Estimulo – Respuesta – Reforzamiento en el Conductismo

Regarding the notion of poverty in a material sense is to see it as a state where a person is without money or food, a place to live or work. Although I found that the idea of poverty was well understood in this general material sense as having an effect on a person’s material well-being, a way of seeing “New Zealand poverty” as being about something other than material also emerged in the interviews. In this non-material way of knowing about poverty and what it means to be poor, a lack of knowledge, education and life skills were emphasized over a lack of access to basic material resources such as food, electricity and housing. Therefore by drawing on a non-material explanation for poverty a lack of basic resources was regarded in terms of mismanagement by a person (or the state) of the income or resources that they have access to. Thus although poverty could be defined in the first instance in material terms, the non-material explanation was also drawn on as this quote demonstrates:

…. In New Zealand I think it would be what your house looks like. Whether you have got a car. Whether you have got material things. And they, I think people measure poverty by materialistic things, though of course there is emotional poverty. Although I think to me it is more a visual theme of having material things.

Participants made a point of stressing that poverty has generally been measured by government in a financial sense and they used the idea of a non-material definition in the interview to resist a perceived assumption that poverty is always due to a lack of money or access to material things. This quote summed up this argument:

…So that is perhaps another aspect of poverty you may or may not of

thought about. Poverty is not just about money and I think you could put that on your fridge, poverty is not about money. And also too, this is the issue that government always brings up - money, money, money. But they

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Additionally the notion that material worth is a one-dimensional way to perceive poverty and wealth was drawn on at times in the interviews:

I think people are poor if they not happy within their life, you know what I mean. To me that is poor. If you have got no money but if you are happy and you can do what you want to do that’s good, you don’t have to be going overseas and all that sort of thing. If you can adapt your life to be happy with what you can do, well that to me is rich. So materialistically, if you have got all the flashy things you give the appearance of being rich but are you?

Participants regularly visited the idea of “New Zealand poverty” as being more likely to comprise of a type of non-material poverty especially when comparing it with the “real third world poverty” found in a global setting:

I must say the poverty is relative. I have been to parts of the world where people have not had very much - third world countries - material resources. Once again kids go to school, well-groomed good posture, beaming smiles, looking forward with a positive outlook, wanting to do well in their lives. They will have had far less than what we have access to in New Zealand in terms of materialistic things but they have a positive state of being. They are happy and have an optimistic outlook on life. I think that it is important to weigh up how we consider poverty and that poverty of material things is perhaps easier to deal with than poverty of spirit. When you have poverty of spirit it is difficult to overcome. And that is where we can learn from other people who may have material poverty but have a great outlook, a great attitude and a great spirit about them. I have seen that and it was an inspiration to me. So that is how I will sum it up.

Three participants mentioned an incident in May 2007 where Folole Muliaga, a Samoan mother of four, who relied on the use of an oxygen machine, died following the disconnection of the power to her home due to an unpaid power account. Those

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participants who talked about this incident used it primarily as an example of how the

“New Zealand poor” are lacking in education and life skills and therefore do not know how to manage and prioritise their spending habits to spend money on the basics:

… It’s like there is some lack of awareness or lack of yeah…. Much as I

felt really terrible for that Samoan lady who died with the electricity cut

off, (I actually had the same doctor she had, ‘cos yes I smoke) at the same

time particularly when I was sick (I had really bad asthma) I had a phone and I had the electricity for the nebulizer. Boy they were first things I had to pay. Because I knew if they were off (and I had two young kids) I was

dead. If I couldn’t ring an ambulance or they (the kids) couldn’t ring one for me. There was actually no way they couldn’t have been paid. They

were the number one bills. And I had to have them all on direct credit because I was in and out of hospital and unless you had them on direct credit you would get behind anyway and not keep track of them. And I

did think, well I don’t know how you didn’t pay them if your life depended on it. I did find that amazing because having been in the same

position there was, no way, no how that the money wouldn’t have gone there because it was life or death. I mean I wouldn’t have starved my kids

but we were on a pretty strict plain diet…

The use of a non-material explanation for poverty contrasted with how participants defined wealth. Wealth was overwhelmingly presented in material terms defined as having a lot of money and having ownership of a lot of things, such as expensive cars. The geography of wealth in Auckland was well known with wealthy people understood to be living in million dollar mansions along the Waterfront and in Remuera, Ponsonby and Takapuna:

The first images that spring to mind of a rich person would be the people living in one of the mansions on the golden mile on Takapuna beach. They are right on the beachfront. They are huge houses that are worth millions two – four million. They would be the rich person. Two cars, three cars, swimming pool, fancy schools.

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There was a general theme running through the transcripts that the wealthy would want to be noticed as being wealthy. Accordingly, this was often expressed as a keen awareness and suspicion of the conspicuous consumption and snobbery of the wealthy. This sentiment was alluded to in this quote:

The last rich person I met was when I was helping my friend out in the Calico Christmas craft fair. She had some Father Christmases to sell amongst other stuff, and they were quite nice. But this woman stopped as

she went past, ‘cos Friday they have all the posh ones who pour out of

Remuera and she looks down and goes to her friend Ahhhh I might have

to buy that Santa. Because we haven’t gone overseas this year I don’t

have a new Santa for this year (laughs). Yeep like you just go overseas every year and collect your new Santa, the Santa for 2007 (laughs out loud). You know now you are reduced to buying it for forty-five dollars or something at a craft fair – that’s rich. I would say she has no idea probably of how people live.

Further, when discussing those who have wealth, participants construed that those who are wealthy tend to shut themselves away from people who have less, that they then become isolated in their wealth. This participant described how although wealthy people have their own unhealthy habits they are blind to these habits when discussing “those

people”, the poor. They see the poor as those who need to correct their behaviour:

Sheryl So thinking about the people you socialise with, what do you

imagine that they are saying about people who are wealthier or poorer than them?