Cultural-Existential PsychologyCultural psychology and experimental existential psychology are two of the fastest-growing movements in social psychology. In this book, Daniel Sullivan combines both perspectives to present a groundbreaking analysis of culture's role in shaping the psychology of threat experience. The first part of the book presents a new theoretical framework guided by three central principles: that humans are in a unique existential situation because we possess symbolic consciousness and culture; that culture provides psychological protection against threatening experiences, but also helps to create them; and that interdisciplinary methods are vital to understanding the link between culture and threat. In the second part of the book, Sullivan presents a novel program of research guided by these principles. Focusing on a case study of a traditionalist group of Mennonites in the midwestern United States, Sullivan examines the relationship between religion, community, guilt, anxiety, and the experience of natural disaster. |
Contents
Fundamental principles of culturalexistential | 26 |
A model of existential threat | 44 |
Cultural variation as patterns of social orientation | 78 |
disorientation avoidance | 108 |
Modernization and changes in attitudes toward suffering | 133 |
Cultural threat orientations among traditionalist | 155 |
Other editions - View all
Cultural-Existential Psychology: The Role of Culture in Suffering and Threat Daniel Sullivan No preview available - 2018 |
Common terms and phrases
Alexanderwohl Mennonites Anabaptist analysis anthropology anxiety behavior beliefs Bethel survivors Chapter Church cognitive collectivism collectivist compared condemnation angst congregation consciousness context contrast cultural psychology cultural-existential psychology CV culture death angst defense DESA culture DESA orientation deviant dialectical DISA and DESA Eigenwelt emotions existential psychology existential threat feel first-level goals God’s Greensburg Greensburg tornado groups guilt Holdeman Mennonites human identity II culture important individual individual’s invisibly controlled cultures Kansas meaning meaninglessness angst mediated Mitwelt modern motivation negative nihilism nihilistic disorientation norms one’s participants patterns perspective phenomenological potential present processes qualitative qualitative research redemptive narrative redemptive suffering reflexivity religiosity religious secular self-esteem self’s sense social control social orientation social psychology society storm structure suffering interpretations symbolic terror management theory theodicy theory threat experiences threat orientation tion tornado transcendence typically ultimate Umwelt undergraduates unique Unitarian Universalism Unitarian Universalists variables worldview