Center for Science, Athabasca University, 1 University Dr., T9S 3A3, Athabasca, AB, Canada.
Integr Psychol Behav Sci. 2023 Sep;57(3):913-936. doi: 10.1007/s12124-022-09689-1. Epub 2022 Apr 27.
Cultural traits are seldom atomic, are distributed over multiple social domains, and undergo differential selection. This makes it important to study the nature and evolution of these traits from a global viewpoint. This paper considers group level cultural traits-what sort of traits are there, how do they evolve, and what is the relationship between cultural traits and their representation in individual worldviews. While not providing a concise theory, important aspects of cultural traits are elaborated and directions of further research indicated. Group level traits arising from individual biological traits are distinguished from those that are intrinsic to a group. The latter are formative of individual worldviews and are emotionally salient for group members. Children are saturated with culture from birth, it provides the scaffolding for their developing worldviews. Affective links between cultural ideas, social behavior, and material elements of culture develop so that the affordances in perceived situations carry biases influencing behavior toward culturally acceptable responses. Intrinsic traits are not, however, acted on directly by group level selection; rather, this selection acts on the behavior of group members and only indirectly on intrinsic cultural ideas through social exchange processes between group members.
文化特征很少是单一的，它们分布在多个社会领域，并经历着不同的选择。这使得从全球视角研究这些特征的性质和演变变得尤为重要。本文从全球视角考虑群体层面的文化特征——有哪些特征，它们是如何演变的，以及文化特征与其在个体世界观中的表现之间的关系。本文虽然没有提供一个简洁的理论，但阐述了文化特征的重要方面，并指出了进一步研究的方向。从个体生物特征中产生的群体层面特征与那些内在的群体特征是不同的。后者是个体世界观形成的基础，对群体成员具有情感上的重要性。从出生起，儿童就被文化所包围，文化为他们正在发展的世界观提供了框架。文化观念、社会行为和文化物质元素之间的情感联系不断发展，以至于在感知到的情境中提供的机会带有偏见，影响着对文化上可接受反应的行为。然而，内在特征并不是直接受到群体层面选择的影响；相反，这种选择作用于群体成员的行为，并且只是通过群体成员之间的社会交换过程间接地影响内在的文化观念。
