Alle Publikationen
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2017
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(2017): Individual Differences in Verbal and Non-Verbal Affective Responses to Smells. Influence of Odor Label Across Cultures. In: Chemical senses 42 (1), S. 37-46. DOI: 10.1093/chemse/bjw098
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27655940 Abstract: Olfactory perception is highly variable from one person to another, as a function of individual and contextual factors. Here, we investigated the influence of 2 important factors of variation: culture and semantic information. More specifically, we tested whether cultural-specific knowledge and presence versus absence of odor names modulate odor perception, by measuring these effects in 2 populations differing in cultural background but not in language. Participants from France and Quebec, Canada, smelled 4 culture-specific and 2 non-specific odorants in 2 conditions: first without label, then with label. Their ratings of pleasantness, familiarity, edibility, and intensity were collected as well as their psychophysiological and olfactomotor responses. The results revealed significant effects of culture and semantic information, both at the verbal and non-verbal level. They also provided evidence that availability of semantic information reduced cultural differences. Semantic information had a unifying action on olfactory perception that overrode the influence of cultural background.
Keywords: Adult, Affect, Culture, culture specific, Disziplin, Female, France, Geruch / mikrobiologische Zusammensetzung von Körpersekreten, Humans, Kognitionswissenschaft/Social Sciences/Humanities, kulturspezifisch, Kulturtheorie, Male, Odorants/analysis, Olfactory Perception, Quebec, Semantics, Smell, Status / biologische Marker, Young Adult -
(2017): Real-time gesture translation in intercultural communication. In: AI & Society 32 (1), S. 25-35. DOI: 10.1007/s00146-014-0573-4
Abstract: Nonverbal behavior plays a crucial role in human communication and often leads to misunderstandings between people from different cultures, even if they speak the same language fluently. While translation systems are available for verbal communication, translators for nonverbal communication do not exist yet. We present the conceptual design and an early prototype of a real-time gesture translator using body tracking and gesture recognition in avatar-mediated intercultural interactions. It contributes to the ambitious goal of bridging between cultures by translating culture-specific gestures to enhance mutual understanding. Possible applications of the gesture translator are discussed as a facilitating tool for global business meetings and as a means of technology-enhanced conflict resolution and prevention.
Keywords: body tracking, Computerwissenschaft, Cultural interaction, culture specific, Disziplin, Gestik, Gestik/Mimik, gesture, Interaktion, Kommunikation, kulturspezifisch, Kulturtheorie, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Nonverbal behaviour, Nonverbales Verhalten, Personenerkennung, Realtechnik, real-time gesture translation, Sozial Intelligente Agenten, Status / biologische Marker, Technik, translators for nonverbal communication -
(2017): Culture-specific models of negotiation for virtual characters. Multi-attribute decision-making based on culture-specific values. In: AI & Society 32 (1), S. 51-63. DOI: 10.1007/s00146-014-0570-7
Abstract: We posit that observed differences in negotiation performance across cultures can be explained by participants trying to optimize across multiple values, where the relative importance of values differs across cultures. We look at two ways for specifying weights on values for different cultures: one in which the weights of the model are hand-crafted, based on intuition interpreting Hofstede dimensions for the cultures, and one in which the weights of the model are learned from data using inverse reinforcement learning (IRL). We apply this model to the Ultimatum Game and integrate it into a virtual human dialog system. We show that weights learned from IRL surpass both a weak baseline with random weights and a strong baseline considering only one factor for maximizing gain in own wealth in accounting for the behavior of human players from four different cultures. We also show that the weights learned with our model for one culture outperform weights learned for other cultures when playing against opponents of the first culture.
Keywords: Cultural decision-making, culture specific, Disziplin, entscheiden, Inverse reinforcement learning: Hofstede, Kulturtheorie, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), NEGOTIATION, Realtechnik, Science and Technology Studies (STS), social importance dynamics, Sozial Intelligente Agenten, Soziale Robotik, Spieltheorie, Technik, Ultimatum Game, virtual agents -
(2017): Pushing boundaries-culture-sensitive care in oncology and palliative care. A qualitative study. In: Psycho-oncology 26 (6), S. 763-769. DOI: 10.1002/pon.4217
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27429221 Abstract: OBJECTIVE In increasingly globalized societies, patient-centered cancer care requires culture-sensitive approaches in order to ensure patients well-being. While migrant patients' needs are frequently reported in the literature, staff members' perception of work with migrant patients, associated challenges, or individual work approaches are largely unknown. This study addresses this research gap through qualitative exploration of experiences of multicultural health care professionals in supportive oncology and palliative care, working with patients from different cultural backgrounds. This study aims to understand staff experience of the impact of culture on cancer care. METHODS This study was conducted at the Medical University of Vienna, including staff from different settings of oncology and palliative care, in different professional positions, and with a range of individual migration backgrounds. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 21 staff members working with patients from different cultural backgrounds. Interviews explored views on the impact of culture on care were audio-taped, transcribed, and analyzed using a rigorous method of thematic analysis, enhanced with grounded theory techniques. RESULTS Interviews revealed 4 key topics: culture-specific differences, assumed reasons for differences, consequences of multicultural care, and tools for culture-sensitive care. Strategies to better deal with migrant patients and their families were suggested to improve work satisfaction amongst staff. CONCLUSIONS This study identifies relevant staff challenges in work with migrant patients. Concrete suggestions for improvement include measures on an organizational level, team level, and personal tools. The suggested measures are applicable to improve work satisfaction and culture-sensitive care not only in cancer care but also in other areas of medicine.
Keywords: Adult, Attitude of Health Personnel, Culturally Competent Care, Culture, culture specific, Female, Gesellschaftsprofit, Health Personnel/psychology/statistics & numerical data, Humans, Interaktion, Job Satisfaction, Kultur, kulturspezifisch, Male, Medical Oncology, Medizin, Middle Aged, Neoplasms/ethnology/therapy, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Palliative Care, Pflege, Qualitative research, Umgangsformen, Young Adult 2015
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(2015): Development of a Dating Violence Assessment Tool for Late Adolescence Across Three Countries. The Violence in Adolescents' Dating Relationships Inventory (VADRI). In: Journal of Interpersonal Violence, S. 2626-2646. DOI: 10.1177/0886260515593543
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26160857 Abstract: Accurate assessment of dating violence (DV) is crucial for evaluation and intervention planning. However, extant self-report measurement tools of DV do not adequately consider age-, generation-, and culture-specific issues, which are essential for its accurate conceptualization. To address these gaps, we developed the Violence in Adolescents' Dating Relationships Inventory (VADR I: ) and evaluated its psychometric properties. The VADRI was developed based on a qualitative approach for item development through adolescents' individual interviews, focus groups, and experts' judgments, followed by a quantitative approach for tool assessment. Two aspects of DV were addressed: victimization and perpetration. After the necessary cultural and linguistic adaptation of items, the instrument was administered to 466 adolescents from three Spanish-speaking countries: Guatemala, Mexico, and Spain. The items were best represented by a one-factor solution in each country, which suggests that DV is a unidimensional construct combining victimization and perpetration. Analyses of item-level factor weights and differential item functioning were conducted aimed at obtaining information about items that best represented the construct, resulting in a 26-item final version that was cross-culturally equivalent. Convergent validity was supported by positive correlations with the Conflict in Adolescent Dating Relationships Inventory, and reliability analyses yielded favorable results (with all Cronbach's α values above .90). We conclude that the VADRI is a valid and reliable instrument for the assessment of DV in various cultural contexts.
Keywords: adolescence, assessment, COMPONENTS, conflict, COUPLES, cross-cultural psychology, Culture, culture specific, Dating Violence, Fehlverhalten, Female, Gewalt, NUMBER, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, PARTNER VIOLENCE, Psychologie, SCALES, Sozialverhalten, Students, test development, Übertretung von sozialen Grenzen/Gewalt, VADRI (Violence in Adolescents Dating Relationships Inventory), VALIDATION -
(2015): Rural N(SO) and German middle-class mothers' interaction with their 3- and 6-month-old infants. A longitudinal cross-cultural analysis. In: Journal of family psychology : JFP : journal of the Division of Family Psychology of the American Psychological Association (Division 43) 29 (4), S. 649-655. DOI: 10.1037/fam0000100
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26075741 Abstract: This study aims to analyze culture-specific development of maternal interactional behavior longitudinally. Rural Cameroonian Nso mothers (n = 72) and German middle-class mothers (n = 106) were observed in free-play interactions with their 3- and 6-month-old infants. Results reveal the expected shift from a social to a nonsocial focus only in the German middle-class mothers' play interactions but not the rural Nso mothers' play. Nso mothers continue their proximal interactional style with a focus on body contact and body stimulation, whereas German middle-class mothers prefer a distal style of interaction with increasing object-centeredness. These cultural differences are in line with broader cultural models and become more accentuated as the infants grow older.
Keywords: Adult, Cross-Cultural Comparison, culture specific, Female, Germany, Humans, Infant, Longitudinal Studies, Male, Maternal Behavior/ethnology/psychology, Mother-Child Relations, Mothers/psychology, Play and Playthings/psychology, Proxemik, Rural Population/statistics & numerical data, Status / biologische Marker -
(2015): Reconsidering Respect for Persons in a Globalizing World. In: Developing world bioethics 15 (2), S. 98-106. DOI: 10.1111/dewb.12045
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24720355 Abstract: Contemporary clinical ethics was founded on principlism, and the four principles: respect for autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence and justice, remain dominant in medical ethics discourse and practice. These principles are held to be expansive enough to provide the basis for the ethical practice of medicine across cultures. Although principlism remains subject to critique and revision, the four-principle model continues to be taught and applied across the world. As the practice of medicine globalizes, it remains critical to examine the extent to which both the four-principle framework, and individual principles among the four, suffice patients and practitioners in different social and cultural contexts. Using the four-principle model we analyze two accounts of surrogate decision making - one from the developed and one from the developing world - in which the clinician undertakes medical decision-making with apparently little input from the patient and/or family. The purpose of this analysis is to highlight challenges in assessing ethical behaviour according to the principlist model. We next describe cultural expectations and mores that inform both patient and clinician behaviors in these scenarios in order to argue that the principle of respect for persons informed by culture-specific ideas of personhood may offer an improved ethical construct for analyzing and guiding medical practice in a globalized and plural world.
Keywords: Beneficence, Bewertung von sozialem Verhalten (/sozialer Angemessenheit), Clinical Decision-Making/ethics, Cultural Characteristics, culture specific, Decision Making, Developed Countries, Developing Countries, Ethical Analysis, Ethics, Medical, Family/ethnology/psychology, Humans, Internationality, Interviews as Topic, Islam, kulturspezifisch, Medizin, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Pakistan, Personal Autonomy, Personhood, Physician-Patient Relations/ethics, Principle-Based Ethics, respect, Respekt, Transcultural Nursing, United States 2014
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(2014): A Framework for User-Defined Body Gestures to Control a Humanoid Robot. In: International Journal of Social Robotics 6 (3), S. 383-396. DOI: 10.1007/s12369-014-0233-3
Abstract: This paper presents a framework that allows users to interact with and navigate a humanoid robot using body gestures. The first part of the paper describes a study to define intuitive gestures for eleven navigational commands based on analyzing 385 gestures performed by 35 participants. From the study results, we present a taxonomy of the user-defined gesture sets, agreement scores for the gesture sets, and time performances of the gesture motions. The second part of the paper presents a full body interaction system for recognizing the user-defined gestures. We evaluate the system by recruiting 22 participants to test for the accuracy of the proposed system. The results show that most of the defined gestures can be successfully recognized with a precision between 86100 % and an accuracy between 7396 %. We discuss the limitations of the system and present future work improvements.
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(2014): Call playback artificially generates a temporary cultural style of high affiliation in marmosets. In: Animal Behaviour 93, S. 163-171. DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2014.04.027
Abstract: Cultural variation can be conceptualized in two main ways: as culture-specific qualitative differences in behavioural form, and also as quantitative variation in performance of constellations of universal behaviours (cultural style). Despite observation of both types in wild nonhuman primates, diffusion of qualitative culture has been scrutinized extensively experimentally while within-species transmission of cultural style has remained entirely unexplored. Here we investigated whether a cultural style of high affiliation could be artificially generated in a nonhuman primate (Callithrix jacchus), by daily playback of conspecific affiliative calls simulating nearby amicable individuals. We found that vocalization playback influenced monkeys to spend more time in affiliative behaviours outside playback hours, relative to silent playback. The effect was specific to affiliation, with no impact on other categories of affect. This change did not persist into the final phase of observation after all playbacks were complete. Findings are consistent with a temporary shift in cultural style effected through vocalization playback, supporting existence of this conception of culture in wild primates and indicating auditory social contagion as a potential diffusion mechanism. The method presented here will allow researchers to test hypotheses concerning cultural transmission of cultural style, and the underlying processes, across a range of contexts and species.
Keywords: BEHAVIOR, behaviour, Biologie, Callithrix jacchus, CALLITHRIX-JACCHUS, CAPUCHIN MONKEYS, CHIMPANZEES, COMMON MARMOSETS, Culture, culture specific, enrichment, Evolution, FOOD, Geräusch/Klang, nonhuman primate, SOCIAL DIFFUSION, social influence, Status / biologische Marker, traditions, transmission -
(2014): Emotion Prediction from Physiological Signals. A Comparison Study Between Visual and Auditory Elicitors. In: Interacting with Computers 26 (3), S. 285-302. DOI: 10.1093/iwc/iwt039
Abstract: Unlike visual stimuli, little attention has been paid to auditory stimuli in terms of emotion prediction with physiological signals. This paper aimed to investigate whether auditory stimuli can be used as an effective elicitor as visual stimuli for emotion prediction using physiological channels. For this purpose, a well-controlled experiment was designed, in which standardized visual and auditory stimuli were systematically selected and presented to participants to induce various emotions spontaneously in a laboratory setting. Numerous physiological signals, including facial electromyogram, electroencephalography, skin conductivity and respiration data, were recorded when participants were exposed to the stimulus presentation. Two data mining methods, namely decision rules and k-nearest neighbor based on the rough set technique, were applied to construct emotion prediction models based on the features extracted from the physiological data. Experimental results demonstrated that auditory stimuli were as effective as visual stimuli in eliciting emotions in terms of systematic physiological reactivity. This was evidenced by the best prediction accuracy quantified by the F-1 measure (visual: 76.2% vs. auditory: 76.1%) among six emotion categories (excited, happy, neutral, sad, fearful and disgusted). Furthermore, we also constructed culture-specific (Chinese vs. Indian) prediction models. The results showed that model prediction accuracy was not significantly different between culture-specific models. Finally, the implications of affective auditory stimuli in human-computer interaction, limitations of the study and suggestions for further research are discussed.
2013
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(2013): A cross-cultural, multimodal, affective corpus for gesture expressivity analysis. In: Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces 7 (1-2), S. 121-134. DOI: 10.1007/s12193-012-0112-x
Abstract: A multimodal, cross-cultural corpus of affective behavior is presented in this research work. The corpus construction process, including issues related to the design and implementation of an experiment, is discussed along with resulting acoustic prosody, facial expressions and gesture expressivity features. However, research work presented here focuses more on the cross-cultural aspect of gestural behavior defining a common corpus construction protocol aiming to identify cultural patterns within non-verbal behavior across cultures i.e. German, Greek and Italian. Culture specific findings regarding gesture expressivity are derived from the affective analysis performed. Additionally, the multimodal aspect, including prosody and facial expressions, is researched in terms of fusion techniques. Finally, a release plan of the corpus to the public domain is discussed aiming to establish the current corpus as a benchmark multimodal, cross-cultural standard and reference point.
2006
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(2006): Decoding speech prosody in five languages. In: Semiotica (158). DOI: 10.1515/SEM.2006.017
Abstract: Twenty English-speaking listeners judged the emotive intent of utterances spoken by male and female speakers of English, German, Chinese, Japanese, and Tagalog. The verbal content of utterances was neutral but prosodic elements conveyed each of four emotions: joy, anger, sadness, and fear. Identification accuracy was above chance performance levels for all emotions in all languages. Across languages, sadness and anger were more accurately recognized than joy and fear. Listeners showed an in-group advantage for decoding emotional prosody, with highest recognition rates for English utterances and lowest recognition rates for Japanese and Chinese utterances. Acoustic properties of stimuli were correlated with the intended emotion expressed. Our results support the view that emotional prosody is decoded by a combination of universal and culture-specific cues.
2003
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(2003): Nonverbal interaction between hitchhikers and drivers. In: Semiotica (147). DOI: 10.1515/semi.2003.092
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/semi.2003.092 Abstract: This essay reconstructs the implicit knowledge of a competent hitchhiker from the viewpoint of semiotics. The initial phase of hitchhiking is purely nonverbal. The hitchhiker starts the interaction by signaling that s/he wants a lift. In the standard case, the sign chosen is a culture-specific gesture. The driver produces one of the following four actions: (i) in the successful case, s/he stops and gives the hitchhiker a lift, whereas (ii) in the opposite case of ultimate non-success, s/he shows no perceptible reaction. In other constellations, s/he (iii) produces an ‘answering’ gesture or (iv) expresses a specific mood, intention, or attitude toward the hitchhiker by changing his or her driving behavior. This article concentrates on actions (iii) and (iv) and reconstructs them as equivalents of verbal utterances, each with a specific propositional content and illocutionary force. In the most elaborate interactions, one can detect a real ‘gestural dialog’ with several turn-takings.
1998
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(1998): Differences in Perception of Everyday Odors. A Japanese-German Cross-cultural Study. In: Chemical senses 23 (1), S. 31-38. DOI: 10.1093/chemse/23.1.31
Abstract: There is a growing appreciation that experience with odors may strongly influence their perception. To further investigate this. the responses of 40 Japanese and 44 age-matched German women to everyday odorants were compared. Subjects were presented with 28 stimuli in squeeze bottles and asked to rate them according to intensity, familiarity, pleasantness and edibility, to describe associations elicited by them and, if possible, to name them. One-third of the odorants were presumed to be familiar to the Japanese only, one-third to the Germans and one-third to both populations. Significant differences were found between the two populations on all measures. Better performance by the Japanese in providing appropriate descriptors for 'Japanese' odorants and by the Germans for 'European' odorants supported the pre-selection of stimuli as culture-typical. Particularly clear differences between the two populations were found in pleasantness ratings. In general, a positive relationship was found between pleasantness and judgement of stimuli as edible, suggesting that culture-specific experiences-particularly of foods-may significantly influence odor perception. Somewhat unexpectedly, significant differences were also found between the two populations in intensity ratings for some odorants. These differences did not seem simply to be artefacts of the test situation and raise the possibility that experience may even influence such basic aspects of odor perception as stimulus intensity.
Keywords: ABILITY, ASSOCIATIONS, Assoziation von Gerüchen als angenehm UND essbar, Children, culture specific, DISCRIMINATION, Geruch / mikrobiologische Zusammensetzung von Körpersekreten, IDENTIFICATION, Intensität von Gerüchen, Kultur, kulturell vorgeprägte Wahrnehmung von Geruchsintensität, MEMORY, PEOPLE, PLEASANTNESS, Speisegewohnheiten, Status / biologische Marker 1995
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(1995): One Story Map Does Not Fit All. A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Children's Written Story Retellings. In: Journal of Narrative and Life History 5 (1), S. 1-19. DOI: 10.1075/jnlh.5.1.01one
Abstract: Narrative is acknowledged to be a primary means by which children develop the voice of their own culture. In recent years, and as a result of the increased interest in story grammar research, retellings have also become a useful tool for assessing children's understanding of stories and teaching comprehension. The assumption across most previous studies is that narrative, especially folktales, provides the same story-schema support, no matter what the culture of the child may be. This cross-cultural study examines the relative effects of literacy and culture on the narrative form of written story retellings. Empirical findings confirm the hypothesis that two disparate populations, otherwise equated for levels of literacy, western-style schooling, and cognitive development, differ significantly in the structural components of their written story retellings. The story grammar of Mandler and Johnson (1977) was evaluated for discriminatory power. Categorizations of specific components of the story grammar showed qualitative differences from culture to culture. Results support culture-specific theories of story schema. (Sociolinguistics, Education)
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