ABSTRACT
The style, methodology, general frameworks, and inspiration of scientific research are more directly determined by culture, and especially by the culture of scientific education, than by language. There are numerous historical examples to illustrate this general point. Of course, language often coincides with culture, and then the two aspects are indistinguishable. In the case of Francophone psychology, however, there are at least two major cultures involved, the French-speaking culture of Western Europe, involving France and parts of Switzerland and Belgium, and that of Northern American French-speaking Canada. So we might expect to see differences in research coming from these two cultural spheres, and the differences found might be even more outspoken if we also had contributions from French-speaking African nations. However, it is important to keep in mind that language often channels cultural exchange, in focusing the speakers of a language into the culture of the language’s dominant nation. In this sense, France has always played an important role in the whole of the French-speaking culture.
