{"id":10656,"date":"2018-02-08T11:52:04","date_gmt":"2018-02-08T02:52:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ibpsych.themantic-education.com\/?p=10656"},"modified":"2018-02-08T11:52:04","modified_gmt":"2018-02-08T02:52:04","slug":"what-is-an-emic-concept","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themantic-education.com\/ibpsych\/2018\/02\/08\/what-is-an-emic-concept\/","title":{"rendered":"What is an “emic concept?”"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post is for the “old” syllabus (May and Nov 2018 exams) and is not needed for the new one. The LO for the old syllabus is: “Using one or more examples, explain \u201cemic\u201d and \u201cetic\u201d concepts.”<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

An emic concept refers to an approach to research that involves studying behaviour in a single culture. This is different to an etic approach which seeks to find universal behaviours and\/or universal explanations for behaviour.<\/p>\n

Some behaviours are culturally specific, whereas others are universal. The emic approach to research focuses on culturally specific behaviours. One of the characteristics of emic studies is that they often use members of the community or culture being studied, as they enable the researchers to understand the behaviour in that community. In this sense, they are studying a unique\u00a0 behaviour “from the inside.” They also tend to be qualitative in nature and use a variety of methods, such as interviews, questionnaires and observations.<\/p>\n

The word “concept” in this learning outcome really means “approach to research.” So if you rephrase this LO to read, ““Using one or more examples, explain \u201cemic\u201d and \u201cetic\u201d approaches to research”\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>it becomes much easier to understand.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One area of study that has benefited from an emic approach is understanding symptoms of psychological disorders. For example, experiencing trauma has an effect on people from a range of cultures. However, symptomatologies* may be different across cultures. Understanding culturally unique symptoms of experiencing trauma can be extremely valuable, especially for Aid workers and people trying to provide assistance to those in an area that is vulnerable to trauma-related symptoms.<\/p>\n

*A symptomatology is a particular set of symptoms of a disease or disorder.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Key Study: Culturally-specific Symptoms of Experiencing Trauma in Ugandan Children (Betancourt, et al. 2009)<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Before we look at the methodology of the study, it’s important to know some context about what is happening in Uganda, a country that has had ongoing conflict for over 20 years. Nearly 2 million people have lost their homes and are living in camps. Children are often abducted to become soldiers in one of the armies, the Lord’s Resistance Army. As you can imagine, many children living in camps have experienced and been exposed to extremely traumatic events\u00a0(see video below).<\/p>\n

Previous research on Ugandan children has shown that there are high levels of PTSD in these youths who have experienced traumatic events related to the war. However, some studies are criticized because they use Western diagnostic systems (e.g. the DSM) to understand the symptoms of Ugandan children.<\/p>\n

Therefore, one of the main aims of Betancourt et al.’s (2009) study was\u00a0to understand the psychosocial problems affecting Ugandan children from the perspective of the children and their caretakers. This\u00a0would help organizations that were trying to help these children deliver better care and treatment for their symptoms.<\/p>\n

The researchers used a purposive sample of 10-17 year old Ugandan children and their caretakers and conducted interviews to get their data. One of the interview methods they used was “Free List” which is when a question is asked in a way that encourages a list as a response. One of their FL questions was “What are the problems of children in this camp?”<\/p>\n

Their research found some of the problems related to locally defined symptoms, including:<\/p>\n