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Cultural Psychology as a Form of Memory Research

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Memory in a Social Context

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Abstract

Cultural psychology investigates the mutual construction of culture and the mind, in which culture creates the mind and the mind creates culture. With the goal of opening a dialogue between memory researchers and cultural psychologists, this chapter argues that cultural psychology is a type of memory research that investigates how culturally acquired knowledge and cognitive strategies (such as independent/interdependent self-construal; holistic/analytical thinking style in cognition) is reiterated and maintained by internalization as automatic long-term memory processes affecting human behavior and psychological processing. We provide an overview of the main findings and theories of cultural psychology and illustrate how cultural psychologists have used theoretical frameworks and methodological paradigms from the field of memory research to explain these findings. Finally, we discuss areas for future research, such as the role of memory systems in the emergence, maintenance, and dynamic change of cultural systems.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kokoro Research Center, Kyoto University, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, Japan

    Masataka Nakayama, Yoshiyuki Ueda & Yukiko Uchida

  2. Graduate School of Human and Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan

    Pamela Marie Taylor & Hitoshi Tominaga

Authors
  1. Masataka Nakayama
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  2. Yoshiyuki Ueda
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  3. Pamela Marie Taylor
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  4. Hitoshi Tominaga
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  5. Yukiko Uchida
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yukiko Uchida .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cognitive and Behavioral Sciences, Graduate School of Human and Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan

    Takashi Tsukiura

  2. Department of Psychology, Keio University, Tokyo, Japan

    Satoshi Umeda

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Nakayama, M., Ueda, Y., Taylor, P.M., Tominaga, H., Uchida, Y. (2017). Cultural Psychology as a Form of Memory Research. In: Tsukiura, T., Umeda, S. (eds) Memory in a Social Context. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-56591-8_16

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