1. Factors in Sojourners’ acculturationto the new culture and culture-of-origin: A Japanese Example
Presentation at the NC ACES biennial convention in Kansas City, MO October, 2012
Makoto Miyoshi, MSEd and Kimberly K. Asner-Self, EdD
Southern Illinois University Carbondale

2. Introduction
Acculturation is the ongoing psychological/ behavioral change individuals experience interacting with another culture (Berry & Sam, 1997).
Sojourners are people from a culture-of-origin who are voluntarily in a new culture for a discreet time and return to culture-of-origin (Berry & Sam, 1997).
Sojourners’ mental health has been linked to coping (Cross, 1995; Tweed, 2004)
Immigrants’ mental health has been linked to both coping and identity (Asner-Self & Marotta, 2005)

3. Purpose of the study
Explore the relationship among ways of coping, acculturation, ethnic identity, and depressive symptomatology with 200 Japanese international sojourners to the U.S.

4. Need for study
There are approximately 251,000* Japanese sojourners in the U.S.:
Long term sojourners – Three + months permanent residency (250,294; Ministry of Foreign Affaires of Japan, 2006), and
Japanese international students - approximately 6,509 in 2007 (Japan Student Service Organization)
No studies on Japanese sojourner well-being in terms of acculturative identity change (Matsudaira, 2006; Seto & Woodford, 2007).
*These numbers do not include Japanese immigrants, those who have permanent residency, or those enrolled directly in either U.S. educational or Japanese educational institutions in the U.S.

5. Methodology
Abbreviated Multidimensional Acculturation Scale-JP(AMAS-JP)
42-item, self-report, Likert like scale
Japanese version of Abbreviated Multidimensional Acculturation Scale (AMAS; Zea et al., 2003) using double translation method (Marin & Marin 1991)
Psychometrics:
Cronbach's alpha = for 273 Japanese/Japanese American
72.80% of variance explained / >1 eigenvalues

6. Methodology Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure-JP
23-item, self-report, Likert like scale
Japanese version of Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure (MEIM; Phinney, 1992) using double translation method (Marin & Marin 1991)
Psychometrics:
Cronbach's alpha = 0.80 for 273 Japanese/Japanese American
48.78% of variance explained / >1 eigenvalues

7. Methodology
the Way of Coping Checklist (WOCC; Tweed, White, & Lehman, 2004)
32-item, self-report, Likert like scale
Retrieved Japanese Item from Tweed, White, & Lehman (2004) .
Psychometrics:p ???
the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II;Kojima, et al, 2002)
21-item, self-report, Likert like scale
Psychometrics:
Cronbach’s = 0.87 for 766 Japanese
37.5% of variance explained / >1 eigenvalues

8. Methodology Participants inclusion criteria: Recruited through:
First generation immigrants, sojourners, green card holders, and others.
18 years +
Recruited through:
Japanese associations/organizations in community, schools, universities, and companies
Social Networking Systems and related BBS
2 follow up participation requests over 3 week interval; follow up stop by request.

9. Methodology Data Collection Survey Monkey Participants were asked:
to click on the web link to be directed to the survey webpage
Read informed consent and accept/decline
SIU Human Subject approved study

10. Results Japanese / Japanese American (N = 200)
Mean age = (SD=10.9);
No significant differences between genders in terms of age, years in the U.S, total AMAS and subscales
TABLE 1
Demographic Statistics
Gender N
Mean (Age)
Std. Deviation
Std. Error Mean
Male
48 (24%)
35.80
13.73
1.98
Female
152 (76%)
37.30
9.92
0.80

11. Results Transforming data with BDI-II (normality purpose)
High skewness as BDI-II data:
Max. BDI-II / Min. BDI-II > 10
The raw data of BDI-II is log transformed
No significant correlation with Ln(BDI-II):
Age and years in the U.S.
Japanese subscales of AMAS-JP
Ethnic Identity subscale of MEIM

12. Results Significant correlation with Ln(BDI-II) (r / p): AMAS-JP MEIM
US Language Competency (USLN): /.002
US Cultural Competency (USCC): /.009
US Total Score (USTotal): /.002
MEIM
Other Group Orientation (OGO) : /.000
WOCC
Distance (Distance) : /.028
Accepting Responsibility (Accept Res): /.003
Escape-Avoidance (Escape-Avo): /.000

13. Results

14. Cultural Ramifications
Discussion
Cultural Ramifications
Greenland & Brown (2005):
The language ability correlates acculturative stress and psychosomatic illness; but it depends the phase:
2 wks- 8mos (positive),
8mos-12mos (negative) (p383)
contact with other group does not correlate with the stress and psychosomatic illness
the gap between perception of language ability and actual language difference (limitation or their study)

15. Clinical Implications
Counseling
Education

16. Limitation
Skewness

17. Further Study
Improving abc