Socio-Economic Environment and Human Psychology

Edited by Ay,se K. ?sk?l and Shigehiro Oishi, Socio-Economic Environment and Human Psychology focuses on the social and economic conditions that impact on every aspect of an individual's life cycle. This edited collection showcases a variety of approaches to the study of the role of the social and economic environment in human psychological processes, such as: judgment and decision-making, trust, the self, and happiness. Further, it brings together state-of-the-art research from the fields of psychology, anthropology, economics, epidemiology, and evolutionary science.

Illuminating how individuals think, feel, and behave in response to the social and economic conditions and settings that shape our daily lives, contributors to this volume explore the role played by economic conditions (wealth, scarcity, disasters); economic change (urbanization, socio-economic mobility); and the type of economic activity or structure (farming, herding, market economy) in the shaping of different psychological processes. As a result, the findings presented in this volume provide readers with important policy implications that have the potential to help to improve the psychological health of citizens at large.

Ay,se K. ?sk?l is Professor of Social Psychology at the School of Psychology, University of Kent, UK. Her current research is organized around two major themes: socio-economic basis of interdependence and cultural conceptions of honour.

Shigehiro Oishi is Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia. His research centers on culture, social ecology, and happiness.

Introduction
Ay,se K. ?sk?l and Shigehori Oishi

Section 1: Ecology and Economic Activity
1. Ecocultural Perspective on Human Behavior
John W. Berry

2. The Role of Economic Culture in Social Interdependence: Consequences for Cognitive Style and Social Exclusion Experiences
Ay,se K. ?sk?l and Harriet Over

3. How Rice Farming Shaped Culture in Southern China
Thomas Talhelm and Shigehiro Oishi

4. Rationally Irrational?: The Ecologies and Economics of Honor
Dov Cohen, Ivan Hernandez, Karl Gruschow, Andrzej Nowak, Michele J. Gelfand, and Wojciech Borkowski

Section 2: Socioeconomic Status and Inequality
5. Decision-Making Up Against the Wall: A Framework for Understanding the Behavioral Dimension of Low Socioeconomic Status
Jennifer Sheehy-Skeffington

6. Socioeconomic Inequality in Health: Individual- and Area-Level Measures of Socioeconomic Position
Nicos Middleton, Panayiota Ellina, George Zannoupas, Demetris Lamnisos, and Christiana Kouta

7. Socioeconomic Cultures: How Education Shapes the Self
Rebecca Carey and Lucy Zhang Bencharit

8. Context Shapes Human Development: Studies from Turkey
?i?dem Ka?it?iba,si and Zeynep Cemalcilar

Section 3: Economic Conditions
9. Economics of Subjective Well-Being: Evaluating the Evidence for the Easterlin Paradox
Anke C. Plagnol and Lucia Macchia

10. Economic Shifts and Cultural Changes in Individualism: A Cross-Temporal Perspective
Yuji Ogihara

11. Dynamics of Culture Change and Cultural Stability Among the Shuar of Ecuador
H. Clark Barrett

Section 4: Ecological and Economic Threat
12. Economic Conditions Cue Evolutionary Challenges: When a Recession is More Than Just a Recession
Jeff Gassen and Sarah E. Hill

13. Disasters, Insurance, and Preferences
Yasuyuki Sawada