Cross-cultural adaptation of Chinese international students: Effects of distant and close support-seeking.

Introduction: Social support-seeking is considered to be an effective way for international students to cope with their acculturative stress and contribute to cross-cultural adaptation. In addition to support from people in the host country (close support), the ease of online communication now allows international students to receive additional support from people back in their home country (distant support). However, little research has investigated whether distant support works as effectively as close support. In two studies, we examined the differential effect of distant and close support-seeking on the psychological adaptation of Chinese international students in the host country and how acculturation orientations relate to the use of these two types of support. Methods: Chinese international students in Japan (Study 1; N = 172) and the United States (Study 2; N = 118) completed an online survey that assessed participants' host/home culture orientation, distant emotional/instrumental support-seeking, close emotional/instrumental support-seeking, and psychological adaptation. Results: Results showed that distant emotional support-seeking negatively predicted psychological adaptation in the host country. Nevertheless, distant emotional support-seeking alleviated feelings of loneliness in Chinese international students as close emotional support-seeking did (Study 2). Also, the results showed that international students with higher home-culture orientation sought more distant support, whereas those with higher host-culture orientation sought more close support. Further, Chinese-culture orientation increased distant emotional support-seeking, decreasing psychological adaptation as well as loneliness. Discussion: These findings highlight the importance of considering the source and types of support when discussing the implications of social support for the cross-cultural adaptation of international students.

Daily-level assessment of the contexts under which seeking social support relates to risk of suicidal thinking.

INTRODUCTION: Perceived social support is a well-established protective factor against suicidal ideation, yet few studies have examined how actually seeking social support relates to suicidal ideation. We investigated the contexts under which social support seeking may be related to greater, or lesser, suicidal ideation. METHODS: Undergraduates completed ecological momentary assessments up to 6 times daily. Multi-level moderated logistic regressions examined interactions between presence of daily-level support seeking with burdensomeness and loneliness as indicators of same-day and next-day suicidal ideation. RESULTS: Seeking social support was positively associated with same-day, but not next-day reports of suicidal thinking. On days when participants felt burdensome and sought support, they had greater odds of reporting suicidal ideation (OR = 1.659, 95% CI = [1.420, 1.938]), compared with days they felt burdensome but did not seek support. There was no effect of burdensomeness on next-day ideation. There was no significant interaction effect between support seeking and loneliness on same-day or next-day ideation. CONCLUSIONS: Seeking support and feeling like a burden are associated with a greater likelihood of experiencing suicidal ideation. The current results underscore the importance of equipping at-risk individuals with a toolbelt of a variety of coping skills.

Personality Traits, Cognitive Styles, Coping Strategies, and Psychological Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic Lockdown on Healthy Youngsters.

The objective of the present study was to explore possible changes in the psychological wellbeing of young healthy students during the initial 14 days of the COVID-19 general lockdown that occurred in March of 2020, and if there was any relation with specific personality traits (neuroticism, psychoticism, and extraversion), cognitive styles (internal and external locus of control and intolerance of uncertainty), and coping strategies. One hundred twenty-two university students aged from 18 to 29 years participated in the study. The dispositional factors were assessed at the beginning of the study, while measures of psychological adjustment (anxiety, depression, and self-perceived health) were taken in three different assessment stages, employing validated questionnaires and scales. Anxiety and depression scores significantly increased after one week of lockdown, reaching a plateau pattern by the second week. The levels of self-perceived mental health, vitality, and quality of life showed a pattern of sustained progressive decrease, with a more acute lessening during the first week. Neuroticism, intolerance of uncertainty, and negative autofocus were associated to worse levels of psychological adjustment. These individual differences might be taken into consideration when designing prevention programs aiming to dampen the psychological impact of a general lockdown in healthy population.

Principal components analysis of the Hesitation Scale: More than just social support seeking.

The seeking of support from others during times of need is a critical strategy for overcoming challenging life events and ameliorating associated stress. The larger percentage of research examining help-seeking behaviour has been conducted with nonclinical samples, and conclusions remain somewhat unclear due to several limitations, including methodological inconsistencies across studies. The Hesitation Scale (HS) was developed to measure social support seeking in patients with traumatic brain injury but has not undergone thorough psychometric evaluation. The goal of this study primarily was to provide a clearer understanding of the specific aspects of support-seeking behaviour assessed by the HS, which is fundamental to the identification of factors that can be modified through targeted clinical interventions. A principal components analysis of the HS in an outpatient sample of 89 patients with spinal cord injury revealed that although the HS may provide an overall indication of respondents' attitudes and beliefs regarding social support seeking, the six significant extracted components of the scale appear to assess distinct aspects of support seeking behaviour. Results also suggested that the HS may have clinical utility in evaluating social support seeking in individuals with spinal cord injury.

Longitudinal Associations between Coping Strategies and Psychopathology in Pre-adolescence.

Much of the literature investigating the association between coping and psychopathology is cross-sectional, or associations have been investigated in a unidirectional manner; hence, bidirectionality between coping and psychopathology remains largely untested. To address this gap, this study investigated bidirectional relations between coping and psychopathology during pre-adolescence. Participants (N = 532, 51% male) and their primary caregiver both completed questionnaires assessing pre-adolescents' coping (i.e., avoidant, problem solving, social support seeking) and symptoms of psychopathology (i.e., generalized anxiety, social anxiety, depression, eating pathology) in Wave 1 (Mage = 11.18 years, SD = 0.56, range = 10-12) and Wave 2 (Mage = 12.18 years, SD = 0.53, range = 11-13, 52% male), one year later. Cross-lagged panel models showed child-reported avoidant coping predicted increases in symptoms of generalized and social anxiety, and eating pathology. In separate child and parent models, symptoms of depression predicted increases in avoidant coping. Greater parent-reported child depressive symptoms also predicted decreases in problem solving coping. Taken together, results suggest unique longitudinal associations between coping and psychopathology in pre-adolescence, with avoidant coping preceding increases in symptoms of anxiety and eating pathology, and depressive symptoms predicting later increases in maladaptive coping.

Coping with my own way: Mediating roles of emotional expression and social support seeking in the associations between individual differences and posttraumatic growth.

This study examined the associations between individual differences and posttraumatic growth, and coping strategies as mediators among 454 trauma-exposed American college students. Results showed that relational-interdependent self-construal, optimism, emotional expression, and social support seeking were associated with higher posttraumatic growth. Moreover, social support seeking and emotional expression partially mediated between relational-interdependent self-construal and posttraumatic growth, such that relational-interdependent self-construal was associated with posttraumatic growth through increased support seeking and emotional expression. However, the association between optimism and posttraumatic growth was partially mediated only by increased emotional expression, but not social support seeking. Findings imply that individual differences may facilitate posttraumatic growth through different coping mechanisms.

Guilt among husband caregivers of Chinese women with breast cancer: The roles of male gender-role norm, caregiving burden and coping processes.

Caregiver guilt (i.e., feeling of inadequacy in providing care to patients) is commonly experienced and studied among husbands of breast cancer survivors in Western countries. However, little is known about the psychosocial correlates of caregiver guilt in their Chinese counterparts. A total of 176 husbands of Chinese breast cancer survivors completed a cross-sectional survey in Weifang, Shandong province, China. As expected, hierarchical regression results showed that higher caregiving burden was associated with higher levels of caregiver guilt. However, for those who had stronger endorsement of the "Masculinity strength" gender-role norm, higher seeking social support from spouse was associated with higher guilt; for those with higher levels of marital satisfaction, higher protective buffering (i.e., hiding of concerns and negative emotions to protect others) was associated with lower caregiver guilt. Western assumptions on the harm of protective buffering and the benefits of support seeking as well as related supportive evidence among Western populations do not directly apply to the Chinese culture, which should be brought awareness to research and practice. Practitioners should consider the cultural background of the caregivers and should not simply encourage support seeking and discourage protective buffering.

Social Dimensions of Personal Growth following Widowhood: A Three-Wave Study.

BACKGROUND: Losing one's spouse is one of the most stressful life events in old age, yet research on positive consequences of overcoming critical life events describes experiences of personal growth for survivors. OBJECTIVE: Because prior studies conceptualized personal growth as a stable accomplishment of an individual, our study challenges this assumption by examining trajectories of personal growth and its links to two aspects of social support. We assume that personal growth is boosted by heightened levels of loss-related social support seeking during early years of widowhood. However, toward the later stages in the bereavement process, we expect personal growth to be fostered by perceived social embeddedness. DATA AND METHOD: Data stem from a survey on relationships in later life conducted in 2012, 2014, and 2016 in Switzerland. The final analytical sample consisted of 508 individuals aged 50+ years, who were on average 73 years old and widowed for about 3 years at baseline. Longitudinal explorative factor analyses yielded a 3-factorial solution for personal growth. Random-effects group-specific growth curves were used to examine the trajectories of personal growth and its subdimensions, by different levels of loss-related social support seeking and embeddedness in a supportive network, over the first 8 years of widowhood. Our analyses included time-invariant and time-varying covariates. RESULTS: On average, our findings point to a stable trajectory of personal growth after having become widowed in later life. Group-specific analyses, however, showed different courses in the trajectories for specific subdimensions of personal growth - particularly for spiritual change and appreciation of life. Average marginal effects also yielded group differences by loss-related support seeking in the level of personal growth over time, which highlight the importance of social support seeking, rather than social embeddedness, at all stages of the bereavement process. CONCLUSION: Findings underline the importance of a longitudinal and linked-lives perspective on personal growth and point to different pathways regarding its various subdimensions. Future research should further examine the validity of personal growth scales for other populations and consider the possibility to experience personal growth already during the anticipation of a traumatic event (e.g., in the case of long-term caretaking).

Internal resources among informal caregivers: trajectories and associations with well-being.

PURPOSE: The experiences, skills, and internal resources that informal caregivers bring into their role may play a critical part in their mental health and well-being. This study examined how caregiver internal resources changed over a 10 year period, and how this was related to caregivers' well-being. METHODS: Data are from the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study, a national sample of adults, at two time points: 1995-1996 (T1) and 2004-2006 (T2). We identified subjects who reported being a caregiver at T2 and starting care after T1 (mean age = 56; 65% female). We examined internal resources: sense of control (personal mastery); primary and secondary control strategies (persistence in goal striving, positive reappraisal, and lowering expectations); and social support seeking, and psychological and subjective well-being. We evaluated how internal resources changed over time, and how these trajectories were associated with well-being at T2 using multivariable linear regressions. RESULTS: Most caregivers had stable levels of internal resources (between 4 and 13% showed an increase or decrease). Caregivers with increasing or high-stable levels of personal mastery had significantly better well-being scores on 6 out of 8 subscales compared with low-stable levels [effect sizes (ES) between 0.39 and 0.79]. Increasing persistence was associated with better personal growth and environmental mastery (ES = 0.96 and 0.91), and increasing and high-stable positive reappraisals were associated with better affect (ES = 0.63 and 0.48) compared with low-stable levels. Lowering aspirations and support seeking were not associated with well-being outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: Practices or interventions that support or improve internal resources could potentially improve caregiver well-being.

Quality of life and mental health among women with ovarian cancer: examining the role of emotional and instrumental social support seeking.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of emotional and instrumental social support seeking in the quality of life (QOL) and mental health of women with ovarian cancer. Participants were recruited through the Pennsylvania Cancer Registry, and one hundred women took part in a mail questionnaire that collected information on their demographics, medical status, social support seeking, QOL and mental health including anxiety, depression and stress. Hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted to assess the influence of emotional and instrumental social support seeking on QOL and mental health. After controlling for remission status, greater emotional social support seeking was predictive of higher overall QOL, social/family QOL, functional QOL and lower depression scores. Instrumental social support seeking was not significant in the models. The results illustrate that social support seeking as a coping mechanism is an important consideration in the QOL and mental health of women with ovarian cancer. Future studies should examine the psychological and behavioral mediators of the relationship to further understand the QOL and mental health of women with ovarian cancer.