Maturity and Culture

IT seems to be desirable in a symposium of this type to state one's ideas in the form of propositions. A proposition is a belief which is held to be sound but requiring further exploration and validation.

A maturing person (I dislike to use the noun “maturity”) is one who is capable of sustaining a realistic insight respecting himself and is capable of meeting the changes and ordeals of experience as opportunities for further learning and growth.

Using this definition as a point of departure, my first proposition may be stated thus: The maturing process of human beings may be thought of as a series of inter-connected planes, each projecting itself in greater or lesser volume and intensity, depending upon certain internal and external factors. These planes may be designated as physiological, emotional, intellectual, and social. These intercalated planes, when thought of as a whole, furnish a description of personality. In observing personality it becomes readily apparent that these planes are rarely synchronized. It is my belief that one of the chief causes of asymmetry is to be found in the person's responses to features of his social environment, that is, his culture.

Standards of maturity are relative to time and place, or in terms of our present discussion, relative to culture. We should not expect persons to mature in the same manner nor toward the same goals in any two distinct cultures. According to Toynbee (A Study of History) the five great cultural systems which have survived and now exist in the contemporary world are:

1. The Orthodox Christian culture of Southeastern Europe and Russia,

2. The Islamic culture of North Africa, and Middle East and extending to the margins of China,

3. The Hindu culture limited to the sub-continent of India,

4. The Far East Culture which includes the arid zone and much of the Pacific Ocean, and

5. Western culture also called Christendom.