American and Japanese women use different coping strategies during normal pregnancy

In this longitudinal study, pregnant women in Japan and the United States reported on three coping strategies. Two are individually phrased: personal influence over outcomes and acceptance of outcomes. The third, social assurance, is grounded in relationships, noting that close others can influence outcomes. A European American sample rated acceptance highest as a strategy, whereas Japanese women rated social assurance highest. For Americans, acceptance correlated with better pregnancy outcomes (less distress over time, better prenatal care, and less weight gain). For Japanese women, social assurance predicted a more positive maternal relationship. Acceptance correlated with less Time 1 distress in both samples. Surprisingly, personal influence generally did not predict positive outcomes in either sample, perhaps because normal pregnancy is a time-limited event with a positive prognosis. The findings are consistent with the view that well-being is related to individual variables in the United States but also to features of social relationships in Japan.     

Does attractiveness buy happiness? “It depends on where you’re from”

Abstract Previous studies document that attractiveness predicts life outcomes, including well‐being and social connectedness. This study investigates whether the attractiveness–outcomes link is especially strong in settings, such as many urban areas, that promote relationship constructions as a product of personal choice. This link may weaken in settings, such as many rural areas, that promote less voluntaristic‐independent relationship constructions. Analyses of survey data from a national representative (United States) sample supported these hypotheses. Attractiveness (operationalized as waist‐to‐hip ratio) predicted well‐being and social connectedness among urban (n = 257) but not rural (n = 330) women. Social connectedness mediated the urban–rural moderation of the attractiveness/well‐being link. Findings suggest that frequently observed attractiveness effects are the product of particular, modern social contexts that promote relationship choice.     

Examining the individual within marriage: Personal strengths and relationship satisfaction

The present investigation aims to identify individual strengths that may benefit efforts toward marital enhancement. Ninety‐two married couples from the Southeastern United States completed questionnaires measuring positive affectivity, optimism, coping skills, personal expansion, and marital satisfaction. Results indicate that perceptions of a spouse's positive affectivity, as well as one's own positive affectivity, are related to relationship satisfaction. In addition, positive affectivity contributed to satisfaction above and beyond negative affectivity. Finally, optimism, coping skills, and personal expansion appear to be important resources for marriage via their association with each partner's affectivity. The discussion considers these results in the context of marital enhancement and relationship flourishing.     

Choosing Across Cultures: The Effect of Choice Complexity on Treatment Outcomes

Prior research has revealed that having choice over treatments can improve their efficacy. However, it is currently unknown if the benefits of treatment choice hold for complex decisions and different cultures. The effects of differing numbers of treatment options were explored across two cultural contexts: United States and Japan. Participants were exposed to an uncomfortable stimulus and provided with up to 15 placebo treatment options they believed would reduce discomfort. There was a significant interaction such that participants from Japan benefited most from fewer treatment options (2 and 5) compared with more treatment options (10 and 15). Participants from the United States, however, showed either no change in discomfort or less discomfort as the number of choices increased. Additionally, participants from Japan reported less satisfaction with the decision process when they had more treatment options to choose from whereas U.S. participants reported similar, if not slightly higher, satisfaction with more treatment options. Further, a second study indicated that a positive experience with the decision process mediated the relationship between choice complexity and treatment efficacy for Japanese participants. These data demonstrate the importance of culture and choice complexity when discussing treatment choice and resulting outcomes in the medical context. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Financial strain and psychological well-being among the American and Japanese elderly.

Research in the United States indicates that stressful life events may create psychological distress among older adults by eroding their sense of personal control and by diminishing their feelings of self-worth. The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) to replicate these findings with data provided by a recent nationwide survey of elderly people in the United States (N = 1,523) and (b) to compare these findings with results obtained from a nationwide survey of older adults in Japan (N = 1,517). The findings from both surveys are quite similar. The data indicate that financial strain tends to erode feelings of control and self-worth in both cultures, and the weakening of these personal resources in turn tends to increase depressive symptoms.     

Are Japanese groups more competitive than Japanese individuals? A cross‐cultural validation of the interindividual–intergroup discontinuity effect

The interindividual–intergroup discontinuity effect is the tendency for relationships between groups to be more competitive than the relationships between individuals. It has been observed robustly in studies conducted in the United States, which is a society characterized as “individualistic.” In this study, it was explored whether the effect was replicable in a “collectivistic” society such as Japan. From the traditional view in cross‐cultural psychology, which emphasizes the collectivistic nature of East Asian peoples, it was expected that the discontinuity effect would be greater in Japan than in the United States. On the other hand, based on recent empirical findings suggesting that North Americans are no less group‐oriented than East Asians, it was expected that the discontinuity effect would be no greater in Japan than in the United States. One hundred and sixty Japanese university students played a 10‐trial repeated prisoner's dilemma game: 26 sessions of interindividual and 18 sessions of intergroup. Following exactly the procedure of prior experiments in the US, individuals and groups were allowed face‐to‐face communication with their opponents before making their decisions, and participants in the intergroup condition were further allowed to converse freely with their in‐group members. Results replicated previous findings in the United States; groups made more competitive choices than did individuals. In addition, neither the magnitude of the discontinuity effect, nor the frequency of competitive choices made by the groups, were larger in Japan than they were in the majority of prior studies conducted in the United States. These findings suggest cross‐cultural robustness of the interindividual–intergroup discontinuity effect. Also, interestingly, they contradict the simple distinction between individualism and collectivism. Implications for studies of culture and group processes are discussed.     

Heterosexual romantic couples mate assortatively for facial symmetry, but not masculinity

Preferences for partners with symmetric and sex-typical faces are well documented and considered evidence for the good-genes theory of mate choice. However, it is unclear whether preferences for these traits drive the real-world selection of mates. In two samples of young heterosexual couples from the United Kingdom (Study 1) and the United States (Study 2), the authors found assortment for facial symmetry but not for sex typicality or independently rated attractiveness. Within-couple similarity in these traits did not predict relationship duration or quality, although female attractiveness and relationship duration were negatively correlated among couples in which the woman was the more attractive partner. The authors conclude that humans may mate assortatively on facial symmetry, but this remains just one of the many physical and nonphysical traits to which people likely attend when forming romantic partnerships. This is also the first evidence that preferences for symmetry transfer from the laboratory to a real-world setting.     

The Role of Masculinity/Femininity, Values, and Occupational Value Affordances in Shaping Young Men��s and Women��s Occupational Choices

Gender differences in occupational values have been well-established, yet little research has examined the predictive qualities of individual difference variables such as self-perceived masculinity/femininity on values and these constructs?? predictive role in the traditionality and perceived value affordances of future occupations??or the values persons expect a job to fulfill. Undergraduates (185 males, 401 females) from the Eastern, Southern, and Midwestern United States reported their occupational values, self-perceived masculinity/femininity, expected occupations, and the perceived value affordances of these jobs. Results indicated significant relationships among self-perceived masculinity/femininity, value endorsements, and the perceptions of value affordances. Results also indicated some differences among the three subsamples as well as gender differences across subsamples. Also, value endorsements mediated the relationships between self-perceived masculinity/femininity and traditionality and self-perceived masculinity/femininity and perceived value affordances. Thus, the values associated with jobs and personal value endorsements are important variables in career choice. The implications of these findings are discussed, and it is suggested that perceptions of occupational value affordances may be an entry point for intervention when trying to reduce occupational gender segregation.     

Culture,morality, and the effect of prosocial behavior motivation on positive affect

We investigated the effect of culture, moral discourse, and motivation to engage in prosocial behavior on benefactors’ positive affect. Participants from three cultures (Japan, Romania, and the United States) responded to scenarios in which they could perform small acts of kindness for different targets. A stronger relationship between agentic and obligated motivation to perform acts of kindness, as well as between obligated motivation and positive affect, was observed for participants from Japan, and for individuals with higher endorsement of the Community Ethic. Agentic motivation to engage in prosocial behavior was related to benefactors’ positive affect, regardless of relationship type.     

Making a Good Impression at Work: National Differences in Employee Impression Management Behaviors in Japan,Korea, and the United States

Impression management has important implications for success at work. This study explores differences in impression management in the East and West by examining the use of self-promotion, ingratiation, and exemplification directed towards three targets: supervisors, peers, and subordinates among 945 company employees from Japan, Korea, and the United States. Our results show that Korean employees used all three strategies most frequently, followed by United States, and then Japanese employees. Japanese and Korean employees used impression management strategies differentially across the three targets, and U.S. employees used impression management equally across targets. This elucidates how cultural trends in hierarchical relationships impact social behavior within the workplace. A follow-up mediation analysis found that relational or labor mobility fully mediated country differences in impression management, suggesting that culture is also reflected in larger social ecological trends in employee's ability and likelihood to change jobs, which also account for impression management strategy usage. Theoretical and practical implications for international business are discussed. This research may be useful in aligning strategies foreign employees might employ for using impression management when in Japan, Korea, and the United States.     

Acclimating International Graduate Students to Professional Engineering Ethics

This article describes the education portion of an ongoing grant-sponsored education and research project designed to help graduate students in all engineering disciplines learn about the basic ethical principles, rules, and obligations associated with engineering practice in the United States. While the curriculum developed for this project is used for both domestic and international students, the educational materials were designed to be sensitive to the specific needs of international graduate students. In recent years, engineering programs in the United States have sought to develop a larger role for professional ethics education in the curriculum. Accreditation requirements, as well as pressures from the private sector, have helped facilitate this shift in focus. Almost half of all engineering graduate students in the U.S. are international students. Further, research indicates that the majority of these students will remain in the U.S. to work post-graduation. It is therefore in the interest of the profession that these students, coming from diverse backgrounds, receive some formal exposure to the professional and ethical expectations and norms of the engineering profession in the United States to help ensure that they have the knowledge and skills—non-technical as well as technical—required in today’s engineering profession. In becoming acculturated to professional norms in a host country, international students face challenges that domestic students do not encounter; such as cultural competency, language proficiency, and acculturation stress. Mitigating these challenges must be a consideration in the development of any effective education materials. The present article discusses the project rationale and describes the development of on-line instructional materials aimed at helping international engineering graduate students acclimate to professional engineering ethics standards in the United States. Finally, a brief data summary of students’ perceptions of the usefulness of the content and instructional interface is provided to demonstrate the initial effectiveness of the materials and to present a case for project sustainability.     

Impact of a Faith-Based Social Justice Course on Pre-Service Teachers

Rapid demographic shifts are occurring around the country. United States’ public schools are more diverse than any time in history. To help prepare pre-service teachers for these shifts, this small-scale qualitative case study explored the impact of a required social justice course for pre-service educators at a large private Christian university in the Southwest United States. Findings suggest that social justice courses for pre-service teachers can have an impact on students’ conceptualizations of social justice and teaching as advocacy, a relationship between students’ Christian perspectives and social justice, and an enhanced role of social justice in students’ personal lives.     

The Powerful Other: How Divine Control Shapes the Relationship Between Personal Control and Psychological Distress

In the sociological study of mental health, the sense of personal control represents a core psychological resource, but some studies document a curvilinear association between personal control and depressive symptoms. This body of research is largely secular in orientation, even though research also demonstrates that some individuals believe in an involved and engaged Powerful Other (e.g., God). We evaluate if such beliefs moderate the relationship between personal control and depression. Using data from the 2005 Work, Stress, and Health Study in the United States (N = 1,791), we first demonstrate that the sense of personal control has an overall curvilinear association with depression, in line with previous research. Then, we document that divine control beliefs modify this association such that the curvilinear association is found primarily among individuals with low levels of divine control. By contrast, among those who more strongly endorse divine control, we observe no relationship between personal control and depression. We situate our findings in the differing and complicated perspectives on the implications of religious beliefs for psychological resources and well‐being.     

Cross-cultural differences and similarities in proneness to shame: An adaptationist and ecological approach

People vary in how easily they feel ashamed, that is, in their shame proneness. According to the information threat theory of shame, variation in shame proneness should, in part, be regulated by features of a person's social ecology. On this view, shame is an emotion program that evolved to mitigate the likelihood or costs of reputation-damaging information spreading to others. In social environments where there are fewer possibilities to form new relationships (i.e., low relational mobility), there are higher costs to damaging or losing existing ones. Therefore, shame proneness toward current relationship partners should increase as perceived relational mobility decreases. In contrast, individuals with whom one has little or no relationship history are easy to replace, and so shame-proneness towards them should not be modulated by relational mobility. We tested these predictions cross-culturally by measuring relational mobility and shame proneness towards friends and strangers in Japan, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Japanese subjects were more shame-prone than their British and American counterparts. Critically, lower relational mobility was associated with greater shame proneness towards friends (but not strangers), and this relationship partially mediated the cultural differences in shame proneness. Shame proneness appears tailored to respond to relevant features of one's social ecology.     

Prisoners of hate

The terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, D.C. on September 11, 2001 as well as domestic terrorism in the United States and elsewhere in the world has prompted an analysis of the psychology of the terrorist. The perpetrators' profound sense of being wronged--their values undermined by foreign powers or a corrupt domestic power structure--has cried out for revolution and revenge. The fanatic ideology of the perpetrators has provided the matrix for a progressively more malevolent representation of the oppressors: the Image of the Enemy. Retribution against the Enemy in the form of mass murder of anonymous civilians becomes an imperative. The counterpart of the image of the Enemy is the idealized collective self-image of members of the movement, faction, or cult. The group narcissism of the white supremacists in the United States, the Aum Shinrikyo in Japan, and the Islamic extremists enhance their collective self-image as pure, righteous, and united. While the foot soldiers, as in any war, gain glory through martyrdom, the instigators and leaders have their own personal narcissistic goals (power and prestige) and plan. For the extremist Islamists the ultimate goal has been overthrow of the moderate Islamic governments; for the domestic terrorists, destabilization of the national government and reinstitution of the traditional values.     

Preparing to Counsel Clients of Different Religious Backgrounds: A Phenomenological Approach

With a clientele reflecting the profound demographic changes taking place in the United States, counselors in the 1990s need to acquire a practical understanding of religious beliefs that may be new and different to them. In their religious research and study, counselors must avoid the pitfalls of bias and stereotyping. The phenomenological method is proposed as a means of studying religion with minimum distortion from personal prejudices and presuppositions.     

Your Own Personal Jesus? Doctrinal Beliefs Versus Personal Spirituality Among Inmates Involved in the Monastery Route in Swedish Prisons

Previous studies, mainly from the United States, have indicated that religious beliefs can help inmates to cope with imprisonment and to build hopes for the future. The purpose of this study was to examine if this is the case also in Sweden, which is usually considered to be one of the most secular countries in the world. The data consist of semistructured interviews with 14 prisoners participating in the so‐called Monastery Route activities within Swedish prisons. Although the activities are based on Christianity, the explicit aim is to invite individuals from all religions, as well as those with an open attitude toward spirituality. How do the inmates formulate their beliefs (if any) along the lines of doctrinal religiousness and personal spirituality, respectively? And, how does this orientation affect the ability to cope with imprisonment, as well as the views of the future? The results show that a small number of the participants defined themselves as Christian, but that the majority had instead developed a more personal form of spirituality. This provided them with a means of working with themselves and gave them a sense of inner calm. The study's findings are contrasted against conflicting results from the United States.     

Linking Adult Attachment Styles to Relationship Satisfaction in Hong Kong and the United States: The Mediating Role of Personal and Structural Commitment

Maintaining a satisfying heterosexual relationship is important to many individuals?? happiness and physical health. Evolutionary theories on the formation of relationships suggest that adult attachment and relationship commitment are universal mechanisms for securing and maintaining such mating relationships. This study sought to understand how these two mechanisms may link to each other and how they in turn contribute to relationship satisfaction with one??s current partner in Hong Kong Chinese and American cultures. Similarities in the model for relationship satisfaction were found among young dating couples in the United States and Hong Kong. Specifically, attachment anxiety was positively linked to structural commitment, whereas attachment avoidance was negatively related to personal commitment. Both dimensions of attachment (anxiety and avoidance) and both components of commitment (personal and structural) were found to predict current relationship satisfaction significantly and equivalently across cultures, with the pathway from attachment avoidance to current relationship satisfaction similarly mediated by personal commitment in both cultural groups. These results were interpreted in terms of a probable universal logic informing the interpersonal dynamics involving attachment and relationship commitment.     

Psychosocial development and moral development: an exploratory comparison of adolescents in Japan and America

Building on previous cross-cultural research, this exploratory study examined the comparative psychosocial and sociomoral development of 46 adolescents--22 Japanese in Japan, 10 Japanese in the United States, and 14 Euro-Americans in the United States. Euro-American participants obtained more positive scores than Japanese in the United States and Japanese in Japan on six psychosocial stages and the total psychosocial score as measured by the Measures of Psychosocial Development. Except in the Contract/Truth domain, all groups scored at a comparable level in sociomoral development as measured by the Sociomoral Reflection Measure-Short Form. Results are discussed in terms of cultural differences affecting adolescent development with implications for research and professional practice.     

Naturally occurring mentoring in Japan and the United States: social roles and correlates

Although the word mentor has traditionally been used to describe a relationship between an older adult and a younger person, recent work has extended its usage to relationships with peers and groups rather than with individuals and uncoupled the instrumental and affective qualities of the role. This paper examines (a) the extent to which adolescents' relationships with significant others in different social roles are characterized by mentoring and (b) the extent to which mentoring and other relationship functions covary. Adolescents' naturally occurring social relationships are explored in two very different contexts—Japan and the United States—that differ in the norms and patterning of social interactions. College students (N = 365) used questionnaires to describe the extent to which relations with significant others were characterized by mentoring. Results indicate striking similarity in the patterning of results in the two countries and support the traditional view of mentoring. Mentoring is most likely to occur in relationships with adults (especially parents), rather than with peers, and with same-gender, rather than other-gender associates. Mentoring by parents appears to covary with other aspects of positive relationships, but be more independent in relationships with unrelated adults or peers. Although more of the variability in experienced mentoring is attributed to differences between associates than to differences between adolescents in both the United States and Japan, this is especially true of the United States. Results suggest that although classic mentoring is most common in both countries, mentoring is somewhat less constrained by social role differences in Japan than is in the United States.