100% satisfaction guarantee Immediately available after payment Both online and in PDF No strings attached
logo-home
Previously searched by you
Previously searched by you
logo
Minor Cross-cultural psychology: Summary Theme 3: Normality and abnormality $3.90
Add to cart
Quickly navigate to
Preview
  2.  
  3. Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam (EUR)
  4.  
  5. Cross Cultural Psychology (ESSBP1110)

Summary

Minor Cross-cultural psychology: Summary Theme 3: Normality and abnormality

10 reviews
 7 purchases
  • Course
  • Cross Cultural Psychology (ESSBP1110)
  • Institution
  • Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam (EUR)
  • Book
  • Cultural Psychology

A complete summary of Theme 3 of the minor cross-cultural psychology. It is written in English, because the exam will also be in English. It has all the articles from the Theme summarized.

Preview 2 out of 37  pages

Document information

  • No
  • H14
  • September 26, 2017
  • 37
  • 2017/2018
  • Summary

Subjects

  • normality
  • abnormality
  • culture
  • disorder
  • psychological
  • depression
  • social anxiety
  • suicide
  • attachment
  • parental
  • styles

Connected book

book image

Book Title:

Author(s):

  • Edition:
  • ISBN:
  • Edition:

Written for

  • Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam (EUR)
  • Psychologie
  • Cross Cultural Psychology (ESSBP1110)
All documents for this subject (28)

10  reviews

review-writer-avatar

By: kajalanejakumar • 2 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: stevenhillen • 4 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: jelledevries2 • 5 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: divanieboldewijn • 5 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: cquaynor • 5 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: isabel581 • 6 year ago

review-writer-avatar

By: tenishadn • 6 year ago

Show more reviews  

Seller

avatar-seller
karoliengarritsen

Reviews received

Content preview

Theme 3
Normality and Abnormality

Learning goals:
Vignette 1
▪ What is the difference between normal and abnormal?
▪ Are the concepts stable over time?
▪ What is the model about?
▪ What is the best way to categorize psychopathology?


Helman (2010). Culture Health and Illness.
Cross-cultural psychiatry is the study and comparison of mental illness, and its treatment, in
different cultures and social groups. Research into the subject has been carries out by two different
types of investigator:
1. Western-trained psychiatrists who have encountered unfamiliar, and what seemed to them
bizarre, syndromes of psychological disturbance in parts of the non-Western world, and who
have tried to understand these syndromes in terms of their own Western categories of mental
illness, such as ‘schizophrenia’ or ‘manic depressive psychosis’.
2. Social and cultural anthropologists, whose main interest have been the definitions of
normality and abnormality in different cultures, the role of culture in shaping personality
structure, and cultural influences on the cause, presentation and treatment of mental illness.
These two approaches share a concern with two types of clinical problem:
1. The diagnosis and treatment of mental illness where health professional and patient come from
different cultural backgrounds.
2. The effect on mental health of migration, urbanization and other forms of social change, as well
as of poverty and deprivation.
The focus of cross-cultural psychiatry is mainly on mental illness rather than on mental disease. It is
less concerned with the organic aspects of psychological disorders than with the psychological,
behavioural and socio-cultural dimensions associated with them. Anthropologist are more interested
in how cultural factors affect the patient’s perceptions and behaviour, the content of their
hallucinations or delusions, and the attitudes of other toward them. In general, relationship to
culture to mental illness can be summarized as:
- It defines ‘normality’ and ‘abnormality’ in a particular society.
- It defines the differences between ‘abnormality’ and ‘mental illness’.
- It may be part of the aetiology or cause of certain illnesses.
- It influences the clinical presentation and distribution of mental illness.
- It determines the ways that mental illness is recognized, labelled, explained and treated by other
member of that society – including by health professionals.
Normality versus Abnormality
Dimensions of Social Behaviour
The illustration below represents the range of possible perceptions – by members of a particular
society or culture – of a particular form of social behaviour: whether they see it as ‘normal’ or


1

, abnormal for their society, and whether it is controlled, or not, by the norms or rules of that society.
It also reflect the fact that all human groups recognize that there are certain times and places when
people can be allowed to behave in an ‘abnormal’ way, provided that they are seen to conform to the
strict guidelines laid down by the culture for this type of situation.
Most cultures disapprove of form of public behaviour that are obviously not being controlled by the
rules of their society. The four zones, and the definitions of behaviour they encompass, are not static.
Rather, they are a series of fluid categories that are likely to change with time and circumstance and
the particular perspective of the onlooker.
Furthermore, these broad social
categories do not necessarily take into
account individual factors such as
personality. Their focus is on the
perspective of the society as a whole or a
section. In the case of A, D and B it is
assumed that the individual is at least
aware (consciously or not) of what the
social norms are, whether they conform
to them or not.
A. Normality
Normality is usually a multidimensional concept. There are two views: healthy, as in a medical
definitions, and social, which are based on shared beliefs within a group of people was what
constitutes the ideal way. Not only the individuals behaviour is important, but also their dress,
hairstyle, posture, facial expression etc, as well as their appropriateness to certain contexts and social
relationships. ‘Normality’ is a series of clusters of attributes, with each cluster being appropriate for a
particular type of context. The definition is never uniform within a population. Most cultures have a
wide range of social norms that are considered appropriate for different age groups, genders,
occupations, social ranks and cultural minorities within the society.
B. Controlled abnormality
Most societies often make provision for certain specified occasions where these codes are
deliberately flouted or inverted, and ‘abnormal’ behaviour, whether of the individual, or of the group,
becomes the temporary norm. One example of controlled abnormal behaviour is ‘rites of reversal’
or ‘symbolic inversions’, which is defined as ‘any acts of expressive behaviour that inverts,
contradicts, abrogated or in some fashion represents an alternative to commonly held cultural codes,
values and norms be they linguistic, literary or artistic, religious, or social and political.
Group behaviour
These special occasions, such as carnival, sometimes involve a collective inversion of normal
behaviour and roles, for example on Halloween. Similar alterations or inversions of normal role
behaviour are found in some of the spirit possession cults of African women, where women who seek
power and aspire to roles otherwise monopolized by men ‘act out thrusting male part with impunity
and with the full approval of the audience’. All these forms are controlled since their timing and
location are clearly defined and structured in advance.
Individual behaviour
In many cultures, especially in the non-industrialized world, individuals involved in interpersonal
conflicts, or who are experiencing feelings of unhappiness, guild, anger of helplessness, are able to
express these feeling in a standardized language of distress. To the Western-trained observer, this
may closely resemble the diagnostic entities of the Western psychiatric model (e.g., being possessed

2

The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:

Guaranteed quality through customer reviews

Guaranteed quality through customer reviews

Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.

Quick and easy check-out

Quick and easy check-out

You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.

Focus on what matters

Focus on what matters

Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!

Frequently asked questions

What do I get when I buy this document?

You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.

Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?

Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.

Who am I buying these notes from?

Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller karoliengarritsen. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.

Will I be stuck with a subscription?

No, you only buy these notes for $3.90. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.

Can Stuvia be trusted?

4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)

64257 documents were sold in the last 30 days

Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy study notes for 15 years now

Start selling

Recently viewed by you

Exam (elaborations) ·

(0)

NEW HAMPSHIRE DRIVER'S EXAM FULL WITH COMPLETE SOLUTIONS 100%

Exam (elaborations) ·

(0)

Actual word of knowledge asvab test|2023 LATEST UPDATE|GUARANTEED SUCCESS

Summary ·

(0)

Migratie en de multiculturele samenleving

Package deal ·

(0)

ATI RN PHARMACOLOGY PROCTORED COMBINED

Exam (elaborations) ·

(0)

Complete Test Bank Critical Care Nursing A Holistic Approach 10th Edition Morton Questions & Answers with rationales (Chapter 1-56)

Summary ·

(0)

Paradoxen Strategie/ Paradoxes Strategy

$3.90  7x  sold
  • (10)
Add to cart
Added