The Native Mind and the Cultural Construction of Nature [Paperback]

The Native Mind and the Cultural Construction of Nature beautifully illustrates Atran and Medin's findings in the realm of folkbiology. They present a series of brilliantly conceived and executed studies whose importance goes far beyond being invaluable science to having real implications for social policy, especially in areas concerned with the environmental issues. This book is essential reading for psychologists, who all too often look at problems from the lens of just one culture, for anthropologists, who all too often neglect evolved universals of thought, and for anyone else interested in the relations between culture, thought, and human values.

An analysis of the cognitive consequences of diminished contact with nature examines the relationship between how people think about the natural world and how they act on it, and how these are affected by cultural differences.

Surveys show that our growing concern over protecting the environment is accompanied by a diminishing sense of human contact with nature. Many people have little commonsense knowledge about natureare unable, for example, to identify local plants and trees or describe how these plants and animals interact. Researchers report dwindling knowledge of nature even in smaller, nonindustrialized societies. In The Native Mind and the Cultural Construction of Nature, Scott Atran and Douglas Medin trace the cognitive consequences of this loss of knowledge. Drawing on nearly two decades of cross-cultural and developmental research, they examine the relationship between how people think about the natural world and how they act on it and how these are affected by cultural differences.

These studies, which involve a series of targeted comparisons among cultural groups living in the same environment and engaged in the same activities, reveal critical universal aspects of mind as well as equal³