Students' eye movements were monitored
Western and Eastern people look at the world in different ways, University of Michigan scientists have claimed.
Researchers compared the way 26 Chinese and 25 US students viewed photographs of animals or inanimate objects set against complex backgrounds.
Westerners' eyes tended to focus on the main subject while the eyes of their Eastern counterparts kept flicking to background details, they said.
The study is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
People from different cultures may allocate attention differently, even within a shared environment
University of Michigan
Its findings appear consistent with previous research which has suggested Eastern people think in a more holistic way than Westerners, instinctively paying greater heed to context.
In contrast, Westerners were thought to be more focused and analytical.
The latest study found that to start with, both American and Chinese students fixed mainly on the background.
But after 420 milliseconds the Americans began to concentrate their attention more on the foreground objects.
This was not true for the Chinese, who kept throwing glances at the background.
Memory differences
The researchers also tested the ability of volunteers to remember previously seen foreground objects when they were superimposed against new backgrounds.
The Chinese students were more likely to forget they had been shown an object before.
In their memory, the foreground object and its original background appeared to be bound together.
The researchers, led by Dr Richard Nisbett, wrote: "The Americans' propensity to fixate sooner and longer on the foregrounded objects suggests that they encoded more visual details of the objects than did the Chinese.
"If so, this could explain the Americans' more accurate recognition of the objects even against a new background."
The researchers suggested social practices may play a role in the differing approaches.
"East Asians live in relatively complex social networks with prescribed role relations.
"Attention to context is, therefore, important for effective functioning.
"In contrast, Westerners live in less constraining social worlds that stress independence and allow them to pay less attention to context.
"The present results provide a useful warning in a world were opportunities to meet people from other cultural backgrounds continue to increase.
"People from different cultures may allocate attention differently, even within a shared environment.
"The result is that we see different aspects of the world, in different ways."
Le concept de semence dans les théories de la matière à la Renaissance
de Marsile Ficin à Pierre Gassendi --- Brepols, 2005. --- Publié avec le concours de la Fondation Universitaire de Belgique
出版社の公式紹介｜アマゾン・フランス｜詳しい章立て｜インデクス
全文仏文ですが、引用文（主にラテン語とドイツ語）は豊富です。フランスやアメリカと違って、注はタフなものとなっていますのでイタリアやドイツの感じを想像しておくと良いかもしれません（そこまで行かない？ま、両者の中間ぐらいです）。国際科学史アカデミー叢書 Collections of Studies from the International Academy of History of Science というシリーズに入って、国際学術出版の老舗ブレポルス書店 Brepols, Turnhout (Belgium) から出版されました。ちなみに、日本語ヴァージョンはありません。目指すは、「10年に一冊の重み」に入るような歴史に残る本です。16世紀の生命と物質そして自然観、パラケルスス主義、新プラトン（フィチーノ）主義、キミア（錬金術＝化学）、種子、スピリトゥス（プネウマ）、ロゴイ・スペルマティコイ（種子的理性）、キンタ・エッセンチア（第５精髄）、アリストテレス主義の鉱物学、その辺がキーワードです。
In Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche affirms that
"whoever despises himself still respects himself as one who despises."
Quoted late in Chuck Barris's Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, translated for film by George Clooney from the screenplay by the suddenly ubiquitous Charlie Kaufman, the aphorism perfectly captures the duality of self-loathing cum self-adoration that is the paradox of the modern confessional.
Hat man sein warum? des Lebens, so verträgt man sich fast mit jedem wie? - Der Mensch strebt nicht nach Glück; nur der Engländer thut das.
Does man have a reason for being? How does everyone tolerate their life? - Humans do not strive for happiness; only the Englishman does that.
If we have our own why of life, we shall get along with almost any how. Man does not strive for pleasure; only the Englishman does.
