Explanatory style, family expressiveness, and self-esteem among Asian American and European American college students.
Fifty-nine Asian American and 40 European American college students completed questionnaires measuring explanatory style, family expressiveness, and self-esteem. In both groups, a global explanatory style correlated with low self-esteem, but only among European Americans was an internal style associated with low self-esteem. The two groups differed in reported styles of family expressiveness, with Asian Americans indicating more emotional restraint. The participants who reported more negative submissiveness had a more global explanatory style, whereas those who reported more positive dominance had a less global explanatory style. An additional measure developed to assess attribution to collectivities did not distinguish the two groups. Results were discussed in terms of the cross-cultural generality of the learned helplessness reformulation.
Kao
E M
EM
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA.
Nagata
D K
DK
Peterson
C
C
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001213:Asian / Q000523:psychology*; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D019260:Expressed Emotion; D005190:Family / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D012649:Self Concept; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology*; D044465:White People / Q000523:psychology*