ABSTRACT
The statistics show an increased incidence among cross-cultural migrants, not only of people in receipt of disability pensions and in the process of obtaining a divorce, but also of child welfare cases, as demonstrated by a report from The Academy of Child Welfare Care in Oslo. Culture is a potent modifier of basic human needs, whether children are considered basically independent beings in whom dependence needs to be fostered or as dependent beings in whom independence needs to be developed. Feelings of guilt and shame are clearly psychoculturally conditioned and dependent upon variations in child rearing practices. The indices of both the behaviour and dynamics involved in shame thus imply a link with sociocentric patterns which, in western mainstream psychological thinking, have been assumed to be characteristic of earlier undifferentiated phases of development. Distance is a social need akin to closeness, and the lack of it may result in similar adverse effects on the subject's peace of mind.
