Читать книгу Multicultural Psychology - Jennifer T. Pedrotti - Страница 65

Source: Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian (2014).

As we have noted thus far, there are many implications of interacting with people who come from different worldviews. It is often the case that differences in these views can be a source of tension between groups, and this may be particularly true for those who have not had exposure to many people who are different from themselves. When we are young, we interact most often within our family structure, and during our childhood, our parents’ views often become ours as well. We learn what is “normal,” and what is “right” at this time, and as our families are often our biggest influence at this time, we may subscribe to our family’s worldview simply because it is the only one we have ever heard. In many cases this may extend to friends’ and community ideas, if one’s community network is homogenous.

When individuals who have had this experience first encounter a view that is different from their own, they may experience a kind of cognitive dissonance, or a shaking of the foundation of their beliefs. This dissonance may be greater if they have a strong relationship with the person who has the different worldview. As individuals grow into adolescence, they begin to enter new spaces without their families (e.g., via friends, others’ houses, etc.). This also commonly occurs during the college years, as you may have already experienced, as it is sometimes the first true move away from family that an older adolescent experiences. In a positive outcome of this type of scenario, individuals learn that not everyone sees the world the same way, and they start to become aware that other worldviews may also be viable. In other cases, however, they might double down on their worldview and reject that another could be true. It is in this type of scenario that tensions may arise between people with different worldviews. Recall the previously discussed vignette involving Alex, the African American college student. If you recall, Alex had many behaviors that he engaged in based on his expectation that he might experience stereotyping and potential discrimination without them. Consider this response to Alex from one of his White classmates:

I don’t get why Alex thinks he has to do all of that stuff with professors. I never do any of those types of things (like going up and introducing myself), and I only go to office hours if I really need to—I just don’t have the time. Regardless, I’ve never had an experience where my professors think ill of me for doing that. I just let them find out what I’m like naturally instead of being so forced like Alex. They always learn my name pretty quickly, and I’ve never been mixed up with others in the class. Also, I know Alex worries sometimes that someone might think he doesn’t belong on campus if he’s somewhere by himself. I think that’s being way too paranoid. Just because that has happened to a couple people on the news doesn’t mean that it will happen to him. Besides, if someone called the police on me and said I didn’t belong somewhere, I wouldn’t sweat it. I would just explain that I did belong there. I never think about my race, and as a result I don’t get bothered about it very much. He should take a lesson from me.

—Connor, age 19

Think for a moment about the impact that these different worldviews might have on the friendship between Alex and Connor. What tensions could these different views lead to in their relationship? One thing that is important to consider here is the fact that many researchers say that most racial and ethnic minorities have a greater knowledge and understanding of worldviews within the dominant culture than the average White person has about racial and ethnic minority worldviews (LaFromboise, Coleman, & Gerton, 1983). One major reason for this difference is that nondominant groups have had less power in society and thus must have this knowledge in order to get by in a society that is largely supportive of endorsement of this worldview. Alex likely understands some of the arguments that Connor makes, and Alex may find some of Connor’s answers naïve due to Connor’s lack of experience with people of color. Connor holds the viewpoint that Alex is thinking about his race too much, and yet many in our country understand that for Black men in particular, being unaware that your race may impact your daily life may have dire consequences (Hadden, Tolliver, Snowden, & Brown-Manning, 2016; Patton & Snyder-Yuly, 2007).

It is possible that if the two remain friends, Connor might witness some of the experiences that Alex has that deal with racial discrimination in his life, and this may allow Connor to make room for the possibility that Alex’s worldview is linked to concrete experience and evidence in his life. Though this might first lead to cognitive dissonance in Connor, he may be able to start to open his worldview to include the idea that race may impact people on a daily basis. This type of ethnocultural empathy is often developed when we interact with individuals who are different from ourselves. For a current example, you might look up the story of John Lewis (a former Freedom Rider who is now a US senator) and Elwin Wilson (a former member of the Ku Klux Klan that confronted Lewis at a rally long ago). When Wilson actually spoke to Lewis, he had a different sense of him as a man, and Wilson changed his life because of this interaction.

One final note in this section: Ignoring the fact that worldviews of others can be different can lead to members of one group assuming that their ideals, beliefs, and characteristics might be viewed in the same way by another group. Researchers in the field of psychology often call the concept of this practice imposed ethics, which refers to putting one’s worldviews onto others as “right,” “normal,” or “healthy” (Berry, 1990; Leong, Leach, Marsella, & Pickren, 2012). This may be intensified by the fact brought up earlier that invalidating the worldviews of nondominant groups by dominant groups may also result in fewer friendships between these two groups, thus making groups more homogenous. Going back to our discussion of the differences between White settlers and American Indian and Indigenous populations in the Americas, the White settlers brought with them a host of customs and practices that were based on their own worldview and insisted that the native populations adhere to these. Any dissensions from this norm were seen as “savage” and “primitive,” among other descriptors. The nondominant group, in this case the native peoples, suffered greatly under these imposed ethics. It is a lesson that our country should not forget in thinking about how to integrate more worldviews into our current social milieu.