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Background: Previous epidemiological studies have shown a high incidence of schizophrenia in African-Caribbeans in the UK, but not in Asians. Aims: We investigated the hypothesis that cultural adherence might protect the Asians against the stress of living in a majority white culture. Methods: The Culture and Identity Schedule (CANDID) was given to patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia making their first contact with psychiatric services, and to a matched group of controls randomly selected from the general population. Results: While the Asian patients displayed no drift away from the traditional values as espoused by their controls, the African-Caribbean patients were less traditional than their controls. Conclusions: The fact that a movement away from their traditional culture distinguishes African-Caribbean patients with a severe psychiatric illness, schizophrenia, from their mentally healthy controls strongly favours marginalization over biculturalism as an interpretation of this shift.

Background: Acculturation is the phenomenon that results when a group with one culture comes into continuous contact with a host culture and changes occur in the original culture of either one or both groups. Acculturation has also been linked with stress-related psychological disorder and depression. Aims: This article investigates the acculturation process and the depressive state of foreign immigrants living in the greater Athens area. Methods: All consecutive cases of 157 foreign immigrants who visited a nongovernmental organization (NGO) providing consultative services to immigrants were interviewed using a structured questionnaire including the Immigrant Acculturation Scale (IAS) and the Centre for Epidemiologic Studies--Depression (CES-D) scale. Results: Factor analysis of IAS yielded a three-factor solution and 17 items with loadings ranging from 0.74 to 0.41. This scale was also tested and proven to be reliable. The main finding is that the higher the acculturation level of the immigrant individual, the lower the CES-D scale score; the fewer the depressive symptoms are self-reported. Length of stay, existence of family in Greece, legal status of residence and employment were also found to have an effect on depressive symptomatology. Conclusion: Acculturation could be seen as a beneficial mechanism protecting the individual to be exposed to stressful non-adaptive behaviour. Key words: acculturation, adaptation, depressive state, immigration

This study aims to evaluate the factor structure and Criterion validity of the English Language Acculturation Stress (ELAS) scale in a community-based sample of elderly Russian immigrants. The sample consists of 300 Russian immigrants with an equal number of females and males, from 59 to 93 years of age (Mean = 73.26, SD = 7.271). The majority of the respondents were married (72%) at the time the interviews were conducted. On average, the respondents have lived in the U.S. for about 7 years (SD = 3.00). We performed both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses to ascertain the factor structure or conceptual dimensions of the 11-item ELAS scale. The findings revealed that this 1l-item scale encompasses three dimensions: Basic English skills, survival English skills, and social involvement English skills. Correlation analyses of the scale with depression, physical health status, and length of residence suggest that the ELAS has good criterion validity and potential as a screening instrument of language acculturation stress for elderly Russian immigrants. Implications for research and practice are discussed, doi:10.1300/ J083v50n3_04 KEYWORDS. Adjustment, distress, depression, health status, migration, psychometrics, screening

Social judgment theory holds that a person's own attitudes function as reference points, influencing the perception of others' attitudes. The authors argue that attitudes themselves are influenced by reference points, namely, the presumed attitudes of others. Whereas exposure to a group that acts as a contextual reference should cause attitude assimilation, exposure to a group that acts as a comparative reference should cause attitude contrast. In Study 1, participants subliminally primed with their political ingroup or outgroup endorsed more extreme political positions than did controls. Study 2 demonstrated that prime types known to uniquely facilitate assimilation and contrast enhanced the polarization effect in the ingroup and outgroup conditions, respectively. Study 3 established an important boundary condition for whether group salience produces attitude assimilation or contrast by showing that perceived closeness to the elderly moderates the direction and strength of the group priming effect. The results suggest that the transition from assimilation to contrast occurs when a group ceases to function as a context and becomes a comparison point. Implications for social judgment theory, assimilation and contrast research, and conflict escalation are discussed. Keywords: attitudes, reference points, assimilation, contrast, intergroup conflict

Background: The current literature on the relationship between cultural adaptation and mental health is premature to offer a comprehensive explanation about the ways acculturation exerts either positive or adverse effects on the mental health of migrants. Aim: This study is an empirical approach towards understanding the magnitude of the relationship between consequences of cultural adaptation and psychological distress. Methods: Two samples of Ghanaian migrants in the Netherlands were included: a clinical group (n=36) and a non-clinical community group (n = 97). Data were acquired by administering a semi-structured interview. Quantified data were analysed using multivariate techniques. Results: Contradictory to our hypotheses, the reported level of mental health symptoms in both groups was relatively low, suggesting a substantial resilience among the Ghanaian group. Confirming our hypotheses, specific dimensions of the acculturation process were associated with health status, particularly affiliation with cultural traditions and feelings of loss concerning the country of birth. Conclusions: Acculturation demands capture critical elements of migrants' experiences that warrant professional interventions tailored to their specific needs. A subtle balance between holding on to the supportive cultural traditions together with moderate involvement in ruminating about pre-migration life, in conjunction with acquiring instrumental skills of the host culture, is a starting position for better health.

Studies have reported discrepant findings about the relationship between acculturation and mental health, often because of inattention to interethnic group differences. This 2003 exploratory study of various Latina ethnic groups attending the Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) Program compared five measures of acculturation and mental health status/utilization. The subgroups differed on language, immigration/migration history, and the prevalence of anxiety attacks and depressive syndrome. The prevalence of anxiety attacks was the highest among those who spoke primarily Spanish, the prevalence of the depressive syndrome was the highest among those with more traditional beliefs, and the use of mental health services was the highest among those with less traditional beliefs. Implications for practice are discussed. Keywords: acculturation; Latinas; mental health; women

Three studies found support for the notion that immigrants' acculturation to the host culture is interactively determined by their need for cognitive closure (A. W. Kruglanski & D. M. Webster, 1996) and the reference group they forge on their arrival. If such reference group is fashioned by close social relations with coethnics, the higher the immigrants' need for closure, the weaker their tendency to assimilate to the new culture and the stronger their tendency to adhere to the culture of origin. By contrast, if the reference entry group is fashioned by close relations with members of the host country, the higher their need for closure, the stronger their tendency to adapt to the new culture and the weaker their tendency to maintain the culture of origin. These findings obtained consistently across 3 immigrant samples in Italy, 1 Croatian and 2 Polish, and across multiple different measures of acculturation.

The study examines stereotype priming effect by activating an independent or interdependent self-construal followed by a dumb Blonde stereotype or a control prime before measuring encyclopedic knowledge performance. Subjects displayed assimilation under interdependence and contrast under independence, indicating that self-activation moderates both effects.

The article examines the impact of cultural assimilation on children's mental health in Australia. Data were drawn from the interrelationship between region of origin, length of stay and indicators of mental health impairment. Findings indicate that children of migrant parents do not significantly differ from children of Australian-born parents in mental health.