Human Motives and Cultural Models

A full understanding of human action requires an understanding of what motivates people to do what they do. For too many years studies of motivation have drawn from different theoretical paradigms. Typically, human motivation has been modeled on animal behavior, while culture has been described as pure knowledge or symbol. The result has been insufficient appreciation of the role of culture in human motivation and a truncated view of culture as disembodied knowledge. The anthropologists in this volume have attempted a different approach, seeking to integrate knowledge, desire, and action into a single explanatory framework. This research builds on recent work in cognitive anthropology on cultural models.

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“This useful, at times exciting collection revives the integrationist vision of culture of Weber, Benedict, and Geertz, a vision that has been taking quite a beating in recent years.”

David Lipset, University of Minnesota

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“Why does one American profess to believe in ‘the American dream’ of financial success without acting on it while another pursues it relentlessly?  Such questions suggest that, if culture constitutes reality, it does so in an uneven way… variations in cognitive models across contexts and times can be used to explain how motivation also varies.”

Stephen C. Leavitt, Union College