Journalist Thom Hartmann recently talked about an article featured in science titled (posted below): Large-Scale Psychological Differences Within China Explained by Rice Versus Wheat Agriculture.
As noted by the Washington journal article (posted below), Malcolm Gladwell brought up this topic in his book Outliers, which is where i must have first come across the idea. I'm surprised this question isn't talked about more, and i've often thought about the impact these seemingly innocuous differences have on our culture and even our genetic make up – or at least what is activated. Didn't Shakespeare say how the heat of Verona brought mens tempers to boil?
The idea of the article, as i understand it, is that rice paddies require collective work where a wheat field permits you to be more individualistic. Thom Hartmann mentions that rice paddies are interconnected so that if one persons rice paddy fails, it affects those surrounding him, therefore cooperation means survival.
If i recall correctly, Gladwell discusses more that, a rice paddy requires constant attention and care, checking water levels daily, where a wheat field permits the farmer to take it easy, thus cultivating a much more laid back kinda fellow. This is then taken further to infer our habits today, are effected by our heritage, thus do we have an inbuilt physiological expectation of certain 'rhythms' which would dictate when we rest? (ie. winter, because the fields are frozen, so we can dance around the village bon fire and be merry etc..)
I've often pondered a statement from a linguist who said that language is shaped by many things, in particular, his statement was that farmers accents are more clipped because any languid accent would get lost in the wind, over the space of a few fields, where a loud and sharper voice made the words easier to understand.
So all is posted below, including a link to Asian Scientists take
(and i hope this is in the right section, i did search to see if anything similar had been posted)
_http://www.asianscientist.com/in-the-lab/rice-wheat-crop-choice-influence-collectivism-2014/
Edit: WSJ link added
As noted by the Washington journal article (posted below), Malcolm Gladwell brought up this topic in his book Outliers, which is where i must have first come across the idea. I'm surprised this question isn't talked about more, and i've often thought about the impact these seemingly innocuous differences have on our culture and even our genetic make up – or at least what is activated. Didn't Shakespeare say how the heat of Verona brought mens tempers to boil?
The idea of the article, as i understand it, is that rice paddies require collective work where a wheat field permits you to be more individualistic. Thom Hartmann mentions that rice paddies are interconnected so that if one persons rice paddy fails, it affects those surrounding him, therefore cooperation means survival.
If i recall correctly, Gladwell discusses more that, a rice paddy requires constant attention and care, checking water levels daily, where a wheat field permits the farmer to take it easy, thus cultivating a much more laid back kinda fellow. This is then taken further to infer our habits today, are effected by our heritage, thus do we have an inbuilt physiological expectation of certain 'rhythms' which would dictate when we rest? (ie. winter, because the fields are frozen, so we can dance around the village bon fire and be merry etc..)
I've often pondered a statement from a linguist who said that language is shaped by many things, in particular, his statement was that farmers accents are more clipped because any languid accent would get lost in the wind, over the space of a few fields, where a loud and sharper voice made the words easier to understand.
So all is posted below, including a link to Asian Scientists take
(and i hope this is in the right section, i did search to see if anything similar had been posted)
The extract from the paper:
Large-Scale Psychological Differences Within China Explained by Rice Versus Wheat Agriculture
Cross-cultural psychologists have mostly contrasted East Asia with the West. However, this study shows that there are major psychological differences within China. We propose that a history of farming rice makes cultures more interdependent, whereas farming wheat makes cultures more independent, and these agricultural legacies continue to affect people in the modern world. We tested 1162 Han Chinese participants in six sites and found that rice-growing southern China is more interdependent and holistic-thinking than the wheat-growing north. To control for confounds like climate, we tested people from neighboring counties along the rice-wheat border and found differences that were just as large. We also find that modernization and pathogen prevalence theories do not fit the data.
Received for publication 4 October 2013.
Accepted for publication 25 March 2014.
Editors summary
Individualism Rules?
On a diverse and large set of cognitive tests, subjects in East Asian countries are more inclined to display collectivist choices, whereas subjects in the United States are more inclined to score as individualists. Talhelm et al. (p. 603; see the Perspective by Henrich) suggest that one historical source of influence was societal patterns of farming rice versus wheat, based on three cognitive measures of individualism and collectivism in 1000 subjects from rice- and wheat-growing regions in China.
_http://www.sciencemag.org/content/344/6184/603
Thom Hartmann discusses a study that looked at the differences between people living in rice growing areas and wheat growing areas.
https://youtu.be/Qw64Gk06YBU
In China, as in many countries, the north-south divide runs deep. People from the north are seen as hale and hearty, while southerners are often portrayed as cunning, cultured traders. Northerners are taller than southerners. The north eats noodles, while the south eats rice—and according to new research, when it comes to personality, that difference has meant everything.
A study published Friday by a group of psychologists in the journal Science finds that China’s noodle-slurping northerners are more individualistic, show more “analytic thought” and divorce more frequently. By contrast, the authors write, rice-eating southerners show more hallmarks traditionally associated with East Asian culture, including more “holistic thought” and lower divorce rates.
The reason? Cultivating rice, the authors say, is a lot harder. Picture a rice paddy, its delicate seedlings tucked in a bed of water. They require careful tending and many hours of labor—by some estimates, twice as much as wheat—as well as reliance on irrigation systems that require neighborly cooperation. As the authors write, for southerners growing rice, “strict self-reliance might have meant starvation.”
Growing wheat, by contrast, the north’s staple grain, is much simpler. One Chinese farming guide from the 1600s quoted in the study advised aspiring farmers that “if one is short of labor power, it is best to grow wheat.”
To produce their findings, the authors evaluated the attitudes of 1,162 Han Chinese students in Beijing and Liaoning in the north and in Fujian, Guangdong, Yunnan and Sichuan in the south. To control for other factors that distinguish the north and south—such as climate, dialect and contact with herding cultures—the authors also analyzed differences between various neighboring counties in five central provinces along China’s rice-wheat border.
According to the authors, the influence of rice cultivation can help explain East Asia’s “strangely persistent interdependence.” For example, they say South Korea and Japan have remained less individualistic than Western countries, even as they’ve grown more wealthy.
The authors aren’t alone in observing the influence various crops have on shaping culture. Malcolm Gladwell in his 2008 book “Outliers” also drew connections between a hard-working ethic (measured by a willingness to fill out long, tedious questionnaires) to a historical tradition of rice cultivation in places such as South Korea, Taiwan and Japan, given that the farming of such crops is arguably an equally tedious chore.
But what will happen to such differences after people move away from tending such crops, as is now happening across China? The study cites findings that U.S. regions settled by Scottish and Irish herders show more violence even long after most herders’ descendants have found other lines of work as evidence that cultural traits stubbornly resist change, even over time. (Herders, psychologists theorize, are ready to put their lives on the line to protect their animals against thieves or attack.)
“In the case of China,” the authors conclude, “only time will tell.”
_http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2014/05/09/wheat-vs-rice-how-chinas-north-south-culinary-divide-shapes-personality/
_http://www.asianscientist.com/in-the-lab/rice-wheat-crop-choice-influence-collectivism-2014/
Edit: WSJ link added