Psychological Maladjustment and Academic Achievement: A Cross-Cultural Study of Japanese, Chinese, and American High School Students

TLDR

The study surveyed 1,386 American, 1,633 Chinese, and 1,247 Japanese eleventh‑grade students using five maladjustment indices—stress, depressed mood, academic anxiety, aggression, and somatic complaints—to examine their relation to academic achievement and parental expectations. Across cultures, Asian students reported higher parental expectations and lower satisfaction, Japanese students exhibited lower maladjustment symptoms, Chinese students had lower stress, anxiety, and aggression but higher depression and somatic complaints, and overall academic achievement was unrelated to maladjustment except that U.S.

Abstract

Psychological maladjustment and its relation to academic achievement, parental expectations, and parental satisfaction were studied in a cross-national sample of 1,386 American, 1,633 Chinese, and 1,247 Japanese eleventh-grade students. 5 indices of maladjustment included measures of stress, depressed mood, academic anxiety, aggression, and somatic complaints. Asian students reported higher levels of parental expectation and lower levels of parental satisfaction concerning academic achievement than their American peers. Nevertheless, Japanese students reported less stress, depressed mood, aggression, academic anxiety, and fewer somatic complaints than did American students. Chinese students reported less stress, academic anxiety, and aggressive feelings than their American counterparts, but did report higher frequencies of depressed mood and somatic complaints. High academic achievement as assessed by a test of mathematics was generally not associated with psychological maladjustment. The only exception was in the United States, where high achievers indicated more frequent feelings of stress than did low achievers.