28th International Congress of Psychology August 8 ... - U-netSURF

esearch and related findings to the developmental efforts to facilitate policy formulation and
execution leading to social change and national development. In the 1960s necessity to undertake
applied research was strongly advocated and supported by the national funding agencies.
Significant contributions are made in the areas of intergroup relations, community work and
co-operation, social motivations, leadership, influence, deprivation, poverty, environmental stress
and health. The challenge is integrating psychological research with social action.
2053.2 Psychology in the Indian tradition: A classical model with contemporary relevance, Rao
Ramakrishna, Institute for Human Science & Service, India
This paper sketches the following psychological model with implications for educational theory,
therapeutic practices and social action. Psychology is the study of the person. The person is
embodied consciousness. Consciousness, mind and the brain are irreducibly distinct. They are
primary bases for three forms of awareness -- brain-processed learning, mind-generated
understanding, and consciousness-accessed realization. Embodied and conditioned, consciousness
becomes clouded and engenders the sense of ego. With the ego come attachment and craving and
consequent anxiety, insecurity, stress, distress, disease and suffering. The goal is liberating the
person from the existential predicament of ignorance and suffering. Yoga is the method.
2053.3 Cultural shaping of emotion experiences: The Indian experience, Girishwar Misra,
University of Delhi, India
The cultural shaping of emotional lives was empirically explored with the help of self reported
narratives in a group of Hindi speakers (N=140). The analysis antecedents of emotion experiences
revealed that while there are multiple pathways through which emotions are experienced there is
considerable similarity within and differences between emotion categories. The pattern faired
quite well when compared with emotional accounts in the texts of ancient India. As an interpretive
schema culture operates through normative practices and social institutions. Through enculturation
the culturally rooted meanings and implicit theories differentially shape emotional experiences and
influence communication, patterns social interaction and well-being.
2053.4 Concepts of social behaviour in India, Krishnan Lilavati, Indian Institute of
Technology, Kanpur, India
The present paper examines the cultural specificity of some Indian concepts of social behaviour.
Considering some examples, it is argued that daan as a form of prosocial behaviour goes beyond
the norms of social responsibility, reciprocity, and equity, and may be culture-specific.
Deservingness as a justice criterion in the Indian context, is a multi-dimensional concept, but is
evidently not culture-specific. The implications of using such concepts for alternative explanations
of cultural variations in social behaviour, and blending the prescriptive and conceptual
traditional-Indian approach with the non-prescriptive empirical approach of contemporary
psychology, are discussed.
2053.5 Indian research on cognitive and developmental psychology: Emerging Indigenous
perspectives, Mohanty Ajit K., Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
Review of Indian research in developmental and cognitive psychology shows an increasing
emphasis on contextual and broad socio-cultural variables and formal/structural aspects of
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