Insights and Challenges of Cultural Psychology 47helping. These kinds of results challenge prevailing models
of communal relationships, which assume that a concern with
obligation detracts from a concern with being responsive to
the others’ needs (Mills & Clark, 1982). They also challenge
models of self-determination, which assume that internaliza-
tion involves a greater sense of perceived autonomy (Deci &
Ryan, 1985). Rather, it appears that in certain collectivist cul-
tures individuals may experience their behavior as demanded
by role requirements, while also experiencing themselves
as strongly endorsing, choosing to engage in, and deriving
satisfaction from the behavior.
In turn, work in the area of morality, relationships, and at-
tachment highlights the need to expand current conceptual-
izations of motivation. For example, research in the domain
of morality with both Hindu Indian populations (Shweder,
Mahapatra, & Miller, 1990) as well as with orthodox reli-
gious communities within the United States (Jensen, 1997)
has documented forms of morality based on concerns with
divinity that are not encompassed in existing psychological
theories of morality, with their exclusive stress on issues of
justice, individual rights, and community (e.g., Kohlberg,
1971; Turiel, 1983). Furthermore, work on moralities of com-
munity have documented the highly individualistic cultural
assumptions that inform Gilligan’s morality of caring frame-
work (Gilligan, 1982), with its emphasis on the voluntaristic
nature of interpersonal commitments. Cross-cultural work
conducted on the morality of caring among Hindu Indian
populations and cross-cultural work conducted utilizing
Kohlbergian methodology have uncovered the existence of
forms of duty-based moralities of caring that although fully
moral in character, differ qualitatively in key respects from
those explained within Gilligan’s framework (J. G. Miller,
1994, 2001b; Snarey & Keljo, 1991).
In terms of relationship research, a growing cross-cultural
literature on attachment is suggesting that some of the ob-
served variation in distribution of secure versus nonsecure
forms of attachment arises at least in part from contrasting
cultural values related to attachment, rather than from certain
cultural subgroups’ having less adaptive styles of attachment
than others. For example, research conducted among Puerto
Rican families suggests that some of the greater tendency of
children to show highly dependent forms of attachment re-
flects the contrasting meanings that they place on interdepen-
dent behavior (Harwood, Miller, & Irizarry, 1995). Thus, an
analysis of open-ended responses of mothers revealed that
compared with European-American mothers, Puerto Rican
mothers viewed dependent behavior relatively positively as
evidence of the child’s relatedness to the mother. Suggesting
that present dimensions of attachment may not be fully
capturing salient concerns for Puerto Rican mothers, this
work further demonstrated that Puerto Rican mothers spon-
taneously emphasized other concerns—such as display of
respect and of tranquility—that are not tapped by present at-
tachment formulations.
In other research, recent work on attachment among
Japanese populations highlights the greater emphasis on
indulgence of the infant’s dependency and on affectively
based rather than informationally oriented communication in
Japanese versus American families (Rothbaum, Weisz, Pott,
Miyake, & Morelli, 2000). In contrast to the predictions of at-
tachment theory, however, such forms of parenting are not
linked with maladaptive outcomes; rather, these parenting
styles have positive adaptive implications, in fitting in with
the cultural value placed on amae,an orientation that in-
volves presuming upon another’s dependency and plays an
important role in close relationships throughout the life cycle.
Such research has pointed out that the common finding that
Japanese attachment more frequently takes what are consid-
ered as insecure or overly dependent forms reflects biases in
present conceptions of attachment, which fail to take into
account the concerns with interdependence in the Japanese
context. Furthermore, it is noted that methodologically, the at-
tachment research paradigm presents a separation context that
is much rarer and thus much more stressful for Japanese than
for American infants. Equally, it is suggested that (rather than
treat the individual as the unit of attachment) to fully capture
Japanese attachment-related concerns would require treat-
ing the individual-caregiver unit rather than the indi-
vidual alone as the object of attachment assessment, with a
focus on how well individuals can anticipate each other’s
responses.SummaryWork in cultural psychology is not only documenting cultural
variability in psychological outcomes, but is also focused on
uncovering respects in which this variation has theoretical
implications in pointing to the implicit cultural underpinnings
of existing psychological effects, as well as respects in which
psychological theory needs to be conceptually expanded to
account for culturally diverse modes of psychological func-
tioning. We have seen specifically that cultural work is high-
lighting the culturally mediated nature of cognition through
individuals’ participation in everyday cultural practices and
use of culturally specific tools; such work has also uncovered
the existence of contrasting culturally based cognitive styles,
as well as extensive cultural variation in basic psychological
processes involving the self, emotions, and motivation.