Coming to the United States, international students face numerous cross-cultural adjustment difficulties. Asian international students have had the most cross-cultural difficulties among all international students. Helping Asian international students deal with their life stress has become a challenge for American counselors and psychologists.Studies on the attitude toward seeking professional psychological help have been done primarily with African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Asian Americans. As the population of Asian international students increases, it becomes important that the attitudes of Asian international students toward seeking professional psychological help be examined. The present study examined the relationship between Asian international students' levels of acculturation and their attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help. In addition, this study explored the relationships between Asian international students' levels of acculturation and their recognition of need for psychotherapeutic help, their stigma tolerance, their interpersonal openness, and their confidence in mental health practitioners.One hundred and seventy Asian international students from one Midwestern university and one Northeastern university participated in this study. Participants completed two questionnaires and a demographic profile sheet: (1) the Suinn-Lew Asian Self-Identity Acculturation Scale-International (SL-ASIA-I); (2) the Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale (ATSPPHS); and (3) the demographic sheet which included country of origin, religious beliefs, plans/intentions to stay in U.S., the length of time in the U.S., previous therapy experiences, age, gender, education, major, marital status, and children. Two hypotheses were tested: (1) There was a significant relationship between Asian international students' acculturation levels and their attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help; (2) The higher levels of acculturation the Asian international students had, the more positive their attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help. Multiple regression analyses were conducted to predict Asian international students' attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help.As was expected, a significant relationship between Asian international students' levels of acculturation and their attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help was observed. In addition, significant correlations were perceived between Asian international students' levels of acculturation and their stigma tolerance and their confidence in mental health practitioners. Discussions of these findings and limitations and recommendations for future research were presented. / Department of Secondary, Higher, and Foundations of Education
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:BSU/oai:cardinalscholar.bsu.edu:handle/182236 |
| Date | January 1998 |
| Creators | Zhang, Naijian |
| Contributors | Dixon, David N. |
| Source Sets | Ball State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Format | vi, 108 leaves ; 28 cm. |
| Source | Virtual Press |
| Coverage | n-us--- |
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