A Chilean study, carried out with the Mapuche community, an indigenous people living in the south of Chile and Argentina, found similarities and differences between beliefs about emotions in different cultures.
Because it is important? Beliefs about emotions have great influence on people’s behavior and responses, serving as a guide for making decisions and evaluating our behavior and that of others. Sometimes they are accepted so passionately that it is difficult to understand that they are beliefs. They probably originate in culture, reflecting the values, customs and norms of a community.
In the Mapuche community, there could be an inconsistency between the teachings of parents and teachers.
What methodology was used? 106 Mapuche adults (77 fathers and mothers and 29 teachers) and 165 non-Mapuche adults (92 mothers and fathers and 73 teachers), completed a questionnaire on parents’ beliefs about children’s emotions, including 6 subscales of said questionnaire translated into Chilean Spanish and 5 derived from Mapuche values.
What beliefs about emotions were considered?
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- The value of anger.
- Being positive can be costly.
- Children can control their emotions.
- Children’s emotions are manipulation.
- The importance of knowing children’s feelings.
- Autonomy
The following are beliefs identified among Chilean Mapuches:
- The importance of controlling fear.
- The importance of staying calm.
- Emotion through observation.
- Regulation through nature.
- Kumeche (being with others and respecting them, being supportive, compassionate, kind, attentive and empathetic).
What similarities were found? There were similarities between emotional autonomy, effectiveness in controlling and regulating emotions, and the belief that when emotions are not controlled, even emotions considered positive can be costly.
What differences were found?The differences, which were significant but not as large as scientists expected, can be summarized as follows:
- The Mapuche firmly believe that children can and should overcome fear and should also be calm and quiet.
- Differences were noted between Mapuches from rural and urban areas. The latter gave greater importance to knowing about the boys’ feelings. The researchers believe that the lack of nature and community support caused Raccoons living in urban areas to have stronger beliefs in the importance of kumeche and nature as a regulator of emotions.
What limitations do scientists name?
1. Due to the recruitment method used, it is likely that the Mapuches in the sample are mostly more educated and privileged.
2. The use of questionnaires, which requires the participant to adapt their beliefs to a statement that may not be precise enough to represent their unique beliefs (an effect that was attempted to be controlled by including beliefs specific to the Mapuche culture).
3. There could be differences between what people say they believe and what they actually do.
Interesting fact: The Mapuches traditionally believe that nature provides an important way to regulate emotions in children, a fact that many studies have guaranteed (,,,,,,).
Study reference: 1. Amy G. Halberstadt, Dejah Oertwig, Enrique H. Riquelme. Beliefs About Children’s Emotions in Chile. Frontiers in Psychology, 2020; 11 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00034