Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology recent issues

Acquiring an Artificial Logographic Orthography: The Beneficial Effects of a Logographic L1 Background and Bilinguality

Ehrich, J. F., Meuter, R. F. I. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

To date, studies have focused on the acquisition of alphabetic second languages in alphabetic first language (L1) users, demonstrating significant transfer effects. The present study examines the process from a reverse perspective, comparing logographic (Mandarin-Chinese) and alphabetic (English) L1 users in the acquisition of an artificial logographic script to determine whether similar language-specific advantageous transfer effects occurred. Chinese-English bilinguals, English-French bilinguals, and English monolinguals learned a small set of symbols (six nouns and six verbs) in an artificial logographic script. A lexical decision task on the artificial symbols revealed markedly faster response times in the Chinese-English bilinguals, indicating a logographic transfer effect suggestive of a language experience— specific advantage. A syntactic decision task evaluated the degree to which the new language was mastered beyond the single word level. No L1-specific transfer effects were found for artificial language strings. However, when carrying out the same task in the native language, both the Chinese-English and the English-French bilinguals outperformed the English monolinguals, indicative of a bilingual processing advantage. The results are discussed in relation to possible differences in processing styles relating to logographic versus alphabetic languages, variably involving visual versus phonological coding.

Goal Integration and Well-Being: Self-Regulation Through Inner Resources in the Netherlands and Spain

Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

Personality integration has been related to individual well-being. The present study focused on the combined influence of personality integration through the personal-striving goal construct, active-passive approach toward achieving one’s goals, and inner resources on well-being. Specific attention was given to how this process works out in two culturally different countries: the Netherlands and Spain. Results indicated that goal integration, passive thinking, active thinking, and vitality were higher in the Netherlands compared to Spain. It was also shown that inner resources combined with active thinking to function as a buffer for the possible negative effects on vitality. Results were similar in both countries, a finding that provides an indication for possible cross-cultural generalization of this process. The overall results present active-passive thinking combined with inner resources as an influential factor in the relation between goal integration and well-being.

Does the Job Satisfaction--Job Performance Relationship Vary Across Cultures?

Ng, T. W. H., Sorensen, K. L., Yim, F. H. K. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

The purpose of this study is to examine whether culture moderates the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance. Multiple theoretical frameworks regarding culture are used as the theoretical guide. Based on meta-analytical moderator tests, the authors find some support for their hypotheses that the effect size for the job satisfaction—job performance relationship is likely to be stronger in individualistic (vs. collectivistic) cultures, in low-power-distance (vs. high-power-distance) cultures, in low-uncertainty-avoidance (vs. high-uncertainty-avoidance) cultures, and in masculine (vs. feminine) cultures. They also observe stronger evidence of these effects for task performance than for contextual performance. Implications for theory, practice, and future research are discussed.

Child Rearing in a Group Setting: Beliefs of Dutch, Caribbean Dutch, and Mediterranean Dutch Caregivers in Center-Based Child Care

Huijbregts, S. K., Tavecchio, L., Leseman, P., Hoffenaar, P. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

Child care centers in Western countries are becoming increasingly culturally diverse, regarding both professional caregivers, children, and their parents. Child-rearing beliefs, which differ between cultures, are found to affect process quality and children’s developmental outcomes. The first aim of this study is to investigate cultural differences in caregivers’ cultural child-rearing beliefs through a semistructured interview. The second aim is to explore the relation between the centers’ cultural context and caregivers’ beliefs. Participants are 61 caregivers (20 Dutch, 20 Caribbean Dutch, and 21 Mediterranean Dutch) working in Dutch child care centers with 2- to 4-year-olds. Cultural differences between Dutch and immigrant caregivers are evident. Dutch caregivers mentioned independence as a socialization goal most, whereas Mediterranean Dutch caregivers stressed collectivistic child-rearing goals most. More years of experience and a positive orientation toward the Dutch society made caregivers value individualistic child-rearing goals more. Working in an ethnically diverse context made both immigrant and Dutch caregivers express collectivistic beliefs more. The results further demonstrate that all cultural groups valued dimensions of both individualism and collectivism, providing further support for the multidimensionality of child-rearing beliefs.

Assessing the Cross-Cultural Validity of a Parental Autonomy Granting Measure: Comparing Adolescents in the United States, China, Mexico, and India

Supple, A. J., Ghazarian, S. R., Peterson, G. W., Bush, K. R. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

This study investigates the cross-cultural validity of a 10-item parental autonomy granting measure with samples of adolescents from the United States, China, Mexico, and India. Multigroup confirmatory factor analysis suggested a moderately high degree of cross-cultural equivalence, particularly for the United States and China. Invariance in item loadings was found across samples, with the exception of items assessing freedom regarding career choices and encouragement to participate in family decisions. Correlations between autonomy granting and three criterion factors suggested that, across cultures, parental autonomy granting is associated with higher perceptions of parental support and greater effort exerted in school. Correlations varied in reference to associations between parental autonomy granting and reports of love withdrawal from mothers and fathers. Results also suggested that mean levels of autonomy granting from parents were highest in the U.S. sample and lowest in China. Results provide support for the universality of autonomy granting as a salient aspect of parenting across cultures but also point to areas where significant cultural differences exist.

Sociocultural Influences on German and Turkish Immigrant Mothers' Long-Term Socialization Goals

Durgel, E. S., Leyendecker, B., Yagmurlu, B., Harwood, R. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:37 PDT

The major aims of this study were (a) to investigate the differences and similarities in long-term socialization goals of German mothers and Turkish immigrant mothers living in Germany and (b) to examine socialization goals of Turkish immigrant mothers in relation to their acculturation attitudes. Participants were composed of 79 Turkish mothers who were either raised in Germany or migrated to Germany and 91 German mothers of preschoolers living in Germany. Turkish immigrant mothers were more likely to expect their children to have close relations with the family and to be well-mannered and they were less likely to value autonomy than were German mothers. Turkish mothers who were more integrated into German culture were found to value individualistic goals such as self-control more than Turkish mothers who were more separated from the German culture, yet both groups valued mutual support within the family very highly. The findings reveal that socialization goal patterns of Turkish immigrant mothers represent the pattern depicted in the psychological interdependence model proposed by Kagitcibasi (2007).

Supportive and Unsupportive Social Interactions in Relation to Cultural Adaptation and Psychological Distress Among Somali Refugees Exposed to Collective or Personal Traumas

Jorden, S., Matheson, K., Anisman, H. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:38 PDT

The present study evaluated the traumatic stressors experienced by Somali refugees to Canada (N = 169) that might be associated with poorer cultural adaptation and greater depressive and trauma symptoms. As well, it was suggested that indices of social support might mediate the relations between traumatic experiences and psychological outcomes. Regression analyses indicated that collective trauma experiences (e.g., civil warfare) were associated with poorer cultural adaptation but were not related to depressive and trauma symptoms. Furthermore, collective trauma was unrelated to social support perceptions that might have mediated the relation to cultural adaptation. In contrast, personally traumatic experiences (e.g., assault from a familiar other) were related to increased depressive and trauma symptoms, and these relations were mediated by self-reports of encountering unsupportive social interactions. Qualitative analyses of interview data (n = 23) suggested that refugees had developed a shared understanding of collective trauma that may have protected against psychological distress.

Helping Strangers Is Lower in Embedded Cultures

Knafo, A., Schwartz, S. H., Levine, R. V. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:38 PDT

The embeddedness cultural value orientation regards the extended in-group, not the individual, as the key social unit. Embedded cultures focus on the welfare of the in-group, limiting concern for outsiders’ well-being. Therefore, the authors hypothesized that people in high-embeddedness cultures are less helpful to strangers in need. They related countries’ embeddedness scores to rates of helping strangers in three field experiments across 21 countries. Large cross-national differences in helping strangers related strongly and negatively to cultural embeddedness in subsets of wealthy and developing countries. This suggests that prevailing cultural values affect the way people relate to needy others outside their in-group.

Literacy, Negotiable Fate, and Thinking Style Among Low Income Women in India

Chaturvedi, A., Chiu, C.-y., Viswanathan, M. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:38 PDT

Few studies have examined how cultural models of agency and literacy are related to thinking styles. The present study fills this gap by examining these links among 180 low-income women with low to moderate levels of literacy. Among these women, those with lower literacy levels believed more strongly in negotiable fate—the belief that although one lacks direct control over one’s fate, one can negotiate control with it. More importantly, among the low-literate participants, the belief in negotiable fate was linked to a greater tendency to exhibit decontextualized judgment and rule-based categorization. This result suggests that thinking style may grow out of an adaptive process whereby people with limited resources negotiate control with the harsh environment they face. This result also highlights the theoretical contribution of a sociocultural perspective to thinking style.

Burnout, Perceived Stress, and Resources Among Educated, Working Jews and Moslem Arabs in Israel: A Cross-Cultural Perspective

Liat, K. — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:24:38 PDT

This study deals with differences in levels of burnout and in the variables that explain it (perceived stress, personal resources, and social resources) among 109 Jews and 122 Moslem Arabs belonging to dual-earner families in Israel. Levels of burnout and variables that explain it are similar for the Jews and Moslem Arabs. The variables that most significantly explain levels of burnout in the two sociocultural contexts are hardiness, perceived stress, and gender.

Modern and Old-fashioned Homonegativity Among Samples of Canadian and American University Students

Morrison, M. A., Morrison, T. G., Franklin, R. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

The viability of modern homonegativity was examined in two studies using Canadian (N = 374) and American (N = 608) university students as participants. Results suggest that negativity toward sexual minorities grounded in contemporary assertions such as gay men and lesbian women no longer experience discrimination and possess all the rights they need, appears to be distinguishable from old-fashioned negativity, which reflects traditional, moral, and/or religious objections to homosexuality. Invariance analysis revealed that a majority of items designed to assess modern homonegativity had equivalent loadings across the two samples. Results also indicated that American participants were more homonegative than their Canadian counterparts, though this difference was most apparent with old-fashioned homonegativity. The limitations associated with the current series of studies are discussed and directions for future research are articulated.

Gender and Attachment Representations in the Preschool Years: Comparisons Between Five Countries

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

Bowlby proposed that the individual's social experiences, as early as in infancy, contribute to the construction of Internal Working Models (IWMs) of attachment, which will later guide the individual's expectations and behaviors in close relationships all along his or her life. The qualitative, individual characteristics of these models reflect the specificity of the individual's early experiences with attachment figures. The attachment literature globally shows that the qualities of IWMs are neither gender specific nor cultural specific. Procedures to evaluate IWMs in adulthood have been well established, based on narrative accounts of childhood experiences. Narrative procedures at earlier ages (e.g., in the preschool years) have been proposed, such as Bretherton's Attachment Story Completion Task (ASCT), to evaluate attachment representations. More than 500 ASCT narratives of preschoolers, coming from five different countries, have been collected, in the perspective of examining possible interactions between gender and culture regarding attachment representations. A specific Q-Sort coding procedure (CCH) has been used to evaluate several dimensions of the narratives. Girls' narratives appeared as systematically more secure than those of same-age boys, whatever their culture. The magnitude of gender differences, however, varied between countries. Taylor's model of gender-specific responses to stress and Harwood's and Posada's hypothesis on inter-cultural differences regarding caregiving are evoked to understand the differences across gender and countries.

Disregard for Outsiders: A Cultural Comparison

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

The place of outsiders—strangers and otherwise irrelevant others—in the cultural logic of a society holds likely consequences for social perception. The authors begin by describing how outsiders are viewed in Western, Japanese, and Chinese societies. Comparing the three groups, it is proposed that the Chinese are most strongly disposed to disregard or ignore those outside their networks of affiliation and practical involvement. To test this claim experimentally, we assessed the incidental memory of Canadians, Japanese, and Chinese students for social targets of differing situational relevance to the perceiver. As expected, the Chinese showed greater memory advantage than the other groups for primary over nonprimary targets, but only when provided with an explicit justification for exclusive attention.

Culture, Context, or Behavioral Control?: English- and Mandarin-Speaking Mothers' Use of Nouns and Verbs in Joint Book Reading

Chan, C. C. Y., Brandone, A. C., Tardif, T. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

Joint book reading provides an ecological context for examining processes involved in the emergence of cultural differences in noun and verb use. Tardif, Gelman, & Xu (1999) found that English- and Mandarin-speaking mothers differed in their relative use of nouns and verbs during joint book reading with their 20-month-olds: Mandarin-speaking mothers produced more main verbs and fewer common nouns than did English-speaking mothers. We sought to clarify the source and specificity of these differences by reexamining these transcripts. Results indicated that cross-linguistic differences in noun and verb use do not arise from cross-cultural variation in behavioral control alone; differences persisted in picture-related conversations. Moreover, in both cultures, mothers' focus on objects and actions shifted in response to the nature of the pictures being discussed. Results are considered in terms of the relationship between culture-specific patterns of book reading, scene perception, and language acquisition.

Behavioral Manifestations of Modesty

Xiaohua Chen, S., Bond, M. H., Bacon Chan, , Donghui Tang, , Buchtel, E. E. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

Three studies examined the social manifestations of modesty in Chinese and Canadian cultures, conceptualizing and operationalizing it as a self-presentation tactic with communal functions. In Study 1, the authors developed a self-report Modest Behavior Scale (MBS) to tap the behavioral aspects of modesty and identified three factors: self-effacement, other-enhancement, and avoidance of attention-seeking. The authors validated the scale by establishing its nomological network with trait modesty, individuation, independent and interdependent self-construals, traditionality, and modernity, in both Hong Kong and Shanghai, which are culturally different regions of China. In Study 2, the MBS was supplemented with additional items, and a different set of predictors, including values, was used to predict the three factors in both Hong Kong and Beijing, China. In Study 3, we administered the MBS in Vancouver, Canada, adding emic items generated from this Canadian sample and using values and other variables as predictors. Gender differences are discussed in terms of the role played by modest self-presentations in promoting intragroup harmony in different cultural settings.

Using a Cognitive Architecture for Addressing the Question of Cognitive Universals in Cross-Cultural Psychology: The Example of Awale

Gobet, F. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

A central theme in cross-cultural psychology is the extent to which cognitive mechanisms are universal, or, alternatively, are specific to a given culture. A new way to tackle this question is proposed: to use the same cognitive architecture, implemented as a computer program, for simulating phenomena in which individuals from different cultures perform a task familiar to their own culture. The CHREST architecture has simulated a number of empirical phenomena related to the Western board game of chess. Here, we show that a model implemented in the same architecture accounts for several phenomena in awalé, a board game from the mancala family, which is commonly played in western Africa and in the Caribbean. CHREST first learns chunks by scanning expert-level games and then is placed in memory experiments and problem-solving situations similar to those used with human youngsters. The model replicates empirical phenomena on memory for awalé positions reasonably well, although not perfectly, and also learns to play a fair, but far from perfect game using pattern recognition. The assumptions that learning is mediated by the acquisition of a large number of chunks and that the capacity of visual short-term memory is limited to three chunks are important in explaining the empirical data for the two games. The implications for theory development in cross-cultural psychology are discussed.

Misconduct Among Chinese American Adolescents: The Role of Acculturation, Family Obligation, and Autonomy Expectations

Juang, L. P., Nguyen, H. H. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

This study examined the relation between acculturation and misconduct among Chinese American adolescents. The sample included 309 adolescents (mean age = 14.7 years, SD = 0.71; 54% female), recruited from two high schools in an ethnically diverse, urban city on the West Coast. Findings showed that acculturation (i.e., generational status and U.S. and Chinese cultural involvements) did not predict misconduct. But specific cultural values (i.e., family obligation and autonomy expectations) did. Specifically, youth with stronger family obligation and later autonomy expectations engaged in less misconduct. Such findings suggest that examining specific and developmentally-salient cultural values may be especially helpful in explaining why some Chinese Americans engage in misconduct.

Representing World History in the 21st Century: The Impact of 9/11, the Iraq War, and the Nation-State on Dynamics of Collective Remembering

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

Following open-ended methodology used in an earlier research by Liu et al., social representations of world history were assessed among university student samples in 12 countries: China, India, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, East Timor, Turkey, Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, Spain, and Portugal. Findings confirmed that across cultures, transcending boundaries of political ideology, civilization age, or youthful statehood. (a) World history is represented as a story about politics and warfare, with World War II the most important event in history and Hitler its most influential individual. (b) Recency effects are pervasive in young adults' collective remembering, with events and figures from the past 100 years accounting for 72% and 78% of nominations on average. (c) Representations were primarily Eurocentric, with events and figures in Western societies accounting for 40% of nominations overall, but this is tempered by nationalism, especially in the prevalence of local heroes instrumental to the founding of the current state. The representational hegemony of the victorious Western powers of World War II is being challenged by negative evaluations of the American presidency following 9/11 (September 9) and the Iraq War, with George Bush Jr. perceived as more negative than Hitler in four out of six samples where they were both nominated as important. Results are interpreted within a theoretical framework of history and identity, where collective remembering of the past is dynamically interlinked to political issues of the present.

Reanalysis of the Structure of the Greek Personality Lexicon

Lee, K., Ashton, M. C. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

We investigated the structure of the Greek personality lexicon, based on a reanalysis of the data reported by Saucier, Georgiades, Tsaousis, and Goldberg. To facilitate comparisons with previous lexical studies of personality structure, our factor analyses were based on ipsatized (i.e., within-subject standardized) ratings on the Greek adjective variable set, after the removal of "negative valence" (or low base rate) adjectives. Results showed a six-factor solution that was very similar to those obtained in a diverse array of other languages, and thus suggest that this six-dimensional structure of personality variation does generalize to the Greek culture.

Maternal Interactional Quality in Two Cultural Environments: German Middle Class and Cameroonian Rural Mothers

Yovsi, R. D., Kartner, J., Keller, H., Lohaus, A. — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 10:52:13 PDT

This study compares German urban middle class with Cameroonian rural Nso mothers interacting with their 4-, 8-, and 12-week-olds on two dimensions of parenting: sensitivity and responsive control. Although the first concept is well-established in the literature, we suggest responsive control as the essence of good parenting leading to optimal development according to Nso mothers' ethnotheories. Although the two concepts differentiate between the two samples, the validity of responsive control in terms of developmental implications still has to be established.

Dramatic Social Change in Russia and Mongolia: Connecting Relative Deprivation to Social Identity

de la Sablonniere, R., Tougas, F., Lortie-Lussier, M. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

Two studies assess people's reactions in the midst of dramatic social change. The studies examine consequences of social change in Russia and Mongolia after the dismantlement of the Soviet Union. They focus on the impact of social changes that are numerous, negative, and rapid. Specifically, an integration of relative deprivation and social identity theories is proposed. According to hypotheses, it is found that the more people perceive social change as numerous and negative, the more they experience social collective relative deprivation. In addition, the more people perceive social change as rapid and negative, the more they express temporal collective relative deprivation. Both types of collective relative deprivation are linked to collective esteem: Whereas the path from temporal collective relative deprivation is negative in both studies, the valence of path from social collective relative deprivation to collective esteem depends on perceived in-group status of the cultural group.

Cultural Differences in Allocation of Attention in Visual Information Processing

Boduroglu, A., Shah, P., Nisbett, R. E. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

Previous research has shown that when processing visual scenes, Westerners attend to salient objects and East Asians attend to the relationships between focal objects and background elements. It is possible that cross-cultural differences in attentional allocation contribute to these earlier findings. In this article, the authors investigate cultural differences in attentional allocation in two experiments, using a visual change detection paradigm. They demonstrate that East Asians are better than Americans at detecting color changes when a layout of a set of colored blocks is expanded to cover a wider region and worse when it is shrunk. East Asians are also slower than Americans are at detecting changes in the center of the screen. The data suggest that East Asians allocate their attention more broadly than Americans. The authors consider potential factors that may contribute to the development of such attention allocation differences.

Acculturation and Parenting Among Turkish Mothers in Australia

Yagmurlu, B., Sanson, A. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

This study investigated acculturation attitudes of Turkish immigrant mothers in Australia and the associations between their interaction levels with Australian society and their parenting values and behaviors. Turkey is traditionally collectivist, and punishment is more common than verbal reasoning among parents; in Australia, which is predominantly individualistic, normative parenting goals emphasize independence (over obedience) and induction-based discipline (over punishment). Participants included 58 Turkish mothers living in Melbourne. Each had a child attending a child care center located in a generally lower socioeconomic area. Questionnaires were used to assess acculturation attitudes, parenting goals, and child-rearing practices. Findings support the hypothesized relationships between acculturation attitudes and parenting behaviors. Mothers who had a tendency to integrate with Australian society reported higher levels of self-direction goals and inductive reasoning and lower levels of compliance goals and obedience-demanding behavior. Findings are discussed in relation to the functions of child-rearing values and practices in sociocultural context.

Cross-Cultural Differences in the Acceptance of Barnum Profiles Supposedly Derived From Western Versus Chinese Astrology

Rogers, P., Soule, J. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

The present study examines cross-cultural differences in the Barnum effect. At Stage 1 of the study, 287 respondents (comprising 149 Westerners and 138 Chinese nationals) provided birth details and completed a belief-in-astrology questionnaire. At Stage 2 a week later, 258 of these (130 Westerners, 128 Chinese) then completed a second belief-in-astrology questionnaire before receiving a Barnum profile supposedly derived from either Western or Chinese astrology, which they rated for, among other things, perceived accuracy (a) for themselves and (b) for other people in general. Preliminary analysis offered initial support for a universal Barnum effect. However, this disappeared after respondent gender, age, general education, and psychological knowledge were controlled for. Further analyses revealed little support for cross-cultural differences in either astrological beliefs or susceptibility to the Barnum effect, although surprisingly, Chinese nationals who believed in astrology did perceive their own (Barnum) profile to be more accurate for people in general than did Chinese skeptics. Finally, Barnum acceptance was not influenced by the apparent source of profiles. The role these factors play in relation to Barnum susceptibility and methodological limitations of the present study are discussed.

Longitudinal Changes in Acculturation for Immigrant Women From the Former Soviet Union

Miller, A. M., Wang, E., Szalacha, L. A., Sorokin, O. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

Most research on immigrant acculturation has been conducted with cross-sectional samples, using statistical designs that may not capture different trajectories for the components that contribute to this complex concept. The purpose of this study was to examine change over time in acculturation for 226 women from the former Soviet Union who had lived in the United States fewer than 8 years when recruited. Using self-report data from four annual waves, growth trajectories were examined in four components of acculturation (American behavior, Russian behavior, English language proficiency, and cultural generativity). Results indicate that these components changed at varying rates. Acculturation is a process with multiple distinct components that should be measured separately to obtain a full profile of change over time.

Fairness in Distributive Justice by 3- and 5-Year-Olds Across Seven Cultures

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

This research investigates 3- and 5-year-olds' relative fairness in distributing small collections of even or odd numbers of more or less desirable candies, either with an adult experimenter or between two dolls. The authors compare more than 200 children from around the world, growing up in seven highly contrasted cultural and economic contexts, from rich and poor urban areas, to small-scale traditional and rural communities. Across cultures, young children tend to optimize their own gain, not showing many signs of self-sacrifice or generosity. Already by 3 years of age, self-optimizing in distributive justice is based on perspective taking and rudiments of mind reading. By 5 years, overall, children tend to show more fairness in sharing. What varies across cultures is the magnitude of young children's self-interest. More fairness (less self-interest) in distributive justice is evident by children growing up in small-scale urban and traditional societies thought to promote more collective values.

Acculturation Orientations and Social Relations Between Immigrant and Host Community Members in California

Bourhis, R. Y., Barrette, G., El-Geledi, S., Schmidt, R. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

This study, based on the Interactive Acculturation Model, investigates the acculturation orientations of undergraduates attending a multicultural university in Los Angeles County. European Americans (n = 178), African Americans (n = 88), Asian immigrants (n = 165), and Hispanic immigrants (n = 109) participated in the questionnaire study. Results show that individualism and integrationism are the acculturation orientations preferred by European American, African American, and Asian immigrants. Hispanic immigrants also prefer individualism. Assimilationism, segregationism, and exclusionism are least endorsed by host community members. Immigrants moderately endorse separatism and weakly endorse assimilationism and marginalization. The social psychological profile of each acculturation orientation revealed that integrationism and individualism was associated with harmonious relational outcomes, whereas assimilationism, segregationism, separatism, and exclusionism were associated with problematic and conflictual intergroup relations.

Acculturation of Iranians in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands: A Test of the Multidimensional Individual Difference Acculturation (MIDA) Model

Safdar, S., Struthers, W., van Oudenhoven, J. P. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

The present study tested the generalizability of a multidimensional individual difference acculturation (MIDA) model in three cultural contexts. The model includes three predictor variables (Psychosocial Resources, Connectedness, and Hassles), predicting three outcome adaptation variables (In-Group Contact, Out-Group Contact, and Psychophysical Distress). The roles of two dimensions of acculturation attitudes (toward Own Culture Maintenance and New Culture Acquisition) were also included in the model. The model was tested and validated with three samples of Iranian immigrants living in the United States, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. The results provided support for the multidimensional model. The relations between each variable in the model are discussed with reference to the demographic variation of the samples and the complexity of societal context.

Causal Attributions About Feminine and Leadership Roles: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

Garcia-Retamero, R., Lopez-Zafra, E. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

In a cross-cultural study, the authors tested whether the leadership role is more congruent with the masculine than the feminine gender role. Participants in Germany and Spain evaluated a male or a female candidate for a leadership position in an industry congruent or incongruent with the candidate's gender role, or in an unspecified industry. In line with the authors' hypotheses, the female candidate was perceived as less qualified for the position, especially when she worked in the incongruent industry. Spanish participants showed more prejudice against the female candidate than did German participants. Furthermore, when German participants predicted that the female candidate would succeed in obtaining the promotion, they made an internal causal attribution to explain this success. Spanish participants, however, sometimes made an external causal attribution. These results are consistent with the role congruity theory.

Does Expressing Your Emotions Raise or Lower Your Blood Pressure?: The Answer Depends on Cultural Context

Butler, E. A., Lee, T. L., Gross, J. J. — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:15:55 PDT

Emotion-expressive behavior is often but not always inversely related to physiological responding. To test the hypothesis that cultural context moderates the relationship between expressivity and physiological responding, the authors have Asian American and European American women engage in face-to-face conversations about a distressing film in same-ethnicity dyads. Blood pressure is measured continuously, and emotional expressivity is rated from reviewing videotapes. Results indicate that emotion-expressive behavior is inversely related to blood pressure in European American dyads, but the reverse was true in Asian American dyads in which there is a trend toward a positive association. These results suggest that the links between emotion-expressive behavior and physiological responding may depend on cultural context. One possible explanation for this effect may be that cultural contexts shape the meaning that individuals give to emotional expressions that occur during social interactions.

A Retrospective on the Beginnings of JCCP and IACCP

Lonner, W. J. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

Effects of Culture Priming on the Social Connectedness of the Bicultural Self: A Self-Reference Effect Approach

Sik Hung Ng, , Lai, J. C. L. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

This research tests the theoretical prediction that the self-concept of bicultural Chinese would become more socially connected when Chinese primed than when Western primed. Measures of social connectedness are derived from the Self-Reference Effect, according to which information will be memorized better when it references the Self than when it references the non-Self. Under Western priming ( n = 91), memory of information referencing Self is better than that referencing font (a nonperson condition referring to the style in which the information is printed), a Nonidentified Person (NIP), or Mother, which suggests a relatively distinct Self (Hypothesis 1). Under Chinese priming (n = 96), the Self-font distinction remains, but the Self—NIP and Self—Mother distinctions disappear as predicted, suggesting a more socially connected Self (Hypothesis 2). The predicted Priming x Referencing interaction effects are (marginally) significant, which confirm that the Self—NIP and Self—Mother connectedness is higher under Chinese priming than under Western priming (Hypothesis 3).

Individualism-collectivism as Descriptive Norms: Development of a Subjective Norm Approach to Culture Measurement

Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

The development and validation of a new instrument for measuring the descriptive norms related to individualism-collectivism (IC) is presented. IC is conceptualized as a group- specific unidimensional cultural construct with four defining attributes (Triandis, 1995). Three studies are reported showing the dimensionality and validities at individual and cultural levels across samples from 11 cultures. The new instrument has good statistical properties with iden- tical structures at the individual and cultural level, good reliabilities at the individual level, adequate agreement within cultures, and demonstrates first signs of convergent and discriminant validity. Correlations at the cultural level also indicate that the measure has the potential to add to research by integrating previously untapped attributes of IC. Finally, normative IC explains variance in self-reported behavior over and above self-referenced IC. Implications and opportunities for norm-oriented research and scale refinement are discussed.

A Cross-Nations, Cross-Cultures, and Cross-Conditions Analysis on the Equivalence of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding

Li, A., Reb, J. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

This article examines measurement equivalence of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR) across two nations (the United States and Singapore), two cultural values (horizontal individualism and horizontal collectivism) and two motivational conditions (standard and faking). One sample of undergraduate students from each country (N Singapore = 158, N United States = 166) participated in this study, and a within-subject experimental design is used. Specifically, at Time 1, participants were simply asked to respond to the BIDR and the INDCOL (standard condition). At Time 2, the participants were instructed to engage in social desirability (faking condition). Multigroup confirmatory factor analyses are used to evaluate the equivalence of the BIDR. The authors found support for the equivalence of the BIDR across the two cultural values. However, there is weaker support for the equivalence of the BIDR across the two countries and the two motivational conditions. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Confirming the Three-Factor Structure of the Disgust Scale--Revised in Eight Countries

Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

The current study evaluates the factor structure of the Disgust Scale—Revised (DS-R) in eight countries: Australia, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United States (N = 2,606). Confirmatory factor analysis is used to compare two different models of the DS-R and to investigate the invariance of the factor structure of the DS-R across countries and gender. A three-factor solution consisting of three different but interrelated disgust factors (a 12-item core disgust factor, an 8-item animal-reminder disgust factor, and a 5-item contamination disgust factor) best accounted for the data in all countries except the Netherlands. Relative to the United States, the three-factor solution is invariant in Australia, Brazil, and Japan but not in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Sweden. The three-factor solution is also invariant across gender in most countries. The implications of these cross-cultural findings for promoting a more valid and reliable assessment of disgust dimensions, as assessed by the DS-R, are discussed.

Reliability of Bidimensional Acculturation Scores: A Meta-Analysis

Huynh, Q.-L., Howell, R. T., Benet-Martinez, V. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

Understanding score reliability is a necessary step in examining the validity of acculturation instruments. Thus, the authors evaluate the aggregate reliability of three multigroup, bidimensional acculturation instruments: General Ethnicity Questionnaire— Abridged, Stephenson Multigroup Acculturation Scale, and Vancouver Index of Acculturation. Reliability generalization techniques are used to analyze 51 internal consistency estimates and 6 sample characteristics for these instruments. Overall, reliability estimates for all three instruments appear to be robust. However, the ranges of reliability estimates across diverse samples vary greatly, which has implications for the interpretation of substantive outcomes and acculturation instrument selection. In addition, variability in reliability estimates is associated with scale length, gender, and ethnic composition of sample. Implications for acculturation research and measurement are discussed.

Self-Construal in Chile and Norway: Implications for Cultural Differences in Individualism and Collectivism

Kolstad, A., Horpestad, S. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

The study compares Chilean and Norwegian self-construal with regard to the concepts of independence and interdependence. Chile has been characterized as collectivistic and Norway as individualistic, and the hypothesis is that this characterization also distinguishes self-perception as independent and interdependent, respectively. The total sample consists of 368 university students. The instrument, Self-Construal Scale (SCS), measures the strength of independence and interdependence. The Chilean sample reports a higher score on both constructs. Both samples report the highest score on independence. The results are inconsistent with previous models that characterize Chile as collectivistic and Norway as individualistic. These characterizations are questioned. The findings also imply that a particular score on either independence or interdependence does not predict the score on the opposite variable. Individuals in the two cultures have a unique blend of independent and interdependent self-appraisal, which represent a composite mix of individualistic and collective elements in each culture.

Perceptions of Culture in Multicultural Space: Joint Presentation of Images From Two Cultures Increases In-Group Attribution of Culture-Typical Characteristics

Chiu, C.-y., Mallorie, L., Hean Tat Keh, , Law, W. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

The present research tests the hypothesis that the copresence of images from two seemingly distinctive cultures (Chinese and American) in the same space increases individuals' sensitivity to the psychological characteristics of the in-group culture and the tendency to use culture as a schema to organize perceptions. The authors contend that viewing images from Chinese and U.S. cultures simultaneously evokes a culture mind-set. As a consequence, individuals (from both China and the United States) tend to enlarge the perceived incompatibility between Chinese and U.S. cultures and expect members of the in-group culture to possess culture-typical psychological attributes. In two experiments, one conducted in Beijing, China, and one in the United States, supportive evidence is found for this contention.

Comparing Americans' and Ukrainians' Allocations of Public Assistance: The Role of Affective Reactions in Helping Behavior

Mullen, E., Skitka, L. J. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

In the United States, people who are personally responsible for needing assistance arouse more negative and less positive affect and are less likely to be helped than people who are not personally responsible for their plight. The authors investigated whether this finding generalized to Ukraine, a more collectivist society. American and Ukrainian participants evaluated 16 claimants who needed an organ transplant and selected up to 6 claimants to receive an organ. Claimants varied in their degree of personal responsibility, contribution to society, and need. Results revealed that personal responsibility had a stronger influence on Americans' than Ukrainians' allocations, whereas contribution to society had a stronger influence on Ukrainians' than Americans' allocations. Participants' affective reactions to claimants mediated these cross-cultural effects.

Does an Acquiescent Response Style Explain Why Koreans are Less Consistent than Americans?

Locke, K. D., Baik, K.-D. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:48:19 PDT

Cultural differences in consistency of responding to questions could be artifacts of cultural differences in acquiescence (an agreeing response style). To highlight this issue, the authors attempt to replicate previous research showing that Koreans are less consistent than Americans are when responding to questions about values. In accord with prior research, the authors find that Koreans are both more acquiescent and less consistent than Americans are. However, the differences between countries in acquiescence partially mediate the differences between countries in consistency. In sum, when using mathematical measures of consistency, researchers must take into account the influence of response styles, and the authors demonstrate two methods for accomplishing that.