Short direct answer: The indigenous model of studying personality in cultural context emerged primarily as a reaction to the dominance of Western theories and measurement approaches in non-Western settings, aiming to develop culturally grounded concepts and assessments that reflect local meanings and constructs.

Explanation and context

• Core idea
  • Indigenous psychology argues that personality cannot be fully understood outside its cultural frame and that culturally specific concepts (emic units) are needed to capture local personality dynamics. This perspective arose in response to Western-centric models that often imposed universal traits or tests that may not map onto non-Western cultures.

• Historical motivation
  • The movement began as scholars noted the limitations of importing Western personality frameworks into diverse cultural settings, prompting a shift toward developing instruments and theories rooted in the local culture rather than relying on universal benchmarks.

• Related approaches
  • In cross-cultural personality study, three main approaches are recognized: cultural-comparative (testing Western models in other cultures), indigenous (developing culture-specific constructs), and the combined approach (integrating universal and cultural variations). The indigenous approach specifically foregrounds culture-bound constructs and assessments.

• Representative formulation
  • Key discussions and elaborations on this shift are found in open educational resources and scholarly articles that explicitly describe the indigenous approach as a corrective to Western dominance and as a driver for culturally valid measurement in personality research. Notable sources include Cheung and colleagues’ analyses and OpenStax/Open-access psychology materials that frame the shift.

Notes on terminology

• Emic vs etic
  • Indigenous (emic) orientation emphasizes culturally specific concepts that cannot be fully captured by universal (etic) models. This distinction underpins why indigenous psychology develops its own instruments and theories.

• Practical outcome
  • The indigenous model has led to the creation of culture-relevant personality constructs and assessment tools, rather than relying solely on Western-developed inventories.

If you’d like, I can pull more precise quotations from these sources or summarize how specific cultures have contributed distinct indigenous constructs to personality research.