States of mind : American and post-Soviet perspectives on contemporary issues in psychology PDF
Preview States of mind : American and post-Soviet perspectives on contemporary issues in psychology
States of Mind: American and Post-Soviet Perspectives on Contemporary Issues in Psychology Diane F. Halpern Alexander E. Voiskounsky, Editors Oxford University Press STATES of MIND This page intentionally left blank STATES of MIND American and Post-Soviet Perspectives on Contemporary Issues in Psychology Edited by Diane F. Halpern & Alexander E. Voiskounsky New York Oxford Oxford University Press 1997 Oxford University Press Oxford New York Athens Auckland Bangkok Bogota Bombay Buenos Aires Calcutta Cape Town Dar es Salaam Delhi Florence Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madras Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi Paris Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto and associated companies in Berlin Ibadan Copyright © 1997 by Oxford University Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data States of mind : American and post-Soviet perspectives on contemporary issues in psychology / edited by Diane F. Halpern and Alexander E. Voiskounsky. p, cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-19-510350-5 (cloth) ISBN 0-19-510351-3 (paper) 1. Psychology—United States. 2. Psychology—Former Soviet republics. I. Halpern, Diane F. II. Voiskounsky, Alexander E. BF121.S826 1997 150.947—dc2o 96-28089 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 42 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Preface he idea for this book grew from several months of discussions between the editors when Halpern, the American editor, was teaching psychology classes at Moscow State University where Voiskounsky, the Russian editor, had worked as a student and then as a professor for most of his adult life. It seemed obvious to us that we could learn a great deal about psychology if we could trade places and view contemporary issues with each other's eyes and against a back- drop of political thought that was diametrically opposed to the one we had each known. We were immediately struck by the differences in how we thought about contemporary issues in psychology and the way we made sense of thoughts, ac- tions, and feelings. Unwittingly, we became participants in the process we wanted to observe. Even as we planned this book, the differences in how we thought about top- ics in psychology and in the world came into focus. These differences became apparent as we selected topics that we believed to be important at the present time and into the future and the way we decided to organize the topics. For example, it was obvious to Halpern, the American, that politics, persuasion, and lying belonged together as a conceptual unit. For Voiskounsky, the Russian, it was equally obvious that politics, prejudice, and ethnic psychology were the most logically connected topics. As we discussed the differences in our thinking, we became aware of the way sociopolitical experiences had differentially shaped the organization and boundaries of these concepts for each of us. In the Soviet Union, the major political issues were the repeated attempts of ethnically dis- vi PREFACE tinct republics (e.g., Armenia, Lithuania, Estonia, Azerbijan, and others) to become independent. Thus, in the Russian mind, the primary concerns of poli- tics were prejudice and ethnicity. In the United States, politics is often an exercise in persuasion because of the choices that need to be made by ordinary citizens in a multiparty political system. But it was only after extended discussion of these deep-rooted differ- ences in how we think about politics that we could understand why the other editor had such "strange" thoughts. Given that this is the English-language ver- sion of this book, we decided to use an organization of topics that is more mean- ingful to Western readers. We plan to reorganize topics for the Russian-language version so that it will be more compatible with the way former Soviets, other former communists, and current communists think about these concepts. We offer this explanation to readers who may be wondering how we negotiated the countless issues that arose from this international enterprise. We hope that this background information will provide readers with some insight into our own states of mind as we planned and wrote this book. In many instances, we had to depart from standard practices in editing an academic book so that readers would understand and appreciate the important differences and similarities in American and post-Soviet psychologies. This is why we cannot honestly call this an edited book, but neither of us has an ap- propriate word in our native language for what it is. The plan was to get out- standing psychologists from the countries that once constituted the Soviet Union and from the United States to write companion chapters on particular topics. This way, we would have an excellent summary of selected fields in psychology from each tradition, with the rare chance to compare them and to speculate about future directions. As we conferred on this book, we found that we had to modify our original plan. Perhaps we need a new word to describe the role of the editors in producing this book. The term "assisted authors" comes to mind, but it reminds the Ameri- can editor of "assisted suicide," not exactly the connotation she wants to give to this collective effort. For various reasons, we have assumed a much more intrusive role in the production of many of the chapters than is normally as- sumed by editors. We sincerely thank all of the authors for their cooperation and understanding. First, there was the problem of translations. Any translation needs to go be- yond a simple correspondence of words to capture the meaning and flavor of a piece. Often, there is a choice of several words that might fit a translation, and each offers a different connotative meaning. In other instances, there seemed to be no good way to translate a word or phrase, and a short description had to be substituted. But we even went beyond that. There are major style differences between former Soviets and native English writers. In order to keep the style consistent throughout the book, we had to adopt a single style and then edit all of the chapters to keep them stylistically harmonious. Most important, some of the information that was presented in the original Russian, and even some that was written in English, would not have been under- PREFACE vii standable to a majority of English-language readers. Background information often had to be provided. For example, there is a reference to the administra- tive status of cities in the chapter on environmental/ecological psychology, con- tributed by two respected Latvian psychologists. This passage could not be understood without an explanation of how cities in the Soviet Union were as- signed an administrative status and how consumer goods were distributed ac- cording to the status of a city. In instances like this one, we took the liberty of explaining what would be needed to make the chapter understandable to read- ers who did not grow up in the Soviet Union. Another example is a reference to the Old Testament as a basis for creating an ethic of honesty and truth in the Russian chapter on the psychology of truth and lies. To English-speaking readers, the reference would be to the Judeo- Christian ethic, but to Russians the term "Judeo" would not be included in the label for this reference. This created the problem of referring to the Ten Com- mandments as though they were not part of Judaism (a strange thought to Westerners) or of changing the way the terms are used in Russian. In this ex- ample, we included the term "Judeo" in parentheses so that Western readers would understand the reference but so that it would also stand apart from the way former Soviets would refer to it. There is no definitive way of knowing if the omission of the word "Judeo" from this ethic reflects random processes in the way terms evolve or if the omission is a deliberate reflection of anti-Semitism. We also tried to add a genuine feel for the lives of the people whom the au- thors wrote about. Communal living spaces in the former Soviet Union, for example, had many features in addition to crowded kitchens and long lines to use the bathroom. These arrangements also meant a loss of privacy and easy access to information about anyone's activities. It made spying easy during the Stalin years and created the need to dissemble even among those with whom people shared living space. The secondary problems created by shared living spaces need not be explained for those who lived in these housing arrangements, but an explanation was needed for most English-language readers. In all cases, drafts of the chapters were shown to the authors to ascertain that we did not alter the essential meaning they wished to convey, even if we altered almost everything else. We are very lucky to have had such a fine group of under- standing authors who allowed us this freedom. Finally, the reader will see that some of the citations to foreign language publications are not in the standard format of the American Psychological As- sociation. In addition, some names maybe spelled inconsistently because of the difficulties of translating various alphabet systems into English. Problems such as these are inherent in international projects that involve numerous languages and widely different conventions for scholarly work. We have many people to thank for their assistance with this book. First, we thank Natella Voiskounsky for her patient translations, editing skill, and good nature. We can't image how we could have completed this project without her. We also thank the Rockefeller Foundation for providing us with a month in which to work together in beautiful Bellagio, Italy. This allowed us the oppor- viii PREFACE tunny to work together closely in a continuous interchange of ideas and expla- nations. We thank the Fulbright Foundation for awarding the American editor (Halpern) a fellowship so that she could teach at Moscow State University in Russia and work with the Russian editor (Voiskounsky). We also thank Kevin Kopelson, at the University of Iowa, for his suggestions for the title. Finally, we thank the authors who so graciously shared their expertise with us. We hope that you, the reader, will come away with a better idea of psychology and the way people are understood in these opposite sides of the world. San Bernardino, California D. F. H. Moscow, Russia A. E. V. December 1996 Contents Contributors xiii Introduction: Psychology in a Sociopolitical Context Diane F. Halpern & Alexander E. Voiskounsky 3 Part One POLITICS AND PERSUASION 13 Political Psychology 1 The Psychosemantic Approach to Political Psychology: Mapping Russian Political Thought Victor F. Petrenko & Olga V. Mitina 19 2 Psychological Perspectives on International Conflict and Cooperation Philip E. Tetlock 49 The Psychology of Truth and Lies 3 Comprehension of Lies: A Russian View Victor Znakov 79 4 Deception, Lying, and Demeanor Paul Ekman 93
The list of books you might like
