Moral disciplining provides a satisfying explanation for Chinese lay concepts of immorality.

In our research on lay prototypes of immorality, we found that Chinese consider behaviors to be more about showing coarse character, rather than being violent and harmful (called behaviors). The target article provides a satisfying rationale for why this Chinese immorality concept, which has many similarities to the puritanical morality described here, is connected to the morality of cooperation.

Distressed yet bonded: A longitudinal investigation of the COVID-19 pandemic's silver lining effects on life satisfaction.

It is a common understanding that the 2019 coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) significantly harmed mental health. However, findings on changes in overall life satisfaction have been mixed and inconclusive. To address this puzzling phenomenon, we draw upon the domain-specific perspective of well-being and research on catastrophe compassion and propose that the pandemic can have opposing effects on mental health and communal satisfaction, which then differently relate to people's overall life satisfaction.

Multiculturalism, Culture Mixing, and Prejudice: Effects of Priming Chinese Diversity Models Among Hong Kong University Students.

In two studies, we investigated how Hong Kong university students reacted to descriptions of China as multicultural vs. assimilatory, examining effects on emotions, prejudice toward Mainland Chinese, attitudes toward Hong Kong/China culture mixing, and cultural identities. Study 1 compared a multicultural priming condition to a control condition and found that the multiculturalism prime significantly reduced desire to socially distance from Mainland Chinese.

Moral expressions in Hong Kong, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom: Cultural similarities and differences in how affective facial muscle activity predicts judgments.

How does facial muscle activity relate to moral judgments across cultures? To explore this question, we used facial electromyography (EMG) among residents of New Zealand ( = 30) and Hong Kong ( = 40), comparing findings to prior data from the United Kingdom. We recorded EMG involved in expressions of disgust (m.levator labii), anger (m.

The joy of obligation: Human cultural worldviews can enhance the rewards of meeting obligations.

Is it particularly human to feel coerced into fulfilling moral obligations, or is it particularly human to enjoy them? I argue for the importance of taking into account how culture promotes prosocial behavior, discussing how Confucian heritage culture enhances the satisfaction of meeting one's obligations.

For Whom Does Determinism Undermine Moral Responsibility? Surveying the Conditions for Free Will Across Cultures.

Philosophers have long debated whether, if determinism is true, we should hold people morally responsible for their actions since in a deterministic universe, people are arguably not the ultimate source of their actions nor could they have done otherwise if initial conditions and the laws of nature are held fixed. To reveal how non-philosophers ordinarily reason about the conditions for free will, we conducted a cross-cultural and cross-linguistic survey ( = 5,268) spanning twenty countries and sixteen languages. Overall, participants tended to ascribe moral responsibility whether the perpetrator lacked sourcehood or alternate possibilities.

A Sense of Obligation: Cultural Differences in the Experience of Obligation.

In this investigation of cultural differences in the experience of obligation, we distinguish between Confucian Role Ethics versus Relative Autonomy lay theories of motivation and illustrate them with data showing relevant cultural differences in both social judgments and intrapersonal experience. First, when judging others, Western European heritage culture (WEHC) participants (relative to Confucian heritage culture [CHC] participants) judged obligation-motivated actors more negatively than those motivated by agency (Study 1, N = 529). Second, in daily diary and situation sampling studies, CHC participants (relative to WEHC participants) perceived more congruency between their own agentic and obligated motivations, and more positive emotional associations with obligated motivations (Study 2, N = 200 and Study 3, N = 244).

The added value of world views over self-views: Predicting modest behaviour in Eastern and Western cultures.

Personality research has been focused on different aspects of the self, including traits, attitudes, beliefs, goals, and motivation. These aspects of the self are used to explain and predict social behaviour. The present research assessed generalized beliefs about the world, termed 'social axioms' (Leung et al.

Do people's world views matter? The why and how.

Over the past decades, personality and social psychologists have extensively investigated the role of self-views in individual functioning. Research on world views, however, has been less well studied due to overly specific conceptualizations, and little research about how and why they impact life outcomes. To answer why and how world views matter, we conducted 7 studies to examine the functions, antecedents, and consequences of generalized beliefs about the world, operationalized as social axioms (Leung et al.

Conceptualizing psychological processes in response to globalization: Components, antecedents, and consequences of global orientations.

The influences of globalization have permeated various aspects of life in contemporary society, from technical innovations, economic development, and lifestyles, to communication patterns. The present research proposed a construct termed global orientation to denote individual differences in the psychological processes of acculturating to the globalizing world. It encompasses multicultural acquisition as a proactive response and ethnic protection as a defensive response to globalization.

Immorality East and West: Are Immoral Behaviors Especially Harmful, or Especially Uncivilized?

What makes some acts immoral? Although Western theories of morality often define harmful behaviors as centrally immoral, whether this is applicable to other cultures is still under debate. In particular, Confucianism emphasizes civility as fundamental to moral excellence. We describe three studies examining how the word immoral is used by Chinese and Westerners.

Consensus at the Heart of Division: Commentary on Norton and Ariely (2011).

We argue that seemingly deep-seated partisan divisions may be built on a foundation of surprising consensus, not only in terms of the wealth distributions that people prefer (Norton & Ariely, 2011, this issue), but also in the gut-level moral reactions and beliefs about money and happiness that may underlie those preferences.

Personality: the universal and the culturally specific.

There appears to be a universal desire to understand individual differences. This common desire exhibits both universal and culturally specific features. Motivations to view oneself positively differ substantially across cultural contexts, as do a number of other variables that covary with this motivation (i.

What do cross-national comparisons of personality traits tell us? The case of conscientiousness.

Much research contrasts self-reported personality traits across cultures. We submit that this enterprise is weakened by significant methodological problems (in particular, the reference-group effect) that undermine the validity of national averages of personality scores. In this study, behavioral and demographic predictors of conscientiousness were correlated with different cross-national measures of conscientiousness based on self-reports, peer reports, and perceptions of national character.