Abstract
Self-control plays an important role in human’s daily life. In the recent two decades, scholars have exerted tremendous effort to examine the etiologies of the individual differences in self-control. Among numerous predictors of self-control, the role of culture has been relatively overlooked. In this study, the influences of cultural orientation on self-control were examined based on the collectivism-individualism framework using both self-report and behavioral task to assess self-control. A convenience sample of 542 Chinese and 446 U.S. undergraduates participated in the research. They were invited to fill out self-report questionnaires reporting their levels of attitudinal self-control and individualistic-collectivistic orientation after completing a computer-based Stroop task. Results of hierarchical regression models showed that Chinese participants reported less attitudinal self-control but had higher behavioral self-control than their U.S. counterparts. Moreover, individual-level individualism and collectivism was negatively and positively related to attitudinal self-control in both countries, respectively. Individual-level collectivism was significantly related to better behavioral self-control, but no significant results were found for the relationship between individual-level individualism and behavioral self-control. In sum, individualism and collectivism have some influences on individual differences in self-control. Implications for future research were discussed.
Highlights
Self-control refers to one’s ability to change thoughts, emotions, and impulses to follow social norms, personal values, and to support the pursuit of long-terms goals [1]
Scholars have considered that individualistic orientation should be more relevant in individualistic countries whereas collectivistic values are more endorsed in collectivistic countries [35, 36], we explored whether the associations between individual-level individualism and collectivism with attitudinal and behavioral self-control differed in China and U.S by examining the interaction effect between country-level and individual-level individualism-collectivism
This study sought to examine the association between individualism and collectivism with self-control using both attitudinal and behavioral measures
Summary
Self-control refers to one’s ability to change thoughts, emotions, and impulses to follow social norms, personal values, and to support the pursuit of long-terms goals [1]. Successful self-control brings immense benefit for personal and social thriving whereas self-control failure is costly in many aspects, such as leading to poor adjustment, criminal and deviant behavior, unsatisfactory academic performance, low well-being, and so forth [2,3,4,5,6]. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
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