Folk conceptions of humanness: Beliefs about distinctive and core human characteristics in Australia, Italy, and China

Bain, P., Vaes, J., Kashima, Y., Haslam, N. and Guan, Y. (2012) Folk conceptions of humanness: Beliefs about distinctive and core human characteristics in Australia, Italy, and China. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 43 (1). pp. 53-58.

Abstract

The present research explores cultural understandings of what it means to be human. We used open-ended responses to examine whether the most culturally salient aspects of humanness are captured by two theoretical dimensions: human uniqueness (HU) and human nature (HN). Australians, Italians, and Chinese (N = 315) showed differences in the characteristics considered human and in the emphasis placed on HU and HN. These findings contribute to developing cross-cultural folk psychological models of humanness.