Thursday, November 15, 2012
Pachinko, The Mandala and Roulette
I think that "illusion of control" can be unpacked in the following way
1) The essential illusion that "I am not an average player. I can beat the odds."
2) That one has a method of beating the odds.
As argued in previous posts it seems to me that (2) has a cultural aspect along the lines of
2.1) The illusion that one can make superior choices.
2.2) The illusion that one can persevere more, rely on ones konjo.
To relate this cultural difference to the overall message of this blog (Nacalianism), I argue that we westerners have illusions about our linguistic thoughts to ourselves, our self-narrative, our 'hearing ourselves speak' (Derrida, 1976). When Westerners think that their choices are better than average, that they can "choose" better numbers on the roulette wheel, they are betting on their internal voice: "This time it is going to be a six," "This time it is going to come up red." "Choice" and verbalisation are, I believe, inextricably linked. Choice is an act of meaning (Stevens, Markus, & Townsend, 2007). Westerners gamblers believe that their words will express the world.
The Japanese do not have any unrealistic expectations about their self-narrative but they do have a similar illusion about what they see and imagine. Japanese style perseverance is seeing a task through to the end. As they look at the pachinko machine, and merge with it as if looking at a Mandala (top right) they think that their imagines and expectations will come true.
The Western linguistic gambler ignores the sights that he sees, and holds onto the notion that his words will come true.
The imaginative gambler ignores the linguistic notions of odds but believes that his visualisation will come true. He negates the linguistic self. He becomes one with with the pachinko machine, and believes that his view will conform to his imagination.
Pachinko machines resemble Buddhist mandalas (top left). They invite the player to realise that the visual world and the self are contradictorily the same (Nishida: see Heisig, 2004).
Roulette tables invite the player to think that the linguistic (34, 33, even) outcomes are the same as the linguistic pronouncements in the mind.
Images
Top left:Tawang Monastery Doorway Mandala by D Momaya. Creative Commons, share alike.
Top right: Pachinko by psd
Bottom:A Nightcap by priskiller. Creative Commons, share alike.
Bibliography
Derrida, J. (1976). Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Baltimore.
Langer, E. J. (1975). The illusion of control. Journal of personality and social psychology, 32(2), 311.
Heisig, J. W. (2004). Nishida’s medieval bent. Japanese journal of religious studies, 55–72. nirc.nanzan-u.ac.jp/publications/jjrs/pdf/674.pdf
Stephens, N. M., Markus, H. R., & Townsend, S. S. (2007). Choice as an act of meaning: the case of social class. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology; Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93(5), 814.
Labels: buddhism, economics, image, japan, japanese culture, Jaques Lacan, Nacalian, nihonbunka, reversal, theory, 日本文化
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Social Loafing in Japan Revisited
In Nakano's experiment, seminar students were asked to grab as many "BIS" chocolates as they could from a bag under two conditions
1) Being told that they would receive an equal share of the chocolates grabbed by the group as a whole
2) Being told that they would receive all the chocolates that they themselves grabbed.
The results were as shown above, with average number of chocolates grabbed were greater in the individual condition (9.45) than the group condition (7.27) indicating the existence of social loafing in Japan, with statistically significant tendency (p<0 .1=".1" despite="despite" n="11).<!--0--" sample="sample" size="size" small="small" the="the">
Fan as I am of the Koushien Baseball Tournament I was hoping my students to "become one circle," and try harder in the group condition but the conditions for Japanese social effort, did not seem to have been met. Only one student grabbed more chocolates in the group condition. The order of the grabbing and the degree of encouragement received from the experimenter (who was not blind to the experimental conditions, had been persuaded by social loafing research) may have affected the result.
Bibliography
Dick, R. van, Tissington, P. A., & Hertel, G. (2009). Do many hands make light work?: How to overcome social loafing and gain motivation in work teams. European Business Review, 21(3), 233–245. doi:10.1108/09555340910956621
Earley, P. C. (1993). East meets West meets Mideast: Further explorations of collectivistic and individualistic work groups. Academy of management journal, 319–348. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/256525
Gabrenya, W. K., Wang, Y.-E., & Latane, B. (1985). Social Loafing on an Optimizing Task Cross-Cultural Differences among Chinese and Americans. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 16(2), 223–242. doi:10.1177/0022002185016002006
Karau, S. J., & Williams, K. D. (1993). Social loafing: A meta-analytic review and theoretical integration. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(4), 681–706. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.65.4.681
Kravitz, D. A., & Martin, B. (1986). Ringelmann rediscovered: The original article. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50(5), 936–941. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.50.5.936
Kugihara, N. (1999). Gender and social loafing in Japan. The Journal of social psychology, 139(4), 516–526. Retrieved from http://heldref-publications.metapress.com/index/3978hl6682r10877.pdf
Latane, B., Williams, K., & Harkins, S. (1979). Many hands make light the work: The causes and consequences of social loafing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology; Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 37(6), 822. Retrieved from http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/37/6/822/
Markus, H. R., & Kitayama, S. (1991). Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation. Psychological Review; Psychological Review, 98(2), 224. Retrieved from http://www.biu.ac.il/PS/docs/diesendruck/2.pdf
Matsui, T., Kakuyama, T., & Onglatco, M. U. (1987). Effects of goals and feedback on performance in groups. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72(3), 407. Retrieved from http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/apl/72/3/407/
Shirakashi, S. (1984). Social loafing of Japanese students. Hiroshima Forum for Psychology, 10, 35–40.
Labels: collectivism, culture, economics, individualism, japan, japanese culture, nihonbunka, 個人主義, 日本文化, 集団主義
Saturday, September 29, 2012
The Purported Death of On-The-Job Training in Japan
There are those such as Dr. Greg Story, whose article was quoted in Japan Today, who argue that on the Job Training should be left to die. Dr. Story (shown in the above video) writes,
"Most countries have moved on from this model but, mainly thanks to the OJT, elements of the imperial forces linger here, in the form of giving orders not praise, condemning not complimenting, and criticising mistakes rather than motivating."
I think that Dr. Story, who is president of the Dale complement-people-to-win-friends Carnegie Institute, is trying to sell Western culture in Japan, marketing Western Culture as something that countries "move on" towards. In sum, ego-massage is the future.
First let's recap. Cultural psychologist, Steven Heine's theory of motivation in the USA and Japan is as follows.
Westerners see themselves as being independent "entityl theorists," seeing success or failure as largely a product of innate abilities. They attempt to find the field in which they shine. They are motivated by success and praise, particularly self-praise, which they do liberally and wholly unrealistically. The important thing is that they hype themselves up, win, and feel motivated to hype themselves up and win some more. Think Mohammed "I am the greatest" Ali, or indeed perhaps, Dr. Greg Story.
The Japanese are interdependent, "incremental theorists" believing that the self is malleable and success or failure is largely a product of effort. They attempt to find the ways in which they are not achieving (i.e. their failures) and by correcting them improve and recieve support and integration with their groups. Doing things for self-praise is considered pretty silly (jigajisan 自画自賛). The Japanese are motivated by failure, and the challenge to improve themselves so that they do not fail next time. A good examples of this sort of psychology is found in Japanese baseball players, who are the best in the world. Another is the business philosophy of Uniqlo president Tadashi Yanai who recommends that we forget about our successes and learn from our failures.
Steven Heine's website is here. And the paper which demonstrates that the Japanese are motivated by failure experiences is here.
Alas, legions of very self-confident people Greg Story have convinced Japanese university educators, and the Japanese Governmental Eucation Department that the Japanese need to have higher self esteem, and turn into self-enhancing Westerners, which has rather put a spanner in the works of Japanese culture, as noted in this article. Will the Japanese be able to become people like Mr. Story? Or will they chuck his advice out the window? Is there a third way?
I add a twist to Heine's theory as follows.
The Japanese are able to be self-critical, or "condemning" linguistically. They can take and dish out criticism in words liberally towards themselves and in-group members (e.g. spouses, and co-workers). But they are not completely self-less as the above theory would have it. In the visual domain, that is in their own reflection and reflective imagination (which the Japanese are very good at - as if they carry a mirror with them all the time), they have very positive self-representations.
This is the main reason for the importance of on the job training or "watching and stealing" (見て盗む）, because it is only by seeing, doing, copying, and making it there own that the Japanese become ego involved.
Finally while there is a lot of linguistic criticism going around in Japanese companies, there is a lot of love if you turn off the sound as it were. Unfortunately people like Mr. Story can't feel the love, because what matters to him is his self-narrative, his cogito, or "ego".
The paper that shows Japanese are sort of always carrying a mirror with them is here.
I would like to argue that sense can be made of past and future prime minister Abe's policy of a "beautiful Japan," (美しい国） as the goal of perfection through "reflective imagination" (反省）.
Labels: economics, japan, japanese culture, nihonbunka, occularcentrism, 日本文化
Monday, June 04, 2012
How to Make a Japanese God
A minimal interpretation of a God surely includes the requirement that God is an entity who is connected with us intra-psychically as well as, or even more so than, externally. That is to say that God is in our minds as well as in the world. God observes us, even in the privacy of our mind, and we address ourselves to him or her in that we are concerned about our behaviour from God's point of view.
Several Western theorists (Adam Smith, Bakhtin, Mead, Lacan, and Freud) argue that we have or model an objective view of ourselves intra-psychically, that is to say, inside our heads. Most Western theorists argue that this "point of view" is a point of "view" only metaphorically. The Western God is associated with language, listening, and understanding.
Adam Smith argues that we all see ourselves from a "impartial spectator." While Adam Smith redacted references to God from his work, after the death of his mother, it seems clear that his impartial spectator is related to his notion of a Christian God and that being above all "reasonable," "impartial spectator" 'spectates' in a "reasonable" (I read linguistic) rather than visual way.
Bakhtin does not explain the origin of his super addressee. He just says that we always presume the presence of another addressee of our language (in addition to the person we are speaking to or writing to). Bakhtin does not state that this super-addressee is a requirement for self, but, in a rare moment of religiosity Bakhtin associates this Super-addressee with God, and its absence with hell.
Mead presents one of the best, most sober, renditions of the need for an objective perspective upon self. Mead argues that in order to have a self we need to see ourselves from an objective point of view. In order to see oneself from an objective point of view, one needs to internalise the viewpoints of others (plural). In order to have a self, an independent self perhaps, one needs to create within oneself a "Generalised other," the perspective of oneself as it were, from nowhere. Mead's sober, Anglo Saxon explanation is almost mathematical or at least logical. The more views that one has of oneself the more one understands oneself. And by combining these views one can achieve objective self-hood, from the viewpoint of *not* one's mother, *not* ones father, but from a sort of mathematically, logically, systematically amalgamated general view point. How is this possible? Mead does not say. It sounds reasonable. But Mead's generalised other is while easy to follow as a theory, not so easy to understand phenomenologically. Where is the generalised in my mental experience? (This question may be a no-brainer for Christians.)
Lacan wavers. On the one had his "Other" seems to personified, sometimes (contra Freud) as a (m)Other, at other times the Other seems to be be language itself, a sort of neo Kantian (these days championed by Chomsky and Pinker) static, systematic, non-persona-ised version of the "generalised other". By non-persona-ized, I mean that the other from which we see the self is non personalised account; something that is not a simulated human. The Other of our self speech, is rather a system, a structure, something that is not seen as a persons. I think that his view is probably very popular among many theorists, or anyone with a scientific outlook. This generalised-other-as-system view does not require anything grotesque. If we understand ourselves from a generalised point of view then it is because we understand language. Language is our other, not a person at all. How nice, how clean and un-queasy that would be if it were the case.
Freud is surprisingly vague, almost mythic in his explanation of the origins of the Super-Ego. The "super ego" is a form of generalised other based on ones father. Freud has written a lot and I do not pretend to have read everything he has written but in one rendition of the origin of the super ego (though he does not use that phrase in the paper in question) he suggest a historical event: that an alpha-male, woman monopolising primal father was killed and eaten by brothers who internalised (not only in that they ate him, but psychologically) the father figure that they had killed, and felt so guilty about that murder that they repressed it. In this rendition there is the horror, the shame or guilt, but towards a concrete act. That slaying of the primal father seems unlikely but Freud's myth mentions *The Horror* that I suggest is essential for "making a god."
We all simulate others all the time. We imagine that we are talking to friends and understand our words from their simulated perspective. We cringe when we feel the gaze of others because we imagine what they have seen, and what we simulate they have felt about what they have seen. But these others that we simulate are others in the plural, others in the particular. How could it be that we might create a perspective, a view from nowhere?
Olaf and Metzinger (2009) propose that our ability to see ourselves from other perspectives is essential to the creation of self (which they argue to be a sort of illusion). In the paper quoted they give a typology of self views. In a "Autoscopic Hallucination" we see ourselves as another, a doppelgänger who is not ourselves and remain aware of the self from which we see the doppelgänger. In "Heautoscopy" we see a doppelgänger and our self, but we are not sure which of the two is our self. In an "Out of Body experience" (perhaps the most godly of the three) we see ourself from an external perspective but still with a "SL" (Subjective Location) floating somewhere above us near the ceiling.
It seems to me that they miss a type of self view: the view from nowhere. We see this view from nowhere represented in many Japanese works of art (Edo period pictures of the floating world, Manga, video games) in self-memories (Cohen) and Japanese behaviour in front of mirrors (Heine, et al.). How is it that the Japanese can have a view from nowhere, up from high in the sky and not feel that they are located in that elvated position?
I suggest that the ability to have a self-view from an external position and at the same time not see that position as a subjective location, nor as another particular viewpoint (of a friend, of family member) requires repression, as Freud argued.
This brings me to the horror. There is a a trope in Japanese horror where (generally female) monsters emerge from images. Traditionally they emerged from lanterns (Oiwasan) scrolls (bottom left), more recently they emerge from mirrors (Juuon, Mirrors), photo developer (Juuon), and most famously a television set (Sadako).
I suggest that perhaps the ability to see oneself from an external, non-particular, generalised perspective, relies less on our ability to generalise a perspective as to find one of them so frightening that we repress it. This explanation suggests that God is some sort of Bogeyman, but that is not my perception. Rather that the total absence of a belief in a generalised view (God), results in a situation which is, as Bakhtin says, hell: well and truly horrifying.
Bibliography to follow
Labels: autoscopy, economics, eye, horror, image, japan, japanese culture, Jaques Lacan, lacan, manga, nihobunka, nihonbunka, occularcentrism, reversal, ring, ringu, self, Shinto, specular, 日本文化
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Hours Studied Per Week at US and Japanese Universities
The labels indicate the percentage of first year university students that study (out side of class) in each of the time bands. For example nearly ten percent of Japanese students do not study at all, whereas in the US only 0.3% of students avoid study entirely. More than two thirds (66.8%) of Japanese university students study only 1-5 hours per week --at most an hour per weekday-- whereas this percentage is only about 15% in the US. The above graph is based on data collected by the Central Council for Education of the Japanese Department for Education and Science, as reported on the front page of today's (2012/2/16) Asahi Newspaper.
The newspaper reports that, alarmed at these statistics, the Ministry of Sports Science and Technology intends to implement entrance and exit tests to ensure that university students are studying more, with a view to creating graduates that can be major players on the global stage (グローバルに活躍する人材, Asahi, 2012).
There is nothing new in the these type of comparisons. Brian J. McVeigh's comprehensive, though damning and as yet untranslated, "Japanese Higher Education As Myth," as well as many domestic commentators, have been pointing out that academically, Japanese universities are allow students to concentrate on their part time jobs, their club and social activities rather than ensuring they study academically. As Mc.Veigh points out, Japanese academic has no academic ethos, little awareness of the value of study, so as soon as escalator of entrance exams end, so does the motivation to study.
The Japanese education department indends to extend the escalator, adding stricter assessments at the end of university life, forcing students to study while they are university if they are to go on to graduate and get a job.
They are going to require that Japanese university teachers become stricter in their evaluations and refused to allow students to graduate even though they have a job lined up. And even though the company ready to employ that student is not nearly so concerned, when compared with US companies, with the academic achievement of the students it intends to employ.
Japanese companies do not care so much about whether students have studied academically during their time at university. If a student has invested time and energy into their club or part time job, achieved a position of responsibility, or shown intelligent, practical, creative endeavour in any aspect of their lives (including academically) then they are happy to hire them. Some companies shy away from students who are particularly academic, perhaps with the belief that having too many scholarly types in the office does not make for successful business. Japanese companies stress 'on the job training', and learning by experience so that university graduates start at the bottom and do not come into work situations where they are expected to apply the theories that they have learnt at college.
The education that Japanese universities have provided, therefore, may be argued to be in line with the demands of Japanese society. Theories - which is after all what universities teach - are not as useful, or as lauded in Japan. Providing interesting lectres, opportunities to interact with each other, be stimulated, experience academe and the lifestyle of academics in "seminars," and to gain life experience in part time jobs and clubs, has provided Japanese students with the social skills training required of them in (non-theory based, non-logocentric) Japanese society.
I set a large amount of homework in my English classes especially. I use online testing to force my students to study outside of class. I believe for students to be competative in a declining economy, academic study is important. But at the same time I fear that Japanese universities are by their attempt to mimic Western universities are going to present fewer opportunities for students to obtain the flexibility and social skills that Japanese society still requires.
One of the reasons why Japanese students do part time jobs is because there are few immigrants, or a 'working class' doing them instead. University students are the working class of Japan. The man the pumps, wash the dishes, serve at tables, and work in the fast food restaurants. The same lack of an underclass obviates the need for a university educated elite. Japanese fulfill all roles at different ages of their lives.
The University evolved out of seminaries, training schools for priests. Their original specialisations were theological studies of the Bible and the Koran. Westerners, and those of the "book religions" believe that one can live ones life based upon the advice gained from the pages of a book, by applying theories.
It seems to me that Japanese companies and their employees have been major players on the international stage. So major were their plays that British industry was wiped out by competition from Japan. As Japan mimics the West more and more, and as Japanese university graduates wonder become more and more out of phase with the living tradition of their employers, will the Japanese economic miracle continue to function so well?
I try to encourage my students and colleagues to integrate theoretical learning with practical experience. I have argued that we should be teaching "part-time job theory," and "club theory," and encourage students to research and analyse these areas of their lives. I hope there is a middle path.
Labels: economics, japan, japanese culture, nihobunka, nihonbunka, 日本文化, 欧米化
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Electronics Graveyard
These days consumer electronics, such as TV sets and refrigerators, do not find their way into the rubbish (garbage), since they have to be taken to recycle centres, in the form of local electronic supplies stores.
Labels: culture, economics, japan, japanese culture, nihonbunka, westernisation, 日本文化
Sunday, August 06, 2006
Are You Riding a Stolen Bicycle?
From a very brief survey of the people that the police were stopping and checking, it would seem that they were concentratiing on those riding the standard, cross bar-less, shopping bicycles (mama-chari - mum's bikes). This suggests to me that the majority of bicycle theft is of such bicycles for the purpose of riding them rather than for the purpose of selling them to a third party. There are quite a lot of expensive mountain bikes and road bikes parked with flimsy locks, or no locks at all. But there are even more shoppers, without locks or with easily breakable built in front wheel locks (which can be twisted so that they do not interfere with the movement of the spokes. These bicycles are about 100 USD new in Japan. They are often abandoned even by their owners and large numbers of them are seen at rubbish collection stations on those days when "large rubbish" can be thrown away. It is my perception that some Japanese people tend to see such bicycles almost as a communal resource. Some towns, such as my old town of Kurume, have organisations that provide bicycles - painted blue - at stations for free for public use.
Perhaps the OECD statistics regarding the rate of theft of bicycles and the fact that bicycle theft represents 30% of crime as experienced by Japanese.
Labels: crime, culture, economics, japan, japanese culture, nihonbunka, 日本文化
This blog represents the opinions of the author, Timothy Takemoto, and not the opinions of his employer.