284 Emotion, Affect, and Mood in Social Judgments
kindness and tolerance are expected of all adults and are even
considered to define what it means to be a mature functioning
human (Kaplunas—White people—are suspected of being
descended from dogs and to have the minds of children).
Our second case comes from the Ilongot, a group indige-
nous to the Philippines and studied by Michelle Rosaldo
(1980). Their word commonly translated as anger isliget.A
young man is restless, frustrated, mulling over past insults.
He is envious of the privileges of his elders and the successes
of his peers. His liget mounts and weighs down on him.
There will likely be other such young men, competing, envi-
ous of one another, and heavy with frustration and boredom.
Led by an elder man, a small group of such youths conducts
a raiding party, sometimes against a known enemy, but more
often against a random victim (man, woman, or child). Dur-
ing the raid, the young men beat their heads to increase their
liget. Theligetmounts and weighs on them. It is felt as
heavy and oppressive, an unrelieved yearning. Finally, the
victim is selected and killed (it does not particularly matter
by whom). The young men rush at the victim, slashing and
mutilating. The victim’s head is severed, and one youth
throws the head in the air. Now theligetis felt as “burning
joy.” The young men feel lightened, freed from the heavy
burden. Filled withliget,the party is intent on mutilation.
They slash, mutilate, and toss heads. They then raid the
home of the victim, destroying property. As they return to
their homes, to keep theirligethot, they drink hot drinks.
They return in triumph as men.
QUESTIONS ARISE FROM
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES
Whatever the validity of these specific observations, these
and many more like them have been important in the psychol-
ogy of emotion. For one, reactions to such observations reveal
diverse assumptions. One reaction to claims of this sort has
been to conclude that emotions among Spaniards, Tahitians,
Ilongot, and Utku are different from emotions in English-
speaking societies. Another reaction has been to conclude that
perhaps each language has a different way of describing emo-
tions (but that does not mean that the emotions themselves are
different). Another reaction has been to conclude that emo-
tional experience is culture-specific but that emotions are not.
Yet another reaction is to dismiss much of the ethnographic
and historical evidence as concerning mere talk—nothing
important for those who would study emotion.
When confronted with claims of cultural and historical
differences in the concept of sadness or with anecdotes of
cultural variability of anger, psychologists must face difficult
questions: Is anger of the Utku the same emotion as anger in
the Ilongot? How could that sameness be empirically tested?
What, if anything, is the anger behind the manifest differences?
Is anger universal? Or could it be a cultural artifact? Answers
to such questions follow predictable theoretical positions on
fundamental issues such as what is real and what is not, what
are legitimate topics in science, and what is the relationship
between mind and body and between language and reality.
The issues raised by reports of cultural differences have
not been settled by available evidence. There is no consensus
on such matters. Or even on how they could be settled. In-
stead, different researchers assume different positions, based
on deeply held philosophical assumptions. These often-
unvoiced assumptions then guide scientific theorizing, divid-
ing the field into camps that each pursue different goals with
different methods. For example, an approach to emotions as
universal natural entities independent of language and culture
stems from (or resonates with) a basic philosophical position
that could be labeled as ontological realism. In contrast, an
approach to emotions as cultural products created through
language stems from (or resonates with) a philosophical po-
sition that could be labeled as nominalism. Psychological the-
orists may not endorse all the traditional consequences of
their philosophical assumptions, and most theorists introduce
ways to accommodate data grounded on other assumptions.
Nevertheless, exposure of these philosophical assumptions
can help us understand some of the sources of strength and
weakness in current research on emotion.
In this chapter, we first outline four philosophical posi-
tions (in necessarily overly simplified and stark terms) that
seem to underlie different research programs on emotion and
that center on the issue of the relation between language and
reality. (Does language accurately describe reality? Influence
reality? Constitute reality? Or does everyday language con-
ceal and obscure reality?) We then explore one way that these
research programs might be integrated.Ontological RealismThe ontological realist assumes that words such asangerand
sadnessare simply labels for preexisting entities. Emotions
are like rivers or lakes or other things in the natural world.
They are self-contained and distinct from any other thing.
They have a concrete localization inside human beings and
other animals (“inside” nowadays often means “in the brain”).
With scientific effort, emotions will be isolated, localized,
measured, and manipulated. From this point of view, it would
not be surprising if each specific emotion were discovered to
correspond to a single neural center, neural circuit, peptide, or
some other specific physical entity.