Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

We explored Asian- and Caucasian-American adults beliefs about illness, investigating whether conceptions of mentaland physical illness reflect the Western biomedical framework and an energy-healing practice grounded in traditionalChinese medicine. For physical illnesses (i.e., cold/flu and cancer), White young adults primarily cited biomedical causes,while Asian young adults and older energy believers often cited alternative causes, X2(4, N=27)=19.06, p¡.01. Whenasked about treatment and prevention, the energy believers continued to endorse alternative approaches, but both whiteand Asian young adults focused on biomedical approaches, X2(4, N=27)¿22.99, ps¡.0001. For mental illnesses (i.e.,depression and anxiety), the energy believers continued to endorse the alternative framework, while White and Asianyoung adults responses were more distributed between biomedical and alternative methods. These results suggest thatmental models of illness are shaped by cultural beliefs, and conflicting beliefs may coexist within young adults who arebeing enculturated in a new framework.