The Cognitive Cultural Models of Problem Solving in Persian-Language Proverbs

Proverbs are a set of thoughts and ideas that are expressed as succinct allegorical expressions and sentences and reflect the cultural values of the people of a society. Proverbs carry a deep insight into the customs, traditions and cultural heritage of a society and therefore help the people of that society to have a common conceptualization of the world and the experiences of their daily lives. It is mainly due to the disclosure of cultural and common values, that the proverbs always play a central role in anthropological studies from different point of views. Using the theory of cultural models, which is one of the most important theories proposed in cognitive anthropology, this article examines twelve Persian proverbs that are used in challenging situations among twenty Persian-speaking informants. Using descriptive-analytical method, the similarity test and multidimensional scaling, this research want to show what kind of cultural models Persian speakers use in critical situations as problem solving strategies. In fact, the purpose of this research is to pave the path to find an answer from a mental-cognitive point of view to the question of what are the cultural models and cultural strategies to solve the problem in critical and challenging situations among Persian speakers. The results showed that "trying to change conditions", "changing attitude towards conditions", "adapting to critical conditions" are among the cultural models that they use as problem solving strategies in times of crisis and challenge.