Global Issues

Global Cultural Differences

Factors such as economics, beliefs, and politics strongly influence global cultural differences. Identification of the gifted and talented, in particular, focuses on what is most esteemed in a society. Religion, for example, is the major influence in directing the everyday lives of millions outside the Western world, and interpretations of holy writings often determine what children may and may not learn. In the Western view, non-Western parts of the world instruct children in nonrational ways. There, fate, in the form of a god, gods, or holy men, will decide an individual's life-path. This means that children's exercise of free will, following one's own interests to reach excellence, or questioning what one is taught, is unacceptable.

In the Western world, old-style schooling involving corporal punishment, dividing curricula into boys' and girls' subject areas, and didactic instruction has largely gone. This is not the case elsewhere. For example, the daughters of the Taliban are not the only girls forbidden education beyond the minimum; this is equally true in many other regions, such as Pakistan, where illiteracy among women is the acceptable norm. The concept of giftedness in such societies is more likely to be one that is morally and socially approved than any quality based on personal achievement.

All children grow up in families, although in developed countries, the term indicating the basic unit in a society varies widely. The term family now includes a high and growing percentage of families headed by a single woman (one-third of all in the United Kingdom) and some with same-gender parents. In the United States, many more high achievers come from two-parent compared with one-parent homes. But in other parts of the world, families may be extended and organized in a hierarchy of age and gender. Three generations under [Page 398]one roof means privacy may be unknown and income as well as ideas and daily rituals may be pooled. Powerful forces shape the outlooks of the young, so that a child's achievements and aims may be ascribed (especially for girls) rather than chosen. Individual, personal hopes are not an option, and sanctions for breaking convention can be as severe as death.

Millions of the world's children have to work to support themselves or help support their families and so have minimum, if any time, at school. This severely limits their knowledge acquisition, as well as their taste for school-type learning. For most, there is no alternative to contributing to the family's essential life support. This problem is relatively more acute for children with the potential to reach a high standard. In addition, the environments of poor children are often unhealthy places to grow up in, both physically and psychologically, so that their loss is not only of health and education, but also of normal psychological development. Dire poverty can stunt their maturation, as well as their intelligence and ability to think ahead, though the time they are able to spend in school, limited as it may be, can have lifelong value.

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