Beyond Individualism-Collectivism and Conflict Style: Considering Acculturation and Media Use

Opportunities for individuals from varied cultural backgrounds to interact, and therefore conflict, are inherently greater because the technologies, economies, and livelihoods of people of many countries are increasingly interdependent. In light of globalization, it is ever more valuable to understand how culture influences the way people manage conflict. The purpose of this study was to examine factors influencing people's individualistic-collectivistic culture tendencies and conflict styles, and whether or not acculturation is a moderating factor between individualism-collectivism and conflict style among foreign nationals living within the United States. In addition to acculturation, researchers also measured media use. The data revealed statistically-significant relationships for media-use and acculturation on individualism-collectivism and conflict styles, and supported the idea that acculturation is a moderating factor between individualism-collectivism and conflict style, although this relationship was only significant among those who preferred the dominating conflict style.     

An Examination of Media Usage among French-Muslims

Media help in the formation of identity. For ethnic communities, ethnic media can play a dual role, aiding in the acculturation process and assisting in holding onto ethnic identities. This study examines media and identity negotiation. Specifically, this study analyzes differences in media usage among French-Muslims. The principal researcher interviewed 42 first and second generation French-Muslims to explore their media usage and the relationships between their media usage and ethnic identification. Analysis uncovered two key findings. First, second-generation French-Muslims prefer to use ethnic media more than French produced media as a form of protest against French assimilationist policies. Second, abandoning ethnic media is equated with becoming French, which is something first and second generation French-Muslims resist.     

Preferences of students with learning disabilities for alternative service delivery modes

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the preferences of students with learning disabilities regarding the location in which they receive help and the person from whom to get help. The attitudes of students with learning disabilities towards school as a function of the time they spend in the mainstream and their characteristics were also investigated. Results of the structured interviews and survey statements of 150 students indicated that they preferred receiving extra help in the special education class from the special education teacher. Students’ preferences for setting or teacher were not related to age, sex, IQ or academic achievement level, nor to the time students spent in the mainstream. The students expressed a positive attitude towards school in general, and towards their teachers, their classmates and the schoolwork in particular.     

Does cross-cultural training in tertiary education enhance cross-cultural adjustment? A systematic review

The increasing cultural diversity within tertiary education and workplace environments requires students and graduates to be knowledgeable and effective in cross-cultural adjustment and managing potential acculturative stress. One of the ways to increase their cross-cultural adjustment is via cross-cultural training (CCT). Given the predominantly business-oriented nature of previous reviews, this paper systematically examined whether CCT was effective when applied to tertiary students. The analysis of different types of CCT and its outcomes was guided by Ward, Bochner, and Furnham’s (2001) ABC (Affective, Behavioural, and Cognitive) model that comprehensively explained the affective, behavioural, and cognitive facets of cross-cultural adjustment. We reviewed 35 CCT studies published post-1990 with control group design or pre-post training evaluation. CCT in tertiary education has become increasingly multi-method and experiential. CCT programs with behavioural components had the most consistent evidence of effectiveness. Programs with both behavioural and cognitive components were more effective than cognitive- and didactic-alone programs. CCT appeared to be particularly effective in enhancing tertiary students’ academic and career performance. Practical implication and suggestions for future research directions are discussed.     

Cultivation of taste and bounded rationality: Some computer simulations

One can approach the economics of the arts, as any field of applied economics, in either of two ways. First, one can treat economic theory and econometric technique as subjects settled by specialists in those fields, to be used in the ec onomics of the arts as they are given, very much as if one were studying the demand for maize. Alternatively, one can treat the economics of the arts as a field which may need and suggest its own developments in theory and technique, suitable to its spec ial problems and processes, from which general economic theory and econometric theory might in principle learn something. Perhaps this latter view is implausible, given the high state of development of economic theory and econometrics in the modern liter ature. Yet many of the advances embodied in these fields have come from particular areas of application-and the economics of maize has been a particularly fertile field.I am indebted to participants in the Seventh International Conference on Cultural Economics, Fort Worth, Texas, October 1992; to p articipants in the Seminar on the Economics of the Arts, Venice, Italy, December 1992; to participants in the conference of the Pennsylvania Economists' Association, Wiles-Barre, PA, June, 1993; to participants in the second conference on Simulating Soci eties, Siena, Italy, July 1993; to participants in the conference of the Society for the Advancement of Behavioral Economics, Rensselaerville, NY, August 1993; and to participants in the Third Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Economics and Manage ment, Portland, OR, August 1993, for useful comments on topics related to the research reported in this paper. Errors and omissions are, of course, attributable to the author.     

Meaning of life as a protective factor of positive affect in acculturation: A resilience framework and a cross-cultural comparison

Although research has demonstrated a strong linkage between meaning of life and positive emotion, few studies have examined this association in the context of acculturation. The purpose of this study was to investigate the predictive effects of meaning of life and acculturative stressor on positive affect in a sample of Chinese international students in Australia and Hong Kong, and to compare these effects between the two groups. Four hundred mainland Chinese postgraduate students at six universities in Hong Kong and 227 Chinese international students at the University of Melbourne in Australia completed a questionnaire that included measures of acculturative stressor, meaning of life, positive affect, and demographic information. The analyses revealed that (1) meaning of life had a strong positive contribution to predict positive affect in acculturation, and acculturative stress had a negative impact on positive affect within both samples; (2) social interaction had a significant negative predictive effect on positive affect in both samples, and academic work served as a significant negative predictor of positive affect in the Hong Kong sample; and (3) meaning of life was found to mediate the relationship between acculturative stress and positive affect in both samples. The theoretical and practical implications of the study are discussed.     

P2P网贷平台的收益及风险对投资人的选择影响——以“金银猫”网贷平台为例

互联网金融依托其成本低、效率高、覆盖广和发展快的特点,已然成为当下中国金融行业不可压倒的一个趋势,相应地,P2P网贷、第三方支付、大数据金融等互联网金融理财产品也成为当下投资者炙手可热的投资选择,试以"金银猫"网贷平台为例,采用计量的方法定量分析网贷平台收益和风险以及成交量的相互关系,并由此分析投资人在面临收益和风险时的选择偏好问题,最后对如何降低P2P网贷平台的发展以促进其发展给出相应的建议。     

What and how teacher educators prefer to learn

In which areas and domains do individual teacher educators prefer to work on their professional development? What kind of learning activities do they want to take on and with whom? Are there significant differences in these preferences between teacher educators? This article reports on a recent survey (N = 268) about the professional development of teacher educators and differences in learning preferences between less and more experienced teacher educators and between university-based and school-based teacher educators. Findings show, for example, that while most university-based teacher educators were mainly interested in improving their teaching, less experienced school-based teacher educators were more focussed on aspects such as coaching skills. In this study, ‘learning profiles’ have been developed for four categories of teacher educators. These profiles may help to create more meaningful arrangements for teacher educators’ initial education and further professional development in a context where teacher education is required to have a more school-based as well as a more research-based orientation.     

How stable is the stratification of higher education in England and Scotland?

This paper asks whether the institutional hierarchies defined by ‘golden triangle’, other Russell Group, other pre-1992 and post-1992 universities in England, and by ancient, old and new universities in Scotland, have become weaker since the 1990s. Using indicators constructed from Universities and Colleges Admissions Service data for 1996–2010, the article finds a stable hierarchical relationship among the sectors within each country, with some indicators showing a slight widening of status differences between sectors towards the end of the period. The main exception was a slight ‘upgrading’ of new (post-1992) universities in Scotland early in the period. There was little change in the association of institutional sector with social class, but in England the association with private secondary schools became slightly stronger and the association with ethnicity weakened.     

Development of the Preferences for College Counseling Inventory

This study describes the development of the Preferences for College Counseling Inventory (PCCI). In addition to providing data about college students' preferences for the logistics of counseling and the demographic/professional background of a potential therapist, the PCCI also provides numerical scores on 3 scales (Therapist Expertise, Therapist Warmth, and Therapist Directiveness) that measure preferences for therapist dispositions and 2 scales (Task‐Oriented Activities and Experiential/Insight‐Oriented Activities) that measure preferences for counseling activities.