Developing an Acculturation and Resilience Scale for Use with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Populations

Australian multicultural society consists of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants, refugees, and international students from different parts of the world. Despite hardships, these individuals show resilience and adapt successfully. However, there is a dearth of scales measuring these positive developments and personal strengths. The study describes the development and evaluation of a scale measuring resilience and acculturation of CALD people. Items were generated for the Acculturation and Resilience Scale (AARS). The AARS and other acculturation and psychological distress scales were administered to 225 CALD community members. Exploratory factor analyses resulted in a 27‐item AARS with three subscales: Acculturation, Resilience, and Spirituality. The three‐factor structure was subjected to a confirmatory factor analysis on a sample of 515 international students. The factor structure stability was upheld by the second sample. The psychometric properties were investigated using the two samples and demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency, test–retest reliability, and divergent validity. The scale addresses a major gap in the literature and can be used to measure the positive acculturation and resilience of the newly arrived and relocated individuals. Further research is warranted to examine the scale's psychometric properties with migrants and refugees from a range of ethnic communities.     

Predicting Chinese international students’ acculturation strategies from socio‐demographic variables and social ties

Different acculturation strategies (i.e. integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization) tend to contribute to different adaptation outcomes for international students. The current study examines Chinese international students’ acculturation strategies under the influence of sociodemographic variables and social ties they developed in the host country. A group of Chinese international students in Belgium (N = 183) participated in an online survey. The results indicate that integration was the most commonly adopted strategy among Chinese international students in Belgium, followed by separation, marginalization and assimilation. The results from three separate multiple regressions show that English proficiency, local language proficiency, prior adaptation experience and female were significant predictors of Chinese students’ social ties (i.e. host‐national ties, international ties and co‐national ties). The discriminant analysis identified host‐national ties, international ties, co‐national ties, local language proficiency and prior adaptation experience as important variables that can distinguish Chinese students’ acculturation strategies.     

Religion/spirituality and quality of life of international tertiary students in New Zealand: an exploratory study

Previous research links religion/spirituality to beneficial health outcomes, but the majority of these studies used samples from populations with long-term illness or older people. The present study explored whether the links between religion/spirituality and quality of life can be observed in a sample of younger adults, and also whether religion/spirituality could function as a coping mechanism in international tertiary students who are often subjected to significant stressors related to acculturation and being away from their families. The sample consisted of 218 domestic and 164 international students at a New Zealand university who were given the quality of life inventory and the additional special module about spirituality/religion/personal beliefs, both developed by the World Health Organization in collaboration with many member states. Religion/spirituality was significantly correlated with psychological quality of life in both groups, and social quality of life in international students. The results also show that religion/spirituality might function as a coping mechanism in international students in response to stressors of acculturation.     

Chinese students in Japan: The mediator and the moderator between their personality and mental health

To clarify the influence of personality traits on the psychological acculturation of Chinese international students in Japan, the present study used three structuring questions: (a) What personality trait makes the students vulnerable to psychological distress? (b) What mediates between personality and psychological distress? (c) What buffers personality from psychological distress? The study examined personality traits (Harm‐Avoidance, HA; and Self‐Directedness, SD; two dimensions of the Temperament and Character Inventory), acculturation attitudes (integration, assimilation, separation, and marginalization), and the mental health (General Health Questionnaire (GHQ)‐30) of 253 Chinese students in Japan (17–30 years of age) using self‐report questionnaires. The hypotheses are: For the Chinese international students in Japan, (a) the individuals with high HA or low SD are more vulnerable to psychological distress; (b) the acculturation strategy mediates between personality (HA/SD) and mental health (GHQ); (c) social support can moderate the effect of personality on acculturation adaptation. The results show that the Chinese international students in Japan had higher GHQ scores compared to normative standards, and marginalization (a less adaptive strategy) was their second most preferred acculturation strategy, next to integration. Individuals with high HA or low SD were more likely to have a marginalization attitude and suffer from more psychological distress. The mediation effect of marginalization and the moderation effect of social support in life (SSL) between HA/SD and GHQ were confirmed. Most of the hypotheses were supported by the results. Explanations of these findings and their implication for acculturation adaptation are discussed.     

Asian Values,Ethnic Identity,and Acculturation Among Ethnic Asian Wives in South Korea

In Korea as of 2009, the immigrant population comprised less than 2.5 % of the total population, whereas almost one in ten marriages taking place during the same year was international, of which more than 75 % were ethnic Asian women married to Korean men. On that ground, this study addresses the importance of Asian values and ethnic identity in ethnic Asian wives’ acculturation to Korean society. The subjects of this study have been selected from three ethnic Asian groups—Japanese, Chinese, and Vietnamese women. Acculturation in this study has been measured in three aspects: Korean cultural attitudes and identity, linguistic assimilation, and the level of satisfaction with Korean culture. First, our findings have revealed that their recognition of Asian values plays an important role in improving their acculturation to Korean society, especially in the realms of cultural attitudes and identity, and satisfaction with Korean culture. Then, there has been no evidence that their sense of ethnic identity is a critical factor of their acculturation to Korean society.     

Implications of adolescents' acculturation strategies for personal and collective self-esteem

Berry, Trimble, and Olmedo's (1986) acculturation model was used to investigate the relationship among adolescents' acculturation strategies, personal self-esteem, and collective self-esteem. Using data from 427 high school students, factor analysis results distinguished Collective Self-esteem Scale constructs (Luhtanen & Crocker, 1992) from both ethnic identity and outgroup orientation subscales of the Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure (Phinney, 1992). Subsequent results showed that: 1) both acculturation dimensions were correlated with personal and collective self-esteems, 2) integrationists shared similar levels of personal and collective self-esteems with assimilationists and/or separationists, and 3) marginalizationists generally had the lowest levels of personal and collective self-esteems. Implications are drawn for understanding acculturation among adolescents and for the utility of group-level measures of self-esteem.     

Acculturation and depressive symptoms in Muslim university students: personal-family acculturation match

The relationships of personal acculturation and of personal-family acculturation match to depressive symptoms were investigated in a sample of 68 Muslim university students. Two dimensions of personal and family acculturation were assessed: heritage and mainstream culture identification. Participants completed the Vancouver Index of Acculturation (Ryder, Alden, & Paulhus, 2000 ) and the depressive disorder subscale of the Psychiatric Diagnostic Screening Questionnaire (Zimmerman & Mattia, 1999 ). For personal acculturation, individuals with high personal heritage culture identification reported fewer lifetime (but not past-year) depressive symptoms. In contrast, individuals with high personal mainstream culture identification reported more past-year (but not lifetime) depressive symptoms. The hypothesis that a match between personal and family acculturation orientation would be associated with fewer depressive symptoms was supported for heritage culture identification only. For past-year depression, the two match conditions (low or high personal and family heritage culture identification) were associated with significantly fewer depressive symptoms than a low personal/high family mismatch but did not differ from a high personal/low family mismatch. For lifetime depression, a high personal/high family match was associated with significantly fewer depressive symptoms than all other conditions. Findings suggests that, for Muslims, a match of high personal and high family heritage culture identification may act as a protective factor for the experience of depressive symptoms both in the short term (past year) and in the long term (lifetime).     

Chinese Proverb Scale: Development and validation of an indigenous measure of Chinese traditional values

The aim of this study was to develop and validate an indigenous measure of Chinese traditional values using Chinese proverbs. A sample of 363 Mainland Chinese undergraduates participated in Study 1, in which a 26‐item Chinese Proverb Scale (CPS) was developed through factor analysis on an initial pool of 118 Chinese proverbs. Four factors were clearly identified: (a) Diligence, (b) Integrity, (c) Self‐Preservation, and (d) Self‐Interest. The CPS showed satisfactory convergent validity with personal values (S. H. Schwartz, 1992, Advances In Experimental Social Psychology, San Diego, Academic Press) and social axioms (K. Leung et al., 2002, Journal of Cross‐Cultural Psychology, 33, p. 286). For incremental validity, the CPS predicted life satisfaction beyond the Big Five personality, personal values, and social axioms. In Study 2, a sample of 239 Mainland Chinese participants completed the CPS across two measurement occasions with an interval of 6 months. Longitudinal structural equation modeling (SEM) revealed the structure of the CPS was robust and invariant over time. In Study 3, a sample of 167 Chinese undergraduates from Hong Kong responded to an adapted version of the CPS. Multigroup SEM showed structural equivalence of the scale across the mainland and Hong Kong samples. The cultural origins of the factors in the CPS and future applications of the scale in various research areas are discussed.     

International student-focused counseling research: A 34-year content analysis

With the rapid growth of the international student population in the United States and internationalization of the counseling field, there is an increasing need to understand how this population is represented in counseling psychology research. To this end, this study provides a content and methodological analysis of 85 international student-focused empirical articles published in journals related to counseling psychology from 1980–2014. Publication trends revealed that of the total number of published empirical articles (N = 6191, 1980–2014), only 1.37% of empirical articles focused on international students. And yet, it appears that the percentage of empirical articles increased from .77% (1980) to 1.75% (2014), indicating a growth of 127% in the number of published empirical articles on international students. Results revealed 10 content categories, of which cultural adjustments, psychological health, and help utilization were the most common topics of inquiry. Methodological trends suggested that quantitative methodologies and convenience sampling were used most frequently and the majority of the sample consisted of international students from Asian countries. Limitations of and recommendations for future research are addressed.     

青少年心理韧性量表的编制和效度验证

心理韧性（resilience）是积极心理学的热点课题。虽然国外已有很多测量工具,但在中国群体中的适用性未得到支持。基于心理韧性的过程模型,通过访谈法开发适合我国青少年群体的心理韧性测量工具。通过访谈25名经历过较大负性生活事件而又适应良好的中学生,编制出100个题目,在283名青少年中初测,通过项目鉴别度分析和探索性因素分析,保留了27个题目,包含目标专注、情绪控制、积极认知、家庭支持和人际协助五个因子,α均大于0.7。复测样本包含420名青少年,验证性因素分析支持了量表的结构效度,二阶因素分析发现前3个因子属于个人力,后2个因子属于支持力。以其他心理韧性量表（RS）和中学生生存质量为关联效标,皮尔逊相关分别为0.53和0.49,支持了量表的外部效度。文章最后讨论了我国青少年心理韧性结构的文化意义及量表的应用范围     

Development and Validation of the Chinese Creative Writing Scale for Primary School Students in Hong Kong

The 13-item Chinese Creative Writing Scale was expanded and modified from the Carlson Originality Scale to assess creativity elements in compositions of primary school students in Hong Kong. The content validity was endorsed by a small expert panel. Results show that the scale has excellent interrater reliability (.90 to .98), and moderate to good internal consistency. Exploratory factor analysis shows that the three factors (flexibility, originality, and fluency) accounted for 59.1% of the variability, which is consistent with the design of the scale. The scale can also be used as an outcome measure for assessing the effectiveness of strategies which aim at enhancing creativity of students. With minor modifications, the scale can also be applied in mainland China, Taiwan, and Chinese societies elsewhere in the world.     

A Revisit of General Self-Efficacy Scale: Uni- or Multi-dimensional?

While a large body of research provides strong evidence that general self-efficacy (GSE) is a unidimensional construct, no study has been conducted to test or compare its single-factor structure with alternative factor structures (e.g., two-factor structure). The main purpose of this study was to re-examine its factor structure in a Chinese context. The Chinese version of GSE scale was administered to 195 Chinese university students. Personal identity and optimism instruments were also used to examine the predictive validity of GSE. Exploratory factor analysis determined that a two-factor solution was best fitting, explaining 54.49 % of the variance, which was reproduced reliably in the two subsamples. Through a series of factor model testing by confirmatory factor analysis, findings indicated that the two-factor structure was reliable, internally valid as demonstrated. Subsequent regression analyses also showed that only one of the two factors significantly predicted personal identity and optimism, whereas the other one was irrelevant. The findings emphasized the value of revisiting GSE as a uni- or multi-dimensional construct.     

Evaluating the Individualism and Collectivism Scale for use in mainland China

A Chinese translation of the 27-item Individualism and Collectivism Scale was administered in southern mainland China to 626 Chinese university students (210 men and 416 women) with a mean age of 19.9 yr. (SD = 1.5). From analysis of the responses to these items, the prior four factors, Horizontal Individualism, Vertical Individualism, Horizontal Collectivism, and Vertical Collectivism, did not clearly emerge in the Chinese sample. Further research on the viability of the scale and conceptualization of the horizontal and vertical distinction in the Chinese context is recommended.     

Psychometric Properties of Two Bicultural Attitude Scales: An Update

The purpose of this paper is to report evidence of psychometric properties of two Bicultural Attitude Scales (BASs) developed by the author. The paper provides evidence of the reliability and validity of the two versions of the BAS (i.e., Parents version and Children versions) based on two studies. The first study was conducted on a sample of 66 Bangladeshi immigrant parents (33 mothers and 33 fathers) living in the USA. The measuring instrument was the Parents version of the BAS. Results showed a high factorial validity structure of the scale—the values ranged from .62 to .96—and high internal consistency reliability of the scale—the alpha coefficient was .80. The second study was conducted on a 412 Bangladeshi ethnic minority young adults (40 % women and 60 % men). Children version of the BAS was used in this study. The study revealed significantly high factorial validity—factor loading values ranged from .34 to .65—and a significantly high internal consistency reliability of the scale—the alpha coefficient was .86.     

Acculturation,self‐construal,mental and physical health: An explorative study of East Asian students in Germany

The present study explores acculturation and its associated aspects of two East Asian student groups with different levels of exposure to German culture (100 international students from East Asian countries [IS]; 61 second generation students of East Asian descent [SGS]). First, we investigated the relationships between acculturation, self‐construal, depressive and somatic symptoms, and differences between the student groups in these variables. Second, the four acculturation types (integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization) were examined regarding their relationship to self‐construal and health outcomes. The results showed that the acculturation dimensions (mainstream, heritage) were relevant to the level of depressive symptoms for IS which was not the case for SGS. Furthermore, IS reported more somatic symptoms whereas there was no difference between the two groups in the level of depressive symptoms. In the analysis of acculturation types, assimilated and integrated students were characterized by high independent self‐construal, while separated and integrated students showed high interdependent self‐construal. Assimilated students displayed the least depressive symptoms of all acculturation groups. This study highlights different characteristics of East Asian students in acculturation, self‐construal and health outcomes, and discusses the complexity of the relationships between acculturation types and health.     

Psychometric Properties of the Shortened Chinese Version of the Family Resilience Assessment Scale

Family theory has refocused attention from deficits to family strengths, and interest in family resilience across cultures has become more widespread. However, few instruments were designed for quantitative research on family resilience. The Family Resilience Assessment Scale (FRAS) was designed to measure family resilience and has been administered in Western populations. The aim of this study was to adapt the FRAS for use with Chinese populations and examine its psychometric properties. The study was conducted using a sample of 991 university students in China (62.9 % female, mean age 20, SD = 1.12). First, the scale was translated and modified into Chinese, and good language equivalency was found. Next, confirmatory factor analysis was used to identify the best-fitting model. Results showed that the 3-factor model consisting of 32 items was an adequate fit. The goodness-of-fit index values for the model were χ ²/df = 5.97, CFI = .84, RMSEA = .08, SRMR = .05. Total scale reliability was α = .95. According to these values it can be said that the modified Chinese version of the FRAS was adapted successfully to the Chinese culture. Moreover, researchers and clinicians can use this instrument to assess family strengths when working with individuals in families experiencing adversity.     

Predictors of international students' psychological and sociocultural adjustment to the context of reception while studying at Aarhus University,Denmark

The number of international students engaging in intercultural education and thereby adjusting to cross‐cultural transition has risen conspicuously as a consequence of globalization and increased mobility. This process of acculturation has been associated with increased creativity as well as adaptation challenges. This paper investigates international students' psychological and sociocultural adjustment to studying at Aarhus University in Denmark. Both international students (n = 129) and domestic students (n = 111) participated in the study. The international students did not report impaired psychological conditions as compared to the control group of domestic students. However, the international students reported a significantly lower level of social support. Social support and perceived discrimination were significant predictors of both psychological and sociocultural adjustment. Additionally, the level of English proficiency alone predicted sociocultural adjustment. Values of vertical individualism and horizontal collectivism predicted psychological adjustment. Finally, integration was found to be a significantly more adaptive acculturation orientation than separation in regard to sociocultural adjustment. These findings were discussed in relation to relevant international research and it was concluded that international students comprise a resourceful student sample and that the international academic environment at Aarhus University appears to be an adequately cultural and value‐oriented good fit as a context of reception for the multicultural engagement of international students.     

international students' employment search in the united states: a phenomenological study

After completing their academic degree, international student populations face unique situations in their search for employment in the United States. This study used a phenomenological examination to identify the perceptions and the experiences of eight undergraduate international students who participated in a 10‐week support group during the employment exploration and application process. Participants documented their personal reflections in journal entries and engaged in a single‐session focus group after the support group. Themes that emerged from the focus group and participants' journal entries were (a) discovering personal uniqueness, (b) coping with acculturation, and (c) dealing with a lack of resources. Implications for career development practitioners are discussed.     

The Effects of Differentiation and Attachment on Satisfaction and Acculturation in Asian-White American International Couple Relationships: Assessment With Chinese,South Korean,and Japanese Partners in Relationships With White American Partners in the United States

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of differentiation and attachment on acculturation and relational satisfaction in Asian partners in Asian-White American international couple relationships. Eighty-seven native-born Chinese, South Korean, and Japanese partners within an international couple relationship with a White American partner in the United States participated in this study. Regression results supported the hypotheses that differentiation and acculturation were significantly related to relationship satisfaction. Differentiation was also significantly associated with acculturation. Attachment style was not significantly associated with levels of relationship satisfaction or acculturation. Overall, the researchers found that differentiation and acculturation were important factors influencing the relationship satisfaction in Asian-White American international couples in the United States. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.     

Dimensions of Acculturation and Work Hope in International Students

Work hope is an emerging and important factor in the career development process of international students. In this study, the authors focused on the work hope of international students and examined its relation to dimensions of acculturation (i.e., dominant society immersion, ethnic identity, ethnic society immersion, individualism, and collectivism). A total of 340 international students completed an online survey. Results of a correlation analysis revealed associations in the expected directions. Multivariate regression analysis revealed that horizontal collectivism, horizontal individualism, and vertical collectivism had a significant and unique contribution in explaining work hope. Implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.