Not All Forms of Independence Are Created Equal: Only Being Independent the "Right Way" Is Associated With Self-Esteem and Life Satisfaction.

Past research has found a strong and positive association between the independent self-construal and life satisfaction, mediated through self-esteem, in both individualistic and collectivistic cultures. In Study 1, we collected data from four countries (the United States, Japan, Romania, and Hungary; N = 736) and replicated these findings in cultures which have received little attention in past research. In Study 2, we treated independence as a multifaceted construct and further examined its relationship with self-esteem and life satisfaction using samples from the United States and Romania (N = 370). Different ways of being independent are associated with self-esteem and life satisfaction in the two cultures, suggesting that it is not independence as a global concept that predicts self-esteem and life satisfaction, but rather, feeling independent in culturally appropriate ways is a signal that one's way of being fits in and is valued in one's context.

Cultural Variability in the Association Between Age and Well-Being: The Role of Uncertainty Avoidance.

Past research has found a mixed relationship between age and subjective well-being. The current research advances the understanding of these findings by incorporating a cultural perspective. We tested whether the relationship between age and well-being is moderated by uncertainty avoidance, a cultural dimension dealing with society's tolerance for ambiguity. In Study 1 (N = 64,228), using a multilevel approach with an international database, we found that older age was associated with lower well-being in countries higher in uncertainty avoidance but not in countries lower in uncertainty avoidance. Further, this cultural variation was mediated by a sense of control. In Study 2 (N = 1,025), we compared a culture with low uncertainty avoidance (the United States) with a culture with high uncertainty avoidance (Romania) and found a consistent pattern: Age was negatively associated with well-being in Romania but not in the United States. This cultural difference was mediated by the use of contrasting coping strategies associated with different levels of a sense of control.

Implicit attitudes towards risky driving: Development and validation of an affect misattribution procedure for speeding.

The present study aimed to develop and validate an instrument for measuring implicit attitudes towards speeding, based on the Affect Misattribution Procedure (AMP). The data collected from 140 drivers supported the reliability of the AMP (α=0.80). Results provided some support for the construct validity of the AMP, through its convergence with explicit attitudes towards speeding (r=0.22). Also, the AMP incrementally predicted driving violations (ΔR2=0.034) and traffic accidents (ΔR2=0.022), above and beyond demographic variables and explicit attitudes towards speeding, thus providing initial evidence for its criterion validity. The multiplicative interaction effect between implicit and explicit attitudes (in predicting the same criterion variables) was not supported. Overall, our results provide support for Speeding-AMP's validity and reliability, which can be successfully used in research concerning risky driving behavior.