Four Principles for Cultivating Alternate Cultural Paradigms in Psychology: Summary Reflections on Innovative Contributions

Abstract

The contributors to this special issue have demonstrated the potency and promise of cultivating Alternate Cultural Paradigms (ACPs) in psychology that reflect and express the lived realities of non-White communities in America. Based on my past research engagement with several distinct American Indian and First Nations communities, I offer for consideration four principles for psychologists who seek to further cultivate ACPs: (a) attend independently to culture and power, (b) anchor conceptual abstractions in empirical examples, (c) complicate stock oppositions and essentialisms, and (d) integrate emancipation with application. Adoption of these four principles should assist with the development of robust ACPs that accurately reflect the lived experiences of non-White communities. The promotion of these in psychology represents the exciting possibility for a more just and equitable future in which the injuries of White racism are remedied and all Americans are granted equal opportunities to live and thrive in self-determined fashion.