Worldviews

Books

Cushner, K., & Brislin, R. W. (1996). Intercultural interactions: A practical guide (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

A resource that presents students with a number of intercultural scenarios to help them understand worldview differences. These scenarios are called well-meaning clashes, indicating that quite often different worldviews are benign misunderstandings.

Gilligan, C. (1982). In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

A classic book that challenged Lawrence Kohlberg’s theory of moral development. Gilligan discussed how the socialization of girls leads them to have very different worldviews with respect to moral development from their male counterparts.

Helms, J. E., & Cook, D. A. (1999). Using race and culture in counseling and psychotherapy: Theory and process. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

An undergraduate or graduate textbook on multicultural psychology that presents the notion of ALANA, that stands for African Americans, Latinas/Latinos, Asian Americans, and Native Americans. They discuss how ALANAs have different worldviews from the White majority population.

Ho, M. K. (1987). Family therapy with ethnic minorities. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

This resource presents how different ethnic minority groups respond to the Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck model of worldview.

Hofstede, G. (1980). Culture’s consequences. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

A seminal book examining individualism and collectivism. Hofstede also categorized cultures into masculine and feminine cultures—terms that Harry Triandis later labeled as vertical and horizontal dimensions.

Kluckhohn F. R., & Strodtbeck, F. L. (1961). Variations in value orientations. Evanston, IL: Row, Peterson.

A classic study that identified four dimensions and three possible value orientations related to worldview. The dimensions were time focus, human activity, social relations, and people–nature relationship. An example of value orientations is past, present, and future for time orientation.

Koss, M. P., Goodman, L. A., Browne, A., Fitzgerald, L. F., Keita, G. P., & Russo, N. F. (1994). No safe haven: Male violence against women at home, at work, and in the community. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

A book that discusses the worldview of women with respect to violence in society.

Richards, P. S., & Bergin, A. E. (2000). Handbook of psychotherapy and religious diversity. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

This book discusses denomination-specific information that can be useful for therapists in working with clients who use their religions as the bases for their worldviews. The religions discussed are seven Christian traditions, and chapters on Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism.

Wong, P. T. P., & Wong, L. C. J. (Eds.). (2006). Handbook of multicultural perspectives on stress and coping. New York: Springer.

This edited volume shows how diverse world views shape the stress and coping process. It also addresses various practical issues ranging from family problems to acculturation from different cultural perspectives.

Chapters and Articles

Berry, J. W. (1969). On cross-cultural comparability. International Journal of Psychology, 4, 119–128.

This article discusses emic–etic differences and suggests that quite often the dominant group in a society imposes its worldviews onto less dominant groups. This is called imposed etics.

Dudley-Grant, G. R. (2003). Perspectives on spirituality and psychology in ethnic populations. In J. S. Mio & G. Y. Iwamasa (Eds.), Culturally diverse mental health: The challenges of research and resistance (pp. 341–359). New York: Brunner-Mazel.

A chapter that discusses spirituality as a filter through which different groups see the world.

Herek, G. (2000). The psychology of sexual prejudice. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 9, 19–22.

This article discusses the different worldviews of lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals in a heterosexist society.

Herek, G. (1995). Psychological heterosexism in the United States. In A. D’Augelli & C. Patterson (Eds.), Lesbian, gay, and bisexual identities over the lifespan: Psychological perspectives (pp. 321–346). New York: Oxford University Press.

A chapter that discusses different worldviews of lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals in a heterosexist society.

Leong, F. T. L., & Wong, P. T. P. (2003). Optimal functioning from cross-cultural perspectives. In W. B. Walsh (Ed.), Counseling psychology and optimal human functioning (pp. 123–150). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

This chapter shows that the conception and the practice of optimal functioning are shaped by diverse world views and value systems in different cultures.

Mio, J. S., Barker-Hackett, L., & Tumambing, J. (2006). Differences in worldviews. In J. S. Mio, L. Barker-Hackett, & J. Tumambing (Eds.), Multicultural psychology: Understanding our diverse communities (pp. 57–83). Boston: McGraw-Hill.

An undergraduate textbook on multicultural psychology that devotes an entire chapter on different kinds of worldviews.

Sue, D. W. (1978). Eliminating cultural oppression in counseling: Toward a general theory. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 25, 419–428.

This article presented a form of worldview that crossed internal–external locus of control with internal–external locus of responsibility, yielding four kinds of worldview.