Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology

Pilots from the United States, the Philippines, and Taiwan as well as flight attendants from the United States, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, and Taiwan completed a 20-item attitudinal questionnaire about group processes on the flight deck. A three-dimensional INDSCAL analysis revealed one dimension, used primarily by the eight Asian groups, which reflected high power distance and collectivism. The second dimension, reflecting individualism and moderate power distance, was used by the U.S. flight attendants. The third dimension, individualism and low power distance, was used almost exclusively by the U.S. pilots. The attitudinal similarity among the eight Asian groups was attributed in part to the questionnaire's monocultural bias. A new study is outlined, and training recommendations are offered.

This study explores Kegan's theory of self development in a sample of 72 Venezuelan adolescents (aged 12 to 18). This study tests (a) whether Kegan's stages are found in a sample of Venezuelan adolescents and if they are equivalent to those found in U.S. adolescents of the same ages, (b) whether Kegan's Subject-Object Interview can be successfully used in a culture other than the United States, (c) whether age, gender, and their interaction have an effect on the stages of self development of this Venezuelan sample, and whether that effect is equivalent to that found in the U.S. subjects. Results show that, as predicted (given the information about U.S. samples), Stages 2, 3, and 4 are found among Venezuelan adolescents; that the instrument can be successfully used to assess these stages; that age has a significant effect, but gender has no effect.

Cross-cultural studies on the recognition of facial expressions of emotions were reanalyzed. It was found that (a) number of emotions included in the stimulus set influenced the accuracy scores; and (b) that Caucasian judges recognized emotions better than non-Caucasian ones. The latter effect may have been due to the culturally biased stimulus sets used in the studies, or to stricter display rules in non-Caucasian cultures. Correlations of the accuracy scores with Hofstede's cultural dimensions, in which number of faces and race of judges were statistically controlled, revealed that uncertainty avoidance predicted accuracy scores in the recognition of sadness and fear, suggesting that some reliable cultural differences in the recognition of emotions from facial expressions may exist.

This study investigated a horizontal décalage phenomenon in the development of children's knowledge about heating and cooling. Décalage phenomena have posed a problem to orthodox Piagetian theory and have reinforced the objection by some domain-specific theorists to the central Piagetian notion of overarching structures. The aim of this study was to contribute to this debate by empirical observation of décalage phenomena. A total of 270 children from 3 ethnic groups were tested for their understanding of heating and cooling concepts, using a standard task and a structured interview. Results showed a strong décalage effect: Children used more sophisticated explanations, at earlier ages, for heating than for cooling phenomena. This horizontal décalage was present in a similar form in all three ethnic groups. We argue that the uniformity of the décalage is difficult to reconcile with domain-specific views.

This study investigated cultural differences in emotion experience and expression in romantic relationships. It was hypothesized that Japanese Americans would report experiencing and expressing emotion to a lesser degree than Filipino Americans, and Filipino Americans would report experiencing and expressing emotion less intensely than Euro Americans. It was also hypothesized that the perceived appropriateness of the expression of emotion would be lowest for Japanese Americans, followed by Filipino Americans, and Filipino Americans would perceive lower appropriateness of emotion expression than Euro Americans. A total of 134 respondents completed a self-report instrument, which assessed a positive and negative emotion instance experienced in their romantic relationship. Negative and positive emotion instances were analyzed separately and only positive emotions were found to vary as a set across culture. Results showed that Filipino Americans rated emotion experience intensity, expression intensity, and appropriateness higher than Japanese Americans; however, contrary to expectations, Euro Americans' means were as low as, or lower, than those of the Japanese Americans respondents on all three dependent measures.

Building on earlier research, which used a common standardized methodology, the present study compared behavior problems reported by teachers for 359 Jamaican and 665 U.S. children aged 6-11. Most of the significant nationality differences reflected higher scores for Jamaican than U.S. children, although none of the differences accounted for more than a small percentage of variance in scores. For those problems reported to be present, Jamaican teachers tended to score a larger proportion as very true or often true than did U.S. teachers. In conjunction with previous findings, this suggests that a larger proportion of Jamaican children find school exceptionally stressful. Gender differences in problem rates were similar to those found in several other cultures. Findings from this and other studies demonstrate considerable similarity in the problems reported by teachers across diverse cultures.

There is a negative correlation between body weight and income in the United States, and epidemic numbers of people diet to become thin. In developing nations, on the other hand, there is a positive correlation between weight and income, and fatness is associated with wealth and abundance. Although these differing cross-cultural trends have been documented by anthropologists, there has been minimal cross-cultural research on attitudes toward obesity and thinness and corresponding dieting behaviors in the psychological literature. A sample of 349 students at a university in Ghana and 219 students at a U.S. university completed questionnaires about their weight, frequency of dieting and restrained eating, the degree to which their weight has interfered with social activities, their perceptions of ideal bodies, disordered eating, and stereotypes of thin and heavy people. Students in Ghana more often rated larger body sizes as ideal for both males and females and also assumed that these larger sizes were held as ideals in society, than did U.S. students. U.S. students (regardless of weight) were more likely to have dieted than were Ghanaian students, with U.S. females being most likely to diet. Additionally, U.S. females scored significantly higher on restraint, eating-disordered behavior, and experiencing weight as social interference. Findings illustrate that perceptions of ideal body size and corresponding behaviors are influenced by culture and gender.

This study provides empirical evidence to support the view that ethnic change is a multidimensional process. Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis conducted on measures of several French Canadian (FC) ethnicity facets, it identifies ethnic affiliation and acculturative tendency as two key dimensions of ethnic change experienced by French Canadians in their contacts with English Canadians. The ethnic affiliation dimension was indicated by measures of FC social interaction, FC family, FC self-identification, and attachment to FC culture, whereas the acculturative tendency dimension was indicated by measures of attachment to English Canadian (EC) culture, attitude toward cultural exchange, and EC social interaction. These two dimensions are subsequently used to develop a typology of French Canadian ethnic orientation. Findings provide support for the ethnic pluralism or multiculturalism perspective in describing ethnic change.