ATTITUDES AND MEMORIES IN TRANSACTION: A CROSSCULTURAL EXPLORATION OF INTERGROUP ATTITUDES AND THE REMEMBERING ACTIVITY (STORY RECALL).

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to explore the relationship between intergroup attitudes and the remembering activity of two culturally different groups of subjects. The theoretical basis of this study is the transactional model as outlined by Meacham (1977). According to this model, the attitudes, memories and the sociocultural background of the rememberer constantly and simultaneously alter one another in a reciprocal fashion. Different sociocultural experiences lead to different attitudes and memories, and any changes brought about in attitudes result in changes in memories and vice versa. To examine this system of relationship, two groups of American and Iranian subjects were recruited. Both groups consisted of 28 university students who were either upper classmen or graduate students. Subjects' initial attitudes toward three sets of attitudinal objects were assessed using a set of 37 Semantic Differential Scales. The three sets of attitudinal objects consisted of peoples and governments of three countries of Iran, Sweden, and the U.S. A week after the inital assessment, the subjects were engaged in a remembering activity which consisted of two tasks. The first task was a free recall task. The subjects were asked to recall, to the best of their abilities, the story of the American hostages in Iran. Following the free recall activity the subjects were given a set of 16 statements, which collectively described the entire hostage event in a concise manner. Each of these statements had four different components which the subjects were asked to mark if they would recognize them. The four components were action, agent, time, and explanation. Immediately after the recall and recognition tasks, the attitudes of the subjects toward the same attitudinal objects were assessed again. The data did not provide any support for the transactional model, but nevertheless revealed some significant differences between the two groups of subjects in regard to some of the attitudinal objects.