Discussion- Future Of Social Psychology

Discussion- Future Of Social Psychology
Discussion- Future Of Social Psychology
Permalink:
1. Discussion post – 2-3 paragraphs. Use attached articles.
After completing this module’s readings, where do you see the future of social psychology going? Do you think we are heading in a different direction?
How can we use the sociocultural perspective and social neuroscience to help improve our social well-being or social welfare?
2. Journal entry – at least 2-3 paragraphs. Use info from previous assignments from the last 10 weeks.
Initial Entry: Reflect on the readings and research in this course and consider the information and perspectives that are vital to your emerging professional interests and your view of the role of psychology in the world. In your post, respond to the following questions:
What do you feel are the most important pieces of information that you have learned?
How has learning about classic and contemporary social psychology issues and research informed your understanding of real-world issues and problems?
Can you find any trends in social psychological research that can be used to improve social welfare?
How well can social psychological research help effect social change?
What ethical issues should current and future researchers take into consideration as they design new studies in order to positively impact society?
Follow-Up Entry: In a new entry, synthesize what you have learned during this module’s blogging activities. Has your thinking changed from exchanging ideas with classmates and experiencing their viewpoints?
In recent years constitutive sociocultural perspectives have become increasingly visible and influential within psychology. Such per- spectives envision psychological processes, such as the mind and the self, as phenomena that are socioculturally constituted—that is, actually made up within, as opposed to merely facilitated by, culture and society. These constitutive approaches to psychology understand cognition, emotion, memory, identity, personality, and other psychological constructs as rela- tional entities that emerge out of interactions with others within a socio- cultural context. Moreover, the perspectives included under this rubric all have a cultural-historical aspect that moves consideration of the sociocul- tural beyond the immediate interpersonal and social situation.
Constitutive sociocultural approaches have been articulated over the past several decades by a diverse group of psychologists and social research- ers whose work has emphasized, in various ways, the inseparability of the psychological and sociocultural realms. These researchers include Urie Bronfenbrenner (1979), Jerome Bruner (1990), Roy D’Andrade (1990), Pierre Dasen (1977), Yrjö Engeström (1990), Jacqueline Goodnow (Good- now, Miller, and Kessel 1995), Patricia Greenfield (1984), Sara Harkness (Harkness and Super 1992), Edward Hutchins (1991), Vera John-Steiner (1985), Shinobu Kitayama (Markus and Kitayama 1991), Jean Lave (1988),
The Sociocultural Turn in Psychology
An Introduction and an Invitation
Suzanne R. Kirschner and Jack Martin
Kirschner_Intro.indd 1 2/25/10 9:42:23 AM
Co py ri gh t © 2 01 0. C ol um bi a Un iv er si ty P re ss . Al l ri gh ts r es er ve d. M ay n ot b e re pr od uc ed i n an y fo rm w it ho ut p er mi ss io n fr om t he p ub li sh er , ex ce
pt f ai r us es p er mi tt ed
un de r U. S. o r ap pl ic ab le c op yr ig ht l aw .
EBSCO Publishing : eBook Academic Collection (EBSCOhost) – printed on 11/12/2017 9:44 AM via SOUTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE UNIV AN: 547483 ; Martin, Jack, Kirschner, Suzanne R..; The Sociocultural Turn in Psychology : The Contextual Emergence of Mind and Self Account: shapiro
2———t h e s o c io c ul t ur a l t ur n i n p s y c hol o g y
Hazel Markus (Markus and Kitayama 1991), Carl Ratner (2002), Barbara Rogoff (2003), Geoffrey Saxe (1991), Sylvia Scribner (Scribner and Cole 1981), Robert Serpell (1976), Richard Shweder (1990), James Stigler (Sti- gler, Lee, and Stevenson 1990), Charles Super (1981), Michael Tomasello (1999), Jaan Valsiner (1998), Dan Wagner (1993), James Wertsch (1998), Sheldon White (Cahan and White 1992), and many others (including the contributors to this current volume). At this writing, several major psychol- ogy journals (including Mind, Culture, and Activity, Theory & Psychology, Culture & Psychology, Narrative Inquiry, and Subjectivity) regularly publish work in sociocultural psychology that adopts constitutive, strongly rela- tional perspectives. Moreover, many colleges and universities now offer courses in fields such as cultural psychology and narrative psychology; a growing number of graduate programs even afford students the opportu- nity to specialize in sociocultural theories and methods. Beyond psychol- ogy, these types of contemporary sociocultural approaches to psychological phenomena and issues are currently being applied widely in education, social work, psychotherapy, business, nursing, language instruction and learning, and many other areas (e.g., Hoshmand 2006; John-Steiner, Pan- ofsky, and Smith 1994; Kozulin 1998).