments.

 Different environments have different
selection pressures, leading different
populations to evolve different traits.

 The most salient example of genetic
variability of humans across different
populations is skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color strongly correlates with
ultraviolet radiation (UVR) that reaches
different parts of the globe.
• Light skin allows sufficient UVR to synthesize

Vitamin D.

• Dark skin prevents over-absorption of UVR,
and prevents breakdown of folic acid.

 Much evidence shows that UVR levels
across the globe correlate strongly with
skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color is an example of geographical
influences on population variation in the
human genome.

 Cultural factors can also influence
genomic variation.
• For example, cow domestication has led to

the development of a mutation that allows us
to process milk.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

4

Innate Biological Variability

 Another example of this is when people
began farming yams in Africa.
• Required the clearing of forests  standing

pools of water  malaria-carrying mosquitoes

• This cultural practice of yam farming ended up
leading to the biological adaptation of
resistance to malaria.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological Variability

 Moken young children swim underwater to
retrieve seafood.

 They have thus developed twice the
underwater visual acuity as European
children.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Normal pupil

Moken pupil
under water

5

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Source: Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, CDC.

Obesity Trends* Among U.S. Adults
BRFSS, 1990, 2000, 2010

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

1990 2000

2010

No Data <10% 10%–14% 15%–19% 20%–24% 25%–29% ≥30%

(*BMI 30, or about 30 lbs. overweight for 5’4” person)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Some explanations include:
• Greater reliance on high-calorie foods (e.g.

fast foods, sodas)

• Larger portion sizes

• More sedentary lifestyle

• Suburban lifestyle—more driving, less
exercise

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

6

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Within the West, there is considerable
variation in obesity rates.

 France has one-fifth the obesity rate of the
United States.
• This despite French food being high in fat and

sugars

• French have higher blood cholesterol than
Americans but less heart disease.

• Why?
© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 French still eat significantly less calories a
day than Americans.
• This is due to the cultural environment that

affects portion sizes and attitudes toward food.

 People eat what’s given to them, portioned.

 Indeed, in comparison to portion sizes in the
France:
• U.S. yogurt containers are 80% larger.

• McDonald’s serves 70% more fries in the United
States per container.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

7

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Late 19th Century Today

5'8" (1.73 m)

5'5" (1.65 m)

5'10" (1.78 m)

6'1" (1.85 m)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

 Economic wealth of a country has close
ties with the height of its people.
• More wealth brings healthier diet (more

vitamins and nutrients), especially at ages
when growth spurts occur.

• Fluctuations of countries’ heights across time
have coincided with broad societal changes
that have an impact on diet.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

8

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Before electric lighting, people’s sleeping
cycle actually had two phases.
• First, people went to sleep for a few hours a

little after sunset.
» They woke up in the middle of the night, during

which they engaged in some leisurely activities.

• Then they slept for a few hours again until
around dawn

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

 Socioeconomic Status (SES).

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

9

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Psychosocial variables :
• Personality characteristics

» Hostility and pessimism

» Sense of hostility and pessimism leads to poorer
health

• Cognitive resources
» Poverty preoccupies people with having to make

difficult choices and trade-offs for survival.

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 One important variable is stress, which
affects health in two ways:
• Stress leads people to engage in unhealthy

habits.

• Stress weakens the immune system.

 Some environments can induce more
stress.
• E.g. New York City has been shown to make

people more stressed.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

10

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Low
SES
Low
SES

Low
Control

Low
Control

Poor HealthPoor Health

High
SES
High
SES

High
Control

High
Control

Good HealthGood Health

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 Ethnicity is also a factor implicated in the
link between SES and health

 In the United States, African Americans
and Hispanic Americans have been
studied extensively in terms of their health
outcomes compared to European
Americans.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

11

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 This unexpected pattern has been called
the epidemiological paradox.

 One explanation is that Hispanic
Americans engage in healthier behaviors
then European Americans.

» Drinking and smoking less

» More social support from large communities

» High level of positive affect

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Medicine varies greatly by culture
• Non-Western societies making use of

traditional medicine agreeing that diseases
are due to supernatural causes, such as
witches, demons, or ghosts.

• Modern Western medicine relies on the
scientific method, using controlled
experiments that are shared internationally,
and not considering supernatural causes to
be good explanations for illness.

12

Medicine and Culture

 Differences in Western medicine
• In France, the metaphor of the body is the “terrain,”

which emphasizes a sense of balance.
» French doctors prescribe more long rests and spa visits.

» Dirt and germs can strengthen one’s terrain; thus, there is
less emphasis on daily bathing.

• The U.S. metaphor of the body is a machine.
» American doctors are more likely to do surgery (to fix

malfunctioning parts).

» Germs are key threat to health; thus, doctors prescribe more
antibiotics than anywhere else.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

 Both geographical and cultural variables
have an impact on one’s biology (both
genotypic and phenotypic).

 Such impact can have profound
consequences, as in the cases of obesity
and mortality rates.

 Even the profession of medicine is not
immune to the effects of culture.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

**CULTPSY3_Chapter11_PDFHandout.pdf**

This file is too large to display. [View in new window](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/cultpsy3-chapter11-pdfhandout-pdf)

**CULTPSY3_Chapter12_PDFHandout.pdf**

This file is too large to display. [View in new window](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/cultpsy3-chapter12-pdfhandout-pdf)

**CULTPSY3_Chapter14_PPT.pdf**

This file is too large to display. [View in new window](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/cultpsy3-chapter14-ppt-pdf)

**## DiscussionBoard.docx**

**Discussion Board**

You will be required to participate in the eight discussion prompts posted on the Canvas Discussion Board throughout the course of the semester. These will relate to assigned course materials. Your responses should incorporate course content assigned during that week and should be approximately 250 words (total, for both prompts).

Please select and reply to two of the prompts below

1. “It is valid to suggest that some cultures are morally superior to others.” Do you agree or disagree with this statement? Explain your conclusion by basing it on evidence from one of the moral psychological models discussed in your textbook.

2. Create a diagram that shows how the different levels of Kohlberg’s model of moral reasoning, Shweder’s different codes of ethics, and the five different moral intuitions are related to each other.

3. An orthodox religious adherent is debating with a progressive religious adherent about abortion. They each provide a certain number of justifications for their perspectives. In the space below, for each religious adherent, graph out how many statements one would expect to correspond to each moral intuition based on the relationship between codes of ethics and moral intuitions.

4. In trying to summarize research on punishment and cooperation for your supervisor, you decide to draw a line graph that separately predicts cooperation within a culture based on a culture’s willingness to engage in (a) antisocial punishment and (b) altruistic punishment. Draw such a line graph.

5. You are surveying computer stores in individualistic and collectivistic cultures to determine what system they use to pay their sales employees. System 1 is to pay based on meritocracy. System 2 is to pay everyone the same amount of money each month. Draw a bar graph that portrays the proportion of individualistic companies and collectivistic companies that use each salary system.

**## CULTPSY3_Chapter13_PDFHandout.pdf**

1

Lecture PowerPoint
Slides

By
Benjamin Cheung

Cultural Psychology
Third Edition

Steven J. Heine

Chapter 13—Physical Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Discuss various biological variations across different cultural
populations

• Explain the process of culture-gene coevolution

• Provide examples of culture-gene coevolution

• Discuss various acquired physical variations across different
cultural populations

• Understand explanations that account for the physical variations
across different cultural populations

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

2

Chapter Objectives

 In this chapter, you will:

• Explain how cultures differ in sleep and perceptions of sleep

• Discuss how socioeconomic status predicts physical health

• Explain how ethnicity predicts physical health

• Explain the epidemiological paradox

• Discuss cultural variation in the metaphors used to conceptualize
medicine

• Discuss the distribution of laypersons’ and doctors' medical
attitudes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Overriding Theme
in This Chapter

 Despite the notion that physical health is a
biological issue, it is still strongly related to
many psychological variables.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Human Biological Variability

 Human biology varies across cultures, and
such variability has two different
explanations/mechanisms:
• Innate biological differences = result of

selection pressures

• Acquired biological differences = cultural
effects on one’s biology, independent of
genes

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

3

Innate Biological Variability

 Humans, like all organisms, evolve due to
selective pressures in their environments.

 Different environments have different
selection pressures, leading different
populations to evolve different traits.

 The most salient example of genetic
variability of humans across different
populations is skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color strongly correlates with
ultraviolet radiation (UVR) that reaches
different parts of the globe.
• Light skin allows sufficient UVR to synthesize

Vitamin D.

• Dark skin prevents over-absorption of UVR,
and prevents breakdown of folic acid.

 Much evidence shows that UVR levels
across the globe correlate strongly with
skin color.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

 Skin color is an example of geographical
influences on population variation in the
human genome.

 Cultural factors can also influence
genomic variation.
• For example, cow domestication has led to

the development of a mutation that allows us
to process milk.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

4

Innate Biological Variability

 Another example of this is when people
began farming yams in Africa.
• Required the clearing of forests  standing

pools of water  malaria-carrying mosquitoes

• This cultural practice of yam farming ended up
leading to the biological adaptation of
resistance to malaria.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Innate Biological Variability

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological Variability

 Moken young children swim underwater to
retrieve seafood.

 They have thus developed twice the
underwater visual acuity as European
children.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Normal pupil

Moken pupil
under water

5

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Source: Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, CDC.

Obesity Trends* Among U.S. Adults
BRFSS, 1990, 2000, 2010

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

1990 2000

2010

No Data <10% 10%–14% 15%–19% 20%–24% 25%–29% ≥30%

(*BMI 30, or about 30 lbs. overweight for 5’4” person)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Some explanations include:
• Greater reliance on high-calorie foods (e.g.

fast foods, sodas)

• Larger portion sizes

• More sedentary lifestyle

• Suburban lifestyle—more driving, less
exercise

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

6

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 Within the West, there is considerable
variation in obesity rates.

 France has one-fifth the obesity rate of the
United States.
• This despite French food being high in fat and

sugars

• French have higher blood cholesterol than
Americans but less heart disease.

• Why?
© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

 French still eat significantly less calories a
day than Americans.
• This is due to the cultural environment that

affects portion sizes and attitudes toward food.

 People eat what’s given to them, portioned.

 Indeed, in comparison to portion sizes in the
France:
• U.S. yogurt containers are 80% larger.

• McDonald’s serves 70% more fries in the United
States per container.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Obesity

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

7

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Late 19th Century Today

5'8" (1.73 m)

5'5" (1.65 m)

5'10" (1.78 m)

6'1" (1.85 m)

Acquired Biological
Variability—Height

 Economic wealth of a country has close
ties with the height of its people.
• More wealth brings healthier diet (more

vitamins and nutrients), especially at ages
when growth spurts occur.

• Fluctuations of countries’ heights across time
have coincided with broad societal changes
that have an impact on diet.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

8

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Before electric lighting, people’s sleeping
cycle actually had two phases.
• First, people went to sleep for a few hours a

little after sunset.
» They woke up in the middle of the night, during

which they engaged in some leisurely activities.

• Then they slept for a few hours again until
around dawn

Culture and Sleep

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

 Socioeconomic Status (SES).

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

9

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Psychosocial variables :
• Personality characteristics

» Hostility and pessimism

» Sense of hostility and pessimism leads to poorer
health

• Cognitive resources
» Poverty preoccupies people with having to make

difficult choices and trade-offs for survival.

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 One important variable is stress, which
affects health in two ways:
• Stress leads people to engage in unhealthy

habits.

• Stress weakens the immune system.

 Some environments can induce more
stress.
• E.g. New York City has been shown to make

people more stressed.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

10

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Low
SES
Low
SES

Low
Control

Low
Control

Poor HealthPoor Health

High
SES
High
SES

High
Control

High
Control

Good HealthGood Health

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Acquired Biological
Variability—Health

 Ethnicity is also a factor implicated in the
link between SES and health

 In the United States, African Americans
and Hispanic Americans have been
studied extensively in terms of their health
outcomes compared to European
Americans.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

11

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Culture and Health

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 This unexpected pattern has been called
the epidemiological paradox.

 One explanation is that Hispanic
Americans engage in healthier behaviors
then European Americans.

» Drinking and smoking less

» More social support from large communities

» High level of positive affect

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

 Medicine varies greatly by culture
• Non-Western societies making use of

traditional medicine agreeing that diseases
are due to supernatural causes, such as
witches, demons, or ghosts.

• Modern Western medicine relies on the
scientific method, using controlled
experiments that are shared internationally,
and not considering supernatural causes to
be good explanations for illness.

12

Medicine and Culture

 Differences in Western medicine
• In France, the metaphor of the body is the “terrain,”

which emphasizes a sense of balance.
» French doctors prescribe more long rests and spa visits.

» Dirt and germs can strengthen one’s terrain; thus, there is
less emphasis on daily bathing.

• The U.S. metaphor of the body is a machine.
» American doctors are more likely to do surgery (to fix

malfunctioning parts).

» Germs are key threat to health; thus, doctors prescribe more
antibiotics than anywhere else.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Medicine and Culture

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

 Both geographical and cultural variables
have an impact on one’s biology (both
genotypic and phenotypic).

 Such impact can have profound
consequences, as in the cases of obesity
and mortality rates.

 Even the profession of medicine is not
immune to the effects of culture.

© 2016 by W. W. Norton & Company

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