Browsing by Author "Ramesh C. Mishra"

Now showing 1 - 18 of 18

A cross-cultural perspective on cognitive development theories used in Indian settings
(Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd, 1998) Ramesh C. Mishra
Cross-cultural applications of developmental theories have raised a number of is sues related to the developmental status of children in Third World countries. This paper analyses the outcomes of research carried out with children in the Indian setting using some major theories of cognitive development. It is argued that group differences in test performance are most likely to be interpreted as "deficits" if one fails to analyse the context in which children are brought up. On the other hand, differences in testperformance can be meaningfully understood and interpreted by adopting an ecocultural perspective.
Cognitive development through schooling and everyday life: A natural experiment among Kharwar children in India
(SAGE Publications Ltd, 2017) Symen A. Brouwers; Fons J.R.Van De Vijver; Ramesh C. Mishra
The influences of schooling and everyday experiences on cognitive development are typically confounded. In the present study, we unraveled the influence of chronological age and years of schooling on the development of general cognitive competency in a two-wave longitudinal design with a three-year interval among 181 Kharwar children in India, aged 6 to 12 years. Effects of chronological age and years of schooling on cognitive development could be estimated independently because of their weak correlation among the Kharwar and because of the many shared background characteristics of school drop-outs, children without schooling, and children with schooling. The same five cognitive measures, each with parallel school and everyday testing modes, were administered to all children on both occasions. The internal structures of both the school and the everyday tests were equivalent across time and to each other. In line with our expectations, analyses of the net development per year revealed a decrement of the effect of chronological age, which was stronger for everyday tests than school tests, and an increment of the effect of years of schooling, which was stronger for school tests than everyday tests. Schooling ought to be considered in all theories of cognitive development, with genuine attention toward the real cognitive advantages it has at each developmental level. © International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development.
Cross-cultural views on human development in the third millennium
(Psychology Press Ltd, 2000) Pierre R. Dasen; Ramesh C. Mishra
The authors examine the prospects of a cross-cultural approach for research in human development. They first examine the apparent conflict between the positivistic and the constructionist paradigms, and examine their methodological implications. They argue for a midline position, seeing the seemingly opposed paradigms as complementary rather than antithetical. The major part of the paper lists the further developments needed in the field, in particular taking new theories to the crosscultural test more quickly, and working out culturally appropriate applications to social issues. Shorter sections are devoted to the choice of appropriate theoretical frameworks, to the development of "indigenous psychologies" and to the working conditions of researchers in different contexts. The authors conclude that the situation of a cross-cultural approach to human development has improved significantly in the last two decades, but that there is still a lot to be done to completely disengage developmental psychology from its inherent ethnocentrism by "taking culture seriously". © 2000 The International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development.
Development of geocentric spatial language and cognition: An Eco-Cultural perspective
(Cambridge University Press, 2010) Pierre R. Dasen; Ramesh C. Mishra
Egocentric spatial language uses coordinates in relation to our body to talk about small-scale space (‘put the knife on the right of the plate and the fork on the left'), while geocentric spatial language uses geographic coordinates (‘put the knife to the east, and the fork to the west'). How do children learn to use geocentric language? And why do geocentric spatial references sound strange in English when they are standard practice in other languages? This book studies child development in Bali, India, Nepal, and Switzerland and explores how children learn to use a geocentric frame both when speaking and performing non-verbal cognitive tasks (such as remembering locations and directions). The authors examine how these skills develop with age, look at the socio-cultural contexts in which the learning takes place, and explore the ecological, cultural, social, and linguistic conditions that favour the use of a geocentric frame of reference. Reviews: "A remarkable illustration of how research can integrate concepts, methods and findings from cognitive and developmental psychology, as well as from cultural anthropology and linguistics, to explain the development and use of spatial frames of reference in a number of cultures." --John W. Berry, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Queen's University, Canada "A wonderful contribution to the literature on child development in relation to language and culture." --Penelope Brown, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics "Dasen and Mishra invite us to revisit the concept of spatial knowledge from a radically decentered perspective. From Bali through India to Nepal, they treat us to a fascinating journey into a variety of cultures. This book offers a richly documented, refreshing alternative to the Western view of human spatial cognition and language." --Michel Denis, LIMSI-CNRS, National Center for Scientific Research, Orsay, France. © Pierre R. Dasen and Ramesh C. Mishra 2010.
Ecology, language, and performance on spatial cognitive tasks
(2003) Ramesh C. Mishra; Pierre R. Dasen; Shanta Niraula
The study of the orientation systems that people use in different cultures to describe the location of objects in space has drawn some interest of researchers in the fields of anthropology, psycholinguistics, and cognitive psychology. There has been a rethinking of the "linguistic relativity hypothesis," and some empirical studies tend to support the notion that language is the major determinant of encoding and cognitive performance on spatial tasks, This paper reports a cross-cultural study carried out with 545 children aged 4 to 14 years, both schooled and unschooled, in India and Nepal. The field sites were selected taking into consideration how reference to spatial locations is organized in the language as well as in the local cultural practices. In a village near Varanansi in India, people organize spatial locations mainly with reference to cardinal directions, but in the city of Varanasi, relative references are also used, although people in both the locations speak the same language (i.e., Hindi). In a village in Nepal, on the other hand, the "uphill-downhill" geocentric frame of reference is the most compelling. We test the relationship between ecology, culture, and language, encoding of spatial information, and performance on some Piagetian spatial tasks, taking age and schooling into account. Berry's eco-cultural model is used to discuss the findings that support linguistic relativism at the group but not at the individual level.
Education of tribal children in India
(SAGE Publications Inc., 2008) Ramesh C. Mishra
[No abstract available]
Effect of Hindi, Sanskrit and Urdu medium schooling on spatial language and encoding
(Springer, 2018) Ramesh C. Mishra; Rajesh K. Jha
Spatial cognition refers to the process through which people acquire knowledge of the location of objects in their surrounding environment. Studies suggest that people use different spatial frames of reference to describe the location of objects in space. The present study examines the frames of reference used by 10–15-year-old students attending Hindi, Sanskrit and Urdu medium schools at Varanasi in performing spatial cognitive tasks. Traditional schools, such as Sanskrit and Urdu medium schools, provide substantial experience and training in the use of a geocentric frame of reference based on cardinal directions (i.e., north, south, east and west). In view of this, it was expected that children attending these schools would use a geocentric frame of reference more than those attending Hindi medium school. Using a variety of procedures, the spatial frames of reference used in description and encoding of objects by students in Hindi, Sanskrit and Urdu medium schools were assessed. The results indicated that traditional Sanskrit and Urdu medium school students used more geocentric language for description of spatial objects and they also engaged in greater geocentric encoding of those objects than the students of Hindi medium schools. © 2018, Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
Family models of independence/interdependence and their intergenerational similarity in Germany, Turkey, and India
(2012) Boris Mayer; Gisela Trommsdorff; Cigdem Kagitcibasi; Ramesh C. Mishra
Family change theory suggests three ideal-typical family models characterized by different combinations of emotional and material interdependencies in the family. Its major proposition is that in economically developing countries with a collectivistic background a family model of emotional interdependence emerges from a family model of complete interdependence. The current study aims to identify and compare patterns of family-related value orientations related to family change theory across three cultures and two generations. Overall, N = 919 dyads of mothers and their adolescent children from Germany, Turkey, and India participated in the study. Three clusters were identified representing the family models of independence, interdependence, and emotional interdependence, respectively. Especially the identification of an emotionally interdependent value pattern using a person-oriented approach is an important step in the empirical validation of family change theory. The preference for the three family models differed across as well as within cultures and generations according to theoretical predictions. Dyadic analyses pointed to substantial intergenerational similarities and also to differences in family models, reflecting both cultural continuity as well as change in family-related value orientations. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.
Geocentric dead reckoning in Sanskrit- and Hindi-medium school children
(2009) Ramesh C. Mishra; Sunita Singh; Pierre R. Dasen
A linguistic and cognitive process that has received scant attention in mainstream developmental psychology is the use of a geocentric frame of spatial reference, which amounts to using a large-scale orientation system (such as cardinal directions) in describing and encoding the location of objects on table space, inside a room. As part of a larger cross-cultural study of the development of this process, in India, Indonesia and Nepal, we present here a study on the possible implications of using a geocentric frame of reference in developing an accurate dead-reckoning skill. Children aged 11 to 15 years in two types of schools in Varanasi, India, who were known from a pretest to use a geocentric frame in language and cognition, were blindfolded, spun around and led blindfolded to a second room. A majority of them were able to keep track of cardinal directions despite these disorienting procedures. They were interviewed about the processes and sources of their skill. © 2009 SAGE Publications.
Health beliefs and behaviour of cervix cancer patients
(Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd, 2006) P. Awasthi; Ramesh C. Mishra; U.P. Shahi
When people fall prey to a chronic disease they develop their own formulations about the disease. Patients often hold a variety of beliefs about causes, consequences, control and outcomes of the disease. This study examines illness beliefs and health seeking behaviour of educated, uneducated, rural and urban women suffering from the cancer of cervix. A control group (of non-patients) was also studied. The findings revealed that individual and psychosocial causes were more strongly represented in the belief system of patients than environmental or supernatural causes. The perceived consequence of illness was negatively correlated with the degree of social support available to patients. Patients characterised by a high level of social support strongly believed that their disease was in control of either "self" or "doctor". They resorted more to "approach-coping" strategy, experienced lesser pain and severity of illness, and expressed greater hope for a disease free life than patients characterised by low social support.
Health-promoting Lifestyle, Illness Control Beliefs and Well-being of the Obese Diabetic Women
(Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd, 2018) Purnima Awasthi; Ramesh C. Mishra; S.K. Singh
The study examines the role of health-promoting lifestyle and illness control beliefs in well-being of obese diabetic women. Measures of illness control belief, health-promoting lifestyle and obesity-related well-being were given to 100 obese diabetic women selected from outdoors of hospitals in Varanasi. Analysis revealed patients’ stronger belief in ‘doctor-control’ and ‘supernatural-control’ than ‘self-control’ of the disease. Nutrition, interpersonal relations, physical activity and stress management were given more importance in health promotion than spiritual growth-related practices. Belief in ‘self-control’ and ‘doctor-control’ of disease was negatively correlated with ‘psychosocial discomfort’, ‘physical discomfort’ and ‘psychosocial impact’ aspects of obesity, whereas ‘supernatural-control’ showed positive relationship with all aspects. All components of ‘health-promoting lifestyle’ were negatively correlated with ‘physical discomfort’, ‘psychosocial discomfort’ and ‘psychosocial impact’ aspects of obesity. Multiple regression analysis brought out ‘self-control’, ‘supernatural-control’, ‘health responsibility’, ‘physical activity’ and ‘stress management’ as significant predictors of ‘well-being’ of the obese diabetic women. © 2018 Department of Psychology, University of Allahabad.
Linguistic relativity and spatial concept development in Nepal
(Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd, 2004) Pierre R. Dasen; Ramesh C. Mishra; Shanta Niraula
Reports the results of a study done in a mountainous region of Nepal on a sample of 144, 6-14 year old boys and girls, schooled and unschooled. A variety of tasks was selected for the analysis of language children use for describing space and for the assessment of spatial encoding and cognitive performance on spatial developmental tasks. The results confirm that the language people use to describe spatial arrays is linked to the way in which they orient themselves in the environment. The age trends in language development indicate a change from intrinsic and projective to geocentric references, with almost no use of egocentric terms, while the encoding of spatial arrays is predominantly absolute (age changes being task specific). Overall, spatial cognitive development is quite independent of spatial encoding, but shows some statistically significant relations to the use of geocentric language.
Piagetian Studies of Cognitive Development in India
(Springer India, 2014) Ramesh C. Mishra
The paper presents a review of studies on cognitive development of children in India inspired by Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. Piaget’s theory is briefly introduced before examining its cross-cultural applications. Early studies of cognitive development, which focus on age-related changes in cognition, are described. These are followed by the studies of the last decades in which developmental contexts, such as those provided by ecology, culture, schooling, and various forms of training, are implicated. Studies of spatial cognition are discussed in some detail and points of convergence between findings of Indian studies and those reported by Piaget are critically examined. The issue of “performance” vs. “competence” is addressed and research evidence that considers performance difference as a matter of cognitive style is presented. Possible reasons for decline of research interest in Piagetian studies in recent years is examined and suggestion for future studies in this field are offered. © 2014, National Academy of Psychology (NAOP) India.
Quasi-experimental research in culture sensitive psychology
(SAGE Publications Ltd, 2018) Pierre R. Dasen; Ramesh C. Mishra; Jürg Wassmann
The research presented in this article follows up on several aspects of Gustav Jahoda’s long and fruitful career: (1) his early fieldwork on cognitive development in Africa, particularly in the area of spatial skills; (2) his interest in cross-cultural psychology as a research method; and (3) his insistence on bringing anthropology and psychology together. The topic of our research is the development of a so-called “geocentric” frame of spatial reference. This is a cognitive style, in which individuals describe and represent small-scale table-top space in terms of large-scale geographic dimensions. We explore the development with age of geocentric language and cognition, and the relationships between the two. We also explore the many environmental and socio-cultural variables that favor the use of this frame. We demonstrate how we untangled several of these variables by using a succession of within-society group comparisons, in several societies where a geocentric frame is in common usage (Bali, Indonesia, India, and Nepal). Our research program unfolds like a detective story, where one finding that is difficult to interpret because of several confounded variables leads to another quasi-experimental group comparison that suggests another hypothesis, which is then tested in a further session of field-work. In each case, we emphasize how important it was to have extensive linguistic and ethnographic knowledge before implementing psychological tests. The research design is not cross-cultural as such (we hardly ever perform comparisons between societies), but culturally sensitive within a series of societies; in other words, as Dasen and Jahoda (1986, p. 413) defined it, “cross-cultural developmental psychology is not just comparative: essentially it is an outlook that takes culture seriously”. © The Author(s) 2018.
Regional Similarities and Differences in People's Beliefs, Practices and Preferences
(1994) Jai B.P. Sinha; C.N. Daftuar; Rajen K. Gupta; Ramesh C. Mishra; R. Jayseetha; S.S. Jha; Jyoti Verma; V.S.R. Vijayakumar
Seven hundred fifty-three students from seven cities of India reported: (a) their perception of what people in general believe, practise and prefer (i.e., operative values); (b) their own allocentric and idiocentric orientations; (c) the extent to which they attached importance to other's (over their own) opinions, desires and interests; and (d) their age, gender, caste, class and urban exposure. The significant mean differences between the seven sub-samples led to identify three clusters of cities, namely the North, the South and the Central. The North and the South presented a contrast—the former manifesting strong orientations to meet unjustifiable and inconvenient social obligations and to cultivate personalised relationships. The Central cluster showed a differentpattern. The items on which the sub-samples did not differ formed a general factor of collectivism consisting of the themes of familialism, hierarchy and relationship orientation. Collectivism was found to be unrelated to the respondents' rating of the importance attached to other's (over one's own) opinions, desires and interests. Femalestudents, and those who were low on caste, class and urban exposure attached greater importance to others' than to one's own desires, opinions and interests. The self-ratings of allocentrism and idiocentrism proved to be unreliable. © 1994, Sage Publications. All rights reserved.
Schooling and everyday cognitive development among Kharwar children in India: A natural experiment
(SAGE Publications Ltd, 2006) Symen A. Brouwers; Ramesh C. Mishra; Fons J.R. Van de vijver
The confounding of chronological and educational age and of schooling and socioeconomic status are persistent problems in the study of the cognitive consequences of schooling. The educational system among the Kharwar in India provides a natural experiment to overcome these problems, since it shows neither source of confounding. The sample comprised of 201 schooled and unschooled Kharwar children from 6 to 9 years of age. The test battery contained tests of mathematics and memory with formal and local stimulus content, as well as tests of inductive reasoning, analogies, fluency, picture vocabulary, and numbers. Confirmatory factor analyses supported similar hierarchical factor structures, with general intelligence in the apex, for both unschooled and schooled children. The per annum score increments of chronological age were about twice as large as those of educational age. These findings illustrate the important role of everyday experiences in the development of basic features of cognitive functioning. © The International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development.
Spatial language and cognitive development in India: An urban/rural comparison
(Psychology Press Taylor & Francis Group, 2005) Ramesh C. Mishra; Pierre R. Dasen
[No abstract available]
The Methodological Interface of Psychology and Anthropology
(Berghahn Books, 2007) Ramesh C. Mishra; Pierre R. Dasen
[No abstract available]