teaching philosophy about writing while answering reflect on three questions
What do you value in the teaching of writing? How do you reflect those values as you teach? How does research on social equity support both your values and your teaching methods (often referred to as pedagogy)?
Grammar for writing? An investigation of the effects
of contextualised grammar teaching
on students writing
Susan Jones Debra Myhill Trevor Bailey
Published online: 14 September 2012
Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012
Abstract The role of grammar instruction in the teaching of writing is contested in
most Anglophone countries, with several robust meta-analyses finding no evidence
of any beneficial effect. However, existing research is limited in that it only con-
siders isolated grammar instruction and offers no theorisation of an instructional
relationship between grammar and writing. This study, drawing on a theorised
understanding of grammar as a meaning-making resource for writing development,
set out to investigate the impact of contextualised grammar instruction on students
writing performance. The study adopted a mixed-methods approach, with a ran-
domised controlled trial and a complementary qualitative study. The statistical
analyses indicate a positive effect on writing performance for the intervention group
(e = 0.21; p \ 0.001); but the study also indicates that the intervention impact
differentially on different sub-groups, benefiting able writers more than weaker
writers. The study is significant in being the first to supply rigorous, theorised
evidence for the potential benefits of teaching grammar to support development in
writing.
Keywords Grammar Linguistics Writing Subject knowledge
Introduction
The instructional benefit of teaching of grammar in first language English curricula
is contested in both research and professional literature in Anglophone countries
(Gordon, 2005; Wyse, 2004) and in the Netherlands (van Gelderen & Oostdam,
S. Jones D. Myhill (&) T. Bailey
Graduate School of Education, University of Exeter, Heavitree Road, Exeter EX1 2LU, UK
e-mail: [emailprotected]
D. Myhill
University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia
123
Read Writ (2013) 26:12411263
DOI 10.1007/s11145-012-9416-1
2005; van Gelderen, 2006). Indeed, in the 1960s and 1970s, following the
Dartmouth Conference (Dixon, 1975), most Anglophone countries (for example,
England, Australia, New Zealand and the USA) abandoned grammar instruction on
the grounds that it was ineffectual in supporting language development, particularly
writing development (Locke, 2009). More recently, driven principally by policy
imperatives, grammar has been re-introduced into the English curriculum in
England, and a parallel process is currently occurring in Australia. However, there is
no clarity or agreement about the role of grammar in the English curriculum and it
remains a strongly contested issue (Myhill, 2011; Myhill & Jones, 2011; Myhill
et al., 2011). The uncertain role of grammar in the language curriculum is set within
an international context, in Anglophone countries particularly, expressing concerns
about the writing attainment of children (NCW, 2003; OFSTED, 2009; Salahu-Din,
Persky, & Miller, 2008). In England, for example, in 2011, 32 % of boys and 19 %
of girls entering secondary education had not achieved the baseline standard in
writing expected for their age group, compared with 20 % of boys and 13 % of girls
who had not achieved the baseline in reading (DfE, 2011). However, there have
been no systematic studies of whether making meaningful connections between
particular linguistic structures and particular writing tasks supports the development
of students writing. This paper reports on the outcomes of a randomised controlled
trial (RCT), funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, which
investigated the impact of contextualised grammar teaching on students writing
performance.
The effectiveness of grammar teaching
Empirical studies investigating the efficacy of grammar teaching provide little
evidence of any beneficial impact upon students competence in writing. Robust
meta-analyses by Braddock, Lloyd-Jones, and Schoer (1963), Hillocks (1986) and
most recently, by the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Co-
ordinating Centre (EPPI) (Andrews et al., 2006; EPPI, 2004) have concluded that
there is no evidence that teaching grammar is of benefit in supporting writing
development. Indeed, Hillocks and Smith (1991, 602) argue that research over a
period of nearly 90 years has consistently shown that the teaching of school
grammar has little or no effect on students.
There are, however, several major difficulties with almost all of the research that
these reviews represent. The first is that studies repeatedly investigate whether
various forms of grammar teaching, such as learning transformational grammar,
grammar exercises and drills, or parsing sentences, improve writing. The emphasis
is on teaching grammar in the hope that it might have an impact on writing
outcomes. In many of the studies (for example, Bateman & Zidonis, 1966; Elley,
Barham, Lamb, & Wylie, 1975, 1979; Robinson, 1959) isolated grammar lessons
are taught as part of a curriculum programme in grammar, and the writing measures
used to draw empirical conclusions are produced in a different teaching context.
Robinson (1959) tested grammatical knowledge and compared this with the quality
of their compositionshe correlated a grammar test with impression marking, and
looked only at word classes. Bateman and Zidonis (1966) taught a transformational
1242 S. Jones et al.
123
grammar course, with the purpose of determining the effects of a study of
transformational-generative grammar on the language growth of secondary school
pupils (Elley et al., 1979, 98). The Elley et al. study (1975, 1979) had three
treatment groups: the first was a course typical of English classes at that time in
New Zealand using a textbook addressing grammar, comprehension, and writing;
the second was a reading-writing course where students spent 40 % of their time
free reading, 40 % sharing a class reader, and 20 % writing; and the final treatment
group was a transformational grammar course with the intention of helping students
see how they can discover facts about their language and how they use it (1975,
28). Students in this group were taught about such things as sentence combining,
subordination, participial modifiers, and deep and surface structures. A second
difficulty with the few existing studies is that many are small -scale. The Bateman
and Zidonis study, for example, had a sample of 41 students.
A further difficulty is that none of the studies theorise an instructional
relationship between grammar and writing, which might inform the design of an
appropriate pedagogical approach. The studies are all located in very different
educational jurisdictions, with differing pre-existing curricular emphases on
grammar. In New Zealand, for example (Elley et al., 1975, 1979) there was
growing unease about the efficacy of traditional grammar teaching amongst
educational professionals, but also a back-to-basics call at policy level which
appeared to advocate strong doses of English grammar as a cure for some of our
educational ills (Elley et al., 1975, 3). But none directly address the inter-
relationship of grammar and writing, or offer a theoretical account of such an inter-
relationship.
Contextualised grammar teaching
Thus, there are, to date, no large-scale studies which investigate the benefits or
otherwise of teaching grammar in the context of writing lessons, in which
connections are forged for the student writer between the grammar under focus and
the learning focus for the writing. However, Hudson (2001) draws attention to a
Finnish doctoral study (Laurinen, 1955) which reports improved punctuation scores
for primary students who have been taught clause structures. Hudson argues that the
benefits accrued are because the particular area of grammar taught correlates with
the learning focus for writing, punctuation. Effective punctuation is underpinned by
grammatical understanding and the teaching helped the students to make
connections between the two.
This synergistic relationship between writing and grammatical understanding is
also evident in Fogel and Ehris (2000) study. This is unusual in taking as its starting
point an identified writing problem, the tendency of some ethnic minority children
to use non-standard Black English vernacular (BEV) in their writing. The study set
out to examine how to structure dialect instruction so that it is effective in teaching
SE forms to students who use BEV in their writing (Fogel & Ehri, 2000, 215) and
found a significant improvement in avoidance of BEV in the group who were given
both strategies and guided support. They argue that their results demonstrated that
the approach used had clarified for students the link between features in their own
Grammar for writing? 1243
123
nonstandard writing and features in SE (2000, 231). The Fogel and Ehri study
moves the field forward by beginning to look at the pedagogical conditions which
support or hinder the transfer of grammatical knowledge into written outputs.
Significantly, too, their study begins with a specific linguistic learning need around
which teaching is designed. Fearn and Farnan (2007) have also investigated
teaching grammar in the context of teaching writing, seeking to examine if there is
a way to teach grammatical structures that will satisfy high-stakes tests and
teachers needs, and at the same time, positively affect writing performance?
(Fearn & Farnan, 2007, 2). Their experimental study encouraged a problem-solving
approach, using oral language, and appears to be focused on the use of particular
linguistic structures or word class: there is no evident attempt to talk about the
construction of meaning or effect through form. Nonetheless, their study did find
positive impact of their intervention and their conclusion is that it is beneficial for
learners when grammar and writing share one instructional context (Fearn &
Farnan, 2007, 16). A recent meta-analysis by Graham and Perin (2007) looking at
effective strategies to teach writing did find that teaching sentence-combining,
helping students to construct more structurally complex sentences, had a positive
effect. In general, however, there is a dearth of studies which address contextualised
grammar teaching probably because grammar has traditionally been taught and
learned in an environment that is devoid of context (Mulder, 2010, 73) or not
taught at all.
Theorising grammar-writing connections
As noted above, a limitation in much of the existing research on grammar teaching
is that there is no clear conceptualisation of a theoretical rationale for why grammar
might support writing development (indeed much of the research is framed by
polemic and ideology). Educational linguists (Carter, 1990; Denham & Lobeck,
2005; Hancock, 2009) contend that a better understanding of how language works in
a variety of contexts supports learning in literacy. They draw particularly on the
principles of contemporary linguistic theories which are descriptive and socio-
cultural in emphasis, or as Carter describes them, functionally oriented, related to
the study of texts and responsive to social purposes (Carter, 1990, 104). This is in
contrast to the more prescriptive approach to grammar which traditional grammars
espoused (Hudson, 2004). In the US, there has been some emphasis on the notion of
grammar in context (Weaver, 1996, for example), but a theoretical relationship
between grammar and writing has never been adequately articulated, and the idea of
in context is problematic, often meaning in practice an isolated mini-grammar
lesson within an English lesson (for a critique of this, see Myhill, 2010a).
The difference between prescriptive and descriptive views of grammar is central to
a consideration of a theoretical rationale for attention to grammar in the teaching of
writing. Prescriptive grammar sets out how language should be used, the rules of
language use; whilst descriptive grammar looks at language in use. Denham and
Lobeck (2010, 3) contrast linguists who have sought to build a grammar that would
be adequate for describing the language with English teachers who have sought to
apply a grammar that is already constructed. Public and political views of grammar
1244 S. Jones et al.
123
tend strongly towards the prescriptive view, maintaining that the role of the teacher is
to address grammatical accuracy in writing and eradicate error (Myhill, 2011; Myhill
& Jones, 2011; Myhill et al., 2011). Hancock, reflecting on the US educational
context, observed that grammar is error and error is grammar in the public mind
(Hancock, 2009, 175). In England, the same tendency at public and policy level is
evidentgrammar is frequently presented as a remediation tool, a language
corrective. The Queens English Society, whose remit is the preservation of the
English language, maintain that grammar is important for the diagnosing of faults or
problems in ones own writing and in that of others (QES, 2011). Traditional school
grammar is prescriptive and is critiqued by Hudson for having no roots in modern
linguistics and for being fragmentary, dogmatic and prescriptive (Hudson, 2004,
116). Descriptive theories of grammar counterpoint the normative emphasis on
correctness, characteristic of prescriptive grammar, with a more socially-oriented
analysis of how language is used, including in different social, linguistic and cultural
contexts. A prescriptivist theory of a grammar-writing relationship would argue for
the importance of grammar in securing correctness in written expression; a
descriptivist theory of a grammar writing relationship would argue for the importance
of grammar in illuminating how written text generates meaning in different contexts.
The theoretical approach adopted in this study builds on descriptivist views of
grammar. Understanding and analysing how language works in different purposes
and contexts makes connections for learners between language as an object of study
and language in use, as realised in the act of writing. This is, in effect, a theory of
grammar centred upon rhetorical understanding. As a theoretical perspective, this
has at its heart the discussion and analysis of how meaning is crafted and created
through shaping language to achieve the writers rhetorical intentions (Kolln, 2002;
Locke, 2005; Micciche, 2004; Paraskevas, 2006). It aims to foster explicit
understanding and conscious control and conscious choice over language which
enables both to see through language in a systematic way and to use language more
discriminatingly (Carter, 1990, 119).
A theorised view of grammar teaching in the context of writing which builds on the
understandings outlined above, and which focuses on the teaching of writing rather
than the teaching of grammar, incorporates the following principles (Myhill, 2010a).
Firstly, writing is a communicative act supporting writers in understanding the social
purposes and audiences of texts and how language creates meanings and effects;
secondly, grammar is a meaning-making resource: supporting writers in making
appropriate linguistic choices which help them to shape and craft text to satisfy their
rhetorical intentions; and finally, connectivity, supporting writers in making
connections between their various language experiences as readers, writers and
speakers, and in making connections between what they write and how they write it.
Teachers grammatical subject knowledge
The absence of explicit grammar teaching in the English curriculum in Anglophone
countries for nearly 50 years has resulted in many present English teachers not
having the grammatical subject knowledge (GSK) needed to teach grammar
confidently. A survey of teachers in England in 1998 (QCA, 1998) revealed
Grammar for writing? 1245
123
considerable lack of confidence, in particular with clause structures and syntax. The
report noted a significant gap in teachers knowledge and confidence in
sentence grammar and this has implications for the teaching of language and
style in texts and pupils own writing (QCA, 1998, 35). In the US context, Vavra
(1996) observed the gap between modern linguistics and the prescriptive, rule-
bound grammar taught by most English teachers. Cameron (1997) argued that the
literature degree qualifications of most English teachers not only leaves them ill-
equipped to cope with grammar teaching, but also generates anxiety, hostility, and
lack of confidence towards grammar.
This lack of confidence plays out in English classrooms through inaccurate
teaching of grammar points (Myhill, 2000, 2003) and insecurity in dealing with
students questions (Burgess, Turvey, & Quarshie, 2000). In two studies investi-
gating pre-service teachers engagement with grammar, Cajkler and Hislam (2002,
2004) demonstrate how they struggle with GSK and how to use it appropriately in
the classroom. Hudson (2004) argued that without adequate grammatical knowledge
teachers cannot make the analysis of texts explicit, nor can they structure the
teaching context effectively.
Research questions
The over-arching research question that this study set out to investigate was: what
impact does contextualised grammar teaching have upon students writing and
students metalinguistic understanding? The qualitative study, not reported here,
provides evidence concerning students metalinguistic understanding, as well as
complementary evidence about the implementation of the intervention. The RCT
provides evidence concerning the impact of the intervention. Consequently, the
following hypotheses were formulated: (a) that contextualised grammar teaching
will be positively related to students writing performance, (b) that the quality of
teachers GSK will mediate the impact of contextualised grammar instruction.
Methodology
Participants
The participants were teachers (n = 32) and students (n = 855) of English in 32
different mixed comprehensive schools in the South-West and the Midlands regions
of England. In each school, a class of Year 8 students, aged 1213, formed the
sample for the RCT. In order to avoid selection bias (Cook & Wei, 2002), the school
sample was secured by using local authority data to compile a numbered list of all
mixed comprehensive schools in the South-West and the Midlands. A random
number generator was used to determine a rank order, and each school was
approached in rank order until the desired sample of 32 was reached.
Baseline data about participants were collected at school, teacher and student
level. At school level, data were compiled on national examination performance,
school inspection outcomes, ethnic diversity, Special educational needs (SEN) and
1246 S. Jones et al.
123
number of students entitled to free school meals (FSM) (as a proxy for socio-
economic status). At teacher level, data were collected on years of teaching
experience, degree subject studied and gender. In addition, teacher participants
undertook a test of GSK at the start of the study and the scores were used as further
baseline data. Student data comprised gender, whether they were students with
English as an additional language (EAL) or entitled to FSM. Attainment data in
English were also collated, drawing on standard national test results in English at
age eleven (including both a writing raw score and writing level) and school
predictions of English results in national tests at age fourteen.
Design
The study sought to investigate whether the use of teaching materials which
embedded grammar teaching within teaching units for writing improved students
performance in writing. Additionally, the study sought to examine whether teachers
GSK was a factor upon the efficacy or otherwise of the intervention.
The sample was first stratified at teacher level according to their GSK scores to
ensure that the two groups were matched, given that GSK is known to be a factor in
the teaching of grammar. The classes were then randomly assigned, using a random
number generator, to either a comparison or an intervention group. Because it is not
possible in a naturalistic educational setting to prevent any teaching of grammar
naturally occurring, we have consistently used the term comparison rather than
control group. The study was blind as participant teachers were not told the
research focus was grammar; instead they were told the focus was on the teaching of
writing (see also Ethical considerations section). Full details of the intervention
and comparison group teaching are provided further below.
Because causal relationships are rarely deterministic, to different degrees, all
causal relationships are context dependent (Shadish, Cook & Campbell, 2002, 5), a
complementary qualitative data set was collated alongside the experimental study to
provide in-depth understanding of the theoretical, pedagogical and contextual
implications of the statistical data. This mixed method approach is important for
RCTs conducted in educational contexts. Indeed, Moore, Graham, and Diamond
(2003) argue that to undertake a trial of an educational or social intervention without
an embedded qualitative process evaluation would be to treat the intervention as a
black box, with no information on how it worked, how it could be improved, or what
the crucial components of the intervention were. Likewise, Shadish et al. (2002, 71)
recommend the addition of qualitative methodologies to experiments to provide
better interpretation and avoid errors in applying research outcomes to practice. In this
study, the data comprised lesson observations, teacher and student interviews, and
writing samples. This paper reports principally from the statistical analysis of the RCT
(for an overview report of the full study, see Myhill et al., 2012).
Procedure
Three members of the research team (all former secondary English teachers) devised
three teaching units on writing, each addressing a different genre: fictional narrative,
Grammar for writing? 1247
123
argument, and poetry. These teaching units were in harmony with the requirements of
the National Curriculum for English (DCSF, 2007), a statutory instrument, and
addressed teaching objectives for Writing as set out in the Framework for Teaching
English (DfES, 2001), the recommended policy document guiding English teaching.
Three learning objectives which specifically addressed linguistic knowledge were
common to all three teaching units, giving the opportunity to explore, for example,
how sentence variety may fulfil different purposes in the three genres; the remaining
objectives were chosen for their relevance to the genre under study. Each teaching unit
was designed to take approximately 3 weeks of timetabled English lessons, and the
study period spanned a school year. In this respect, the intervention was wholly
aligned with curriculum and teaching norms and designed for implementation in a
naturalistic setting. The teaching units adopted many of the pedagogic practices
common in secondary English classrooms, such as the use of text models, group work
and discussion, opportunities for planning and drafting, peer assessment. To that
extent, they reflected typical practice in the teaching of writing. However, in addition,
within each unit, grammar teaching was embedded, making connections between a
linguistic feature and its effect in writing. Some of these were genre-specific. For
example, the fictional narrative unit looked at how first or third person are used to
create different voice or viewpoint. Others were more generically related to
improving writing: for example, varying sentence lengths to create textual rhythm
(For more detailed explanation of the teaching activities, see Myhill, 2010b, 2011;
Myhill & Jones, 2011; Myhill et al., 2011 in professional journals). There was no
focus on grammatical error or accuracy: rather the focus was to help writers to
recognise how making grammatical choices could shape their texts for communi-
cative purposes. Table 1 below provides an overview of the learning objectives and
written outcomes for each scheme and provides examples of the embedded grammar
focus.
Both the intervention and comparison group were taught the three types of
writing over the same period, addressing the same curriculum teaching objectives,
and producing the same written outcomes (in other words columns 1, 2, and 4 of
Table 1 were the same for both groups). Both groups were given the same set of
stimulus materials and resources, but only the intervention group had detailed
teaching units, planned at lesson level, in which grammar was explicitly taught.
Thus it is reasonable, as far as is possible within a naturalistic context, to conclude
that any differences in writing performance are attributable to the intervention.
Testing materials
The impact of the intervention on students writing performance was determined by
a pre and post test sample of writing. Both the pre and post test writing sample were
first person narratives, drawing on personal experience, and written under controlled
conditions (see Appendix 1). In order to avoid any possible bias created by the
precise choice of writing task, the topic was selected to avoid known gender
preferences in writing and to avoid the need of any specific topic knowledge or
experience. To minimise any possible test effect, a cross-over design was used: half
the sample took Writing Task 1 as the pretest, and the other half took Writing Test 2;
1248 S. Jones et al.
123
this was reversed for the post test. Both tests were independently marked by
Cambridge Assessment, an independent organisation who was responsible for
setting and marking the national test of writing for 14 year olds until 2006. The
mark schemes, one for each task, were developed based on the generic framework
underpinning the mark schemes used for all national curriculum writing tests. The
model was based specifically on the mark scheme used for the longer writing task in
the former Key Stage 3 English test. This criterion-based mark scheme has three
strands, with a maximum score of 30 marks: sentence structure and punctuation
(max. 8 marks), text structure and organisation (max. 8 marks), and composition and
Table 1 An overview of the three teaching units
Genre Learning objectives Grammar focus
examples (intervention
only)
Written outcomes
Fictional
narrative
Varying sentences and
punctuation for clarity and
effect
Developing varied linguistic and
literary techniques
Improving vocabulary for
precision and effect
Developing viewpoint, voice and
ideas
Using grammar accurately and
appropriately
Using sentence
fragments or short
sentences for
emphasis
Use of first/third
person to establish
viewpoint
Expanding noun
phrases to create
character description
A story plan, plus writing the
opening, the climax, or the
resolution of the story
Argument Varying sentences and
punctuation for clarity and
effect
Developing varied linguistic and
literary devices
Improving vocabulary for
precision and effect
Developing viewpoint, voice and
ideas
Structuring, organising and
presenting texts in a variety of
forms on paper and on screen
Using grammar accurately and
appropriately
Using modal verbs to
create different
degrees of assertion
Using co-ordination to
create counter
arguments
Using subordination to
articulate
propositions
A written persuasive speech
Poetry Varying sentences and
punctuation for clarity and
effect
Developing varied linguistics
and literary techniques
Improving vocabulary for
precision and impact
Generating ideas, planning and
drafting
Using expanded noun
phrases to create a
picture poem
Comparing line length
in poetry with
sentence variety in
prose
Using sentence
patterning for effect
A portfolio of three poems,
plus reflective annotation
Grammar for writing? 1249
123
effect (max. 14 marks). Each strand is linked to two of the assessment focuses for
writing and the criteria are derived from national curriculum levels. For each set of
scripts, Cambridge Assessment provided a first markers set of marks, a second
markers set and a resolution mark, adjudicated by a third senior marker if the first
two marks were very different. Cambridge Assessment devised training materials
for marking; delivered a training day for each marking round; and ensured the usual
standardisation checks during the marking. The markers did not know from which
treatment group the writing was derived, and the research team was not involved in
the process of marking and assessment at all. A full report was provided by
Cambridge Assessment on the marking process, including a brief commentary on
the writing itself. Markers reported some evidence of carelessness in the post-test
writing, which led to speculation that some students might have been less motivated
than in the first round, perhaps because the task was completed at the end of the
academic year.
Attrition and fidelity
The principle of intervention fidelity is highly problematic in naturalistic educational
settings as it is very difficult to control the key variable of the teacher. There is always
a methodological trade-off between internal validity and ecological validity, and the
study privileged ecological validity. It is important to understand the ways in which
the intervention was mediated by the teachers. Thus, although each teacher in the
intervention had the same training and the same set of materials, it was neither possible
nor ethical to attempt to achieve identical implementation. Teachers were allowed to
adapt materials to suit the needs of their students, but they were asked to maintain the
specified learning focus and the intervention group were asked to remain as close as
possible to the teaching methods in the teaching units. The qualitative study,
particularly the lesson observations and teacher interviews, indicates that all bar one
teacher used the teaching units throughout the research period, and there was a high
level of commitment to the project. In all the lessons observed, the teaching units were
being used. In the teacher interviews just over half of the teachers specifically claimed
they had maintained high fidelity to the teaching schemes, in part because of their
commitment to the research project, or as one teacher put it, Ive tried to be faithful to
your project. They also appeared content to maintain high fidelity to the intervention
because of their approval of the quality of the schemesI think the scheme of work
is really, really good; and the sense that they were being successful with the
studentsI think the lessons are going really well and I think theyre really
learning. However, there were differences in the way they were implemented. Where
adaptations were made, a significant number were pragmatic adaptations in timing,
where tasks or activities had to be truncated because of time limitations. However, of
particular relevance to the research focus of the study, is the fact that some of the
adaptations were altering or omitting the focus on grammar at the heart of the research
because it was felt to be too difficult. One teacher reflected that she found it really
difficult and I adapted it to something else, whilst another just totally left out the
clause part of that exercise, the final element because actually, in the scheme so far we
havent taught, I havent taught them anything about clauses, so it would have just
1250 S. Jones et al.
123
completely have gone over their head. Another felt that her students would really
struggle with ellipsis. I deliberately didnt use the term, as with a lot of terms in this
scheme, saying a term that theyve not come across before would scare them. These
adaptations to the grammar element of the lessons link to the statistical finding,
reported later in this paper, that teachers GSK was an important factor in mediating
the intervention.
However, one teacher in the comparison group showed such low levels of fidelity
that it was decided to exclude this class from the data analysis (for example, she
taught lessons whi
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psych week 7 DQ 1
Discussion: Cultural Influences on Psychological Conditions
Cultures have different views of understanding psychological disorders and psychological maladjustment. For instance, some cultures may view psychological conditions resulting from a bio-medical condition such as a brain condition. Other cultures view psychological conditions deriving from psychosocial stressors from social causes. Still other cultures combine multiple explanations. For this reason, as a working professional, it will be important for you to understand how culture influences the way psychological conditions are treated.
For this Discussion, you will examine the influence of culture on psychological conditions or treatments.
To Prepare:
Review this weeks Learning Resources and consider a psychological condition or treatment you are unfamiliar with and the culture in which it occurs.
By Day 4
Post and describe a psychological condition or treatment that was unfamiliar to you. Then, explain why you think this condition or treatment occurs in the culture you read about but not in others, that you know about.
Learning Resources
Required Readings
Hwang, W., Myers, H. F., Abe-Kim, J., & Ting, J. Y. (2008). A conceptual paradigm for understanding culture’s impact on mental health: The cultural influences on mental health (CIMH) model. Clinical Psychology Review, 28(2), 211227. doi:10.1016/j.cpr.2007.05.00.
Abi-Hashem, N. (2018). Trauma, coping, resiliency among Syrian refugees in Lebanon and beyond. In G. Rich & S. Sirikantraporn (Eds.), Human strengths and resilience: Developmental, cross-cultural, and international Perspectives (pp. 105124).Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Credit Line: Human Strengths and Resilience: Developmental, Cross-Cultural, and International Perspectives, by Rich, G.; Sirikantraporn, S. Copyright2018 by Lexington Books. Reprinted by permission ofLexington Books via the Copyright Clearance Center.
Draguns, J. G., & Tanaka-Matsumi, J. (2003). Assessment of psychopathology across and within cultures: Issues and findings. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 41(7), 755776.
Lewis-Fernandez, R., & Kleinman, A. (1988). Culture, personality, and psychopathology. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 103(1), 6771.
Lopez, S. R., & Guarnaccia, P. J. J. (2000). Cultural psychopathology: Uncovering the social world of mental illness. Annual Review of Psychology, 51, 571598
Ryder, A. G., Yang, J., & Heine, S. J. (2002). Somatization vs. psychologization of emotional distress: A paradigmatic example for cultural psychopathology. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, 10(3).
Credit Line: International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology, & Ryder, A. G.; Yang, J.; Heine, S. J. (2002). Somatization vs. Psychologization of Emotional Distress: A Paradigmatic Example for Cultural Psychopathology. Retrieved from https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1080&context=orpc. Used with permission of International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology.
Optional Resources
Kleinman, A. (1982). Neurasthenia and depression: A study of somatization and culture in China. Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry, 6(2), 117190. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF00051427
Lewis-Fernandez, R., et al. (2014). Culture and psychiatric evaluation: Operationalizing cultural formulation for DSM-5. Psychiatry, 77(2), 130154.
Note: Retrieved from the Walden Library databases.
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