PROJECT SUMMARY

DHB – Understanding Conceptual and Cultural Change:

The Role of Expertise and Flexibility in Folk Medicine

Principal Investigator: Norbert O. Ross, Vanderbilt University

Other Collaborating Institutions: Vanderbilt University Medical Center,

University of California, Los Angeles

International Collaborator: Dr. Jose Ferrer, Guayacan

This project brings together tools, techniques, and insights from anthropology, cognitive psychology, and computer science to investigate the dynamics of human conceptual knowledge and its effect on cultural processes. Cognitive psychology informs cross-cultural experiments in the field, while cross-cultural findings motivate behavioral experiments and psychological theories. Theories are cast in terms of computational mechanisms. The resulting computational models make predictions concerning conceptual dynamics and cultural dynamics, which can be tested in the laboratory and in the field. This synergy will inform and relate theories of cultural transformation, cognitive dynamics, and computational modeling.

Intellectual Merit. At the center of the project is an exploration of the multifaceted dynamics of

conceptual knowledge about folk medicine. The primary research site is the Highlands of Chiapas, where we will study within- and cross-cultural differences in conceptual knowledge among Tzotzil Maya and Ladinos. We systematically examine how folkmedical concepts are represented and used by novices and a variety of experts and relate patterns of conceptual agreement to the structure of social/expert networks.

Given the relative isolation of their community, clear cultural differences are expected to be found in folkmedical concepts of Maya and Ladinos. We explore short-term dynamics of conceptual change by sponsoring a medical workshop provided by a local NGO and a Vanderbilt physician, consultants on this proposal. We explore long-term dynamics of conceptual change by extending a study by Linda Garro, also a consultant, to examine changes in folkmedical knowledge by expert and novice groups in Pichataro, a Purepecha community that has witnessed significant change over the thirty years since Garro’s original research. We also explore conceptual knowledge of folkmedicine for Hispanics in the Nashville area, allowing us both to understand conceptual models of US immigrants but also providing a key comparison group to Pitchataro (an area where many US immigrants originate). Field research combines ethnographic analyses with experimental techniques adapted from cognitive psychology; results from the field provide hypotheses about the psychological mechanisms underlying conceptual knowledge, guiding experiments in the laboratory. The project aims to better understand how conceptual knowledge is represented, how it differs among experts and novices, how it is acquired from instruction, observation, and intervention, and how it changes with new experiences. Computational modeling grounds psychological mechanisms in mathematical and computational formalisms, adding rigor to our theories and allowing the complex dynamics of conceptual change to be explored in simulation. New advances in modeling investigate how conceptual knowledge can be incrementally adjusted from new experiences, how causal knowledge is integrated with rule-based and statistical knowledge, and how conceptual models and agent-based models can be integrated. Ultimately, we aim to bridge multiple levels of analysis in order to develop an understanding of how cultural processes constrain individual cognition, how cognitive mechanisms contribute to cultural change, and how these mechanisms can be formally characterized in computational models.

Broader Impacts. This collaboration enhances the interdisciplinary perspectives of investigators from anthropology, psychology, and computer science, influencing future research, teaching, and continued public outreach. Importantly, it trains a new generation of scientists to combine methods, perspectives, and theoretical approaches from different fields. The project will foster international ties with researchers in Mexico (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Chiapas, México, Universidad Michoacana, and Universidad de Las Americas). It builds on established programs in Vanderbilt’s Department of Anthropology to bring promising young scientists from Mexican communities to Vanderbilt for graduate study. And while the focus is on the dynamics of conceptual knowledge, a specific understanding of conceptual knowledge about folk medicine could contribute toward educating the public – especially our growing immigrant population – about scientific medical treatments. Furthermore, the project includes Vanderbilt Medical School personnel and will help train a new generation of medical staff to deal with the challenges of attending to an increasing number of patients from different cultural settings.