Jia-Yan Pan

The Protective Function of Meaning of Life on Life Satisfaction among Chinese Students in Australia and Hong Kong: A Cross-Cultural Comparative Study.

Objective: The authors compared the predictive effects of acculturative stressors and meaning of life on life satisfaction between Chinese students in Australia and in Hong Kong. Participants: In 2006, the researchers recruited 606 Chinese students studying abroad at the University of Melbourne in Australia and at 6 universities in Hong Kong. Methods: Participants completed a questionnaire that included measures of acculturative stressors, meaning of life, life satisfaction, and demographic information. Results: The Australian sample experienced a significantly higher level of acculturative stressors than did the Hong Kong sample, but life satisfaction did not differ significantly between the 2 samples. Meaning of life had a strong positive contribution and acculturative stressors had a negative contribution in predicting life satisfaction in both samples. Meaning of life partially mediated the relationship between acculturative stressors and life satisfaction in both samples. Conclusions: The authors discuss the theoretical and practical implications for Chinese students studying abroad.

Acculturative Stressor and Meaning of Life as Predictors of Negative Affect in Acculturation: A Cross-Cultural Comparative Study between Chinese International Students in Australia and Hong Kong

Objective: The purpose of the present study was to compare the predictive effects of acculturative stressor and meaning of life on negative affect in the process of acculturation between Chinese international students in Australia and Hong Kong. Method: Four hundred mainland Chinese students studying at six universities in Hong Kong and 227 Chinese international students studying at the University of Melbourne in Australia completed a questionnaire that included measures of acculturative stressor, meaning of life, negative affect and demographic information. Results: The Australian sample was found to have a higher level of acculturative stressor and negative affect than the Hong Kong sample. Acculturative stressor had a positive impact on negative affect in both samples, but the impact of different domains of acculturative stressor on negative affect varied between the two groups. Finally, meaning of life partially mediated the relationship between acculturative stressor and negative affect in the Hong Kong sample, but no such effect was found in the Australia sample. Conclusions: Acculturative stressor is a critical risk factor for negative affect in acculturation for Chinese international students in Australia and Hong Kong. Meaning of life acted as a protective factor that mitigated negative affect for mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong, but not for the Chinese international students in Australia. The theoretical and practical implications for resilience-based and meaning-oriented intervention for Chinese international students are discussed.

Development and Validation of the Chinese Making Sense of Adversity Scale: Acculturative Stressors as an Example.

Objective: The objective of this study is to develop and validate the Chinese Making Sense of Adversity Scale (CMSAS) to measure the cognitive coping strategies that Chinese people adopt to make sense of adversity. Method: A 12-item CMSAS was developed by in-depth interview and item analysis. The scale was validated with a sample of 627 Chinese international students in Australia and Mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong. Results: Exploratory factor analysis identified two factors: making positive sense and making negative sense of adversity. The CMSAS exhibited high internal consistency reliability and good concurrent validity. Conclusion: The CMSAS is a reliable and valid instrument for measuring the coping strategies used by Chinese people to make sense of adversity. However, further validation of the scale is needed.

Cross-Validation of Mental Health Recovery Measures in a Hong Kong Chinese Sample

Objectives: The concept of recovery has begun shifting mental health service delivery from a medical perspective toward a client-centered recovery orientation. This shift is also beginning in Hong Kong, but its development is hampered by a dearth of available measures in Chinese. Method: This article translates two measures of recovery (mental health recovery measure and the recovery subscale of peer outcomes protocol) and one measure of recovery-promoting environments (recovery self-assessment) into Chinese and investigates their psychometric properties among 206 Hong Kong Chinese people with severe mental illness. Result: Multifactor solutions from earlier studies were not replicated; our evidence pointed to one-factor solutions. Since all recovery measures demonstrated high internal consistency reliability (.92 to .96), we analyzed total scale scores. Conclusion: Moderately high correlations among the recovery measures (.33 to .56) provide some support for construct validity, yet further investigation of recovery measures in a Chinese population is needed.

Ways of coping of Chinese caregivers for family members with schizophrenia in two metropolitan cities: Guangzhou and Hong Kong, China

Background: In Chinese societies, family caregivers play an important role in the recovery of persons with serious mental illness, such as schizophrenia. While family caregivers are often invaluable sources of caregiving in the community, a majority of them lack adequate knowledge and support skills to cope with the tasks involved. Aims: This study compares the coping strategies and psychological health of caregivers for family members with schizophrenia in two Chinese cities, Hong Kong and Guangzhou. Method: A total of 109 caregivers, including 39 from Hong Kong and 70 from Guangzhou, were recruited from non-governmental mental health organizations in the two cities. They were assessed by the Chinese version of the Ways of Coping Questionnaire and the General Health Questionnaire. Results: While there was no significant difference in the psychological distress of the family caregivers in the two locations, the Guangzhou caregivers adopt significantly more of the eight coping strategies, namely, confronting coping, distancing, self-control, seeking social support, accepting responsibility, escape–avoidance, planful problem solving and positive reappraisal, than their counterparts in Hong Kong. Significant correlations were also found between psychological distress and coping strategies of caregivers in the two cities. Conclusion: There were significant differences in the coping strategies of family caregivers for people with schizophrenia in the two Chinese cities. Further studies are warranted to investigate factors affecting their coping strategies and their effects on psychological health.

Validity and Reliability of Internalized Stigma of Mental Illness (Cantonese)

Purpose: This study aims to translate and test the reliability and validity of the Internalized Stigma of Mental Illness-Cantonese (ISMI-C). Methods: The original English version of ISMI is translated into the ISMI-C by going through forward and backward translation procedure. A cross-sectional research design is adopted that involved 295 participants randomly drawn from a population of Chinese consumers participated in different kinds of community-based mental health services. Results: Results show that the Cronbach’s α coefficient of the ISMI-C is .93. With regard to validity test, the ISMI-C shows significant and negative correlation with measures on self-esteem and quality of life. Also, an explorative factor analysis yields five factors that are consistent with previous research results. Discussion: This study shows that the ISMI-C is a reliable and valid measure. ISMI-C can facilitate the development of interventions in reducing self-stigma for people with mental illness across Chinese societies.

Validation of the automatic thoughts questionnaire (ATQ) among mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong

OBJECTIVE The present study validated the combined version of the 8-item Automatic Thought Questionnaire (ATQ) and 10 positive items from the ATQ-revised among Chinese university students. METHOD A total of 412 Mainland Chinese university students were recruited in Hong Kong by an online survey. RESULTS A 14-item Chinese ATQ was derived via item analysis. Satisfactory internal consistency reliability and good split-half reliability were obtained. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis revealed a 3-correlated-factor solution for the Chinese ATQ: negative thought, positive thought (emotional), and positive thought (cognitive). The negative ATQ subscale score was positively correlated with negative affect, and negatively correlated with positive affect and life satisfaction. The two positive ATQ subscale scores were negatively correlated with negative affect, and positively correlated with positive affect and life satisfaction. CONCLUSION The 14-item ATQ is a valid and reliable instrument for measuring automatic thoughts in the Chinese context of Hong Kong.

Validity and Reliability of Recovery Assessment Scale for Cantonese Speaking Chinese Consumers with Mental Illness

The present study aims to determine the reliability and validity of a 24-item Recovery Assessment Scale for Cantonese speakers (RAS-C) in the Chinese cultural context. The original English version of the RAS was translated into the RAS-C by means of forward and backward translation procedures. AThe cross-sectional research design adopted involving 295 participants randomly drawn from a population of Chinese Cantonese speaking consumers with mental illness who have been participating in community-based mental health services. The RAS-C has demonstrated high reliability with Cronbach’s alpha = .92. The RAS-C also shows significant and positive correlations with measures on the stage of recovery, self-esteem and quality of life of the service consumers. An explorative factor analysis of the RAS-C yielded five factors that were consistent with previous research results. The present study confirms the reliability and validity of the RAS-C. The RAS-C can facilitate the development of interventions that are effective in promoting the recovery of consumers in Chinese communities.

Are recovery and quality of life different outcome measures for community-based psychosocial program?

ABSTRACT This research study aims to explore the relationship between quality of life (QoL) and recovery in mental illness in a community-based psychosocial program. By adopting a prospective, naturalistic, longitudinal follow-up research design, a cohort of 87 consumers who were discharged from mental hospitals and participated in a community-based psychosocial program were followed for one year. QoL and recovery of these individuals were assessed at baseline, 6-month and 12-month follow up assessments. At the 12-month follow up, this cohort of participants showed improvement in QoL and achieved a recovery rate of 8%. ANOVA analysis indicated that overall QoL was not related to recovery. Moreover, multiple linear regression analysis showed that overall QoL was predicted significantly by self-efficacy at baseline, improvement in self-efficacy and improvement in functioning (adjusted R2 = 22.8; F(3,81) = 9.272, p < .001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that recovery was significantly predicted by baseline functioning level and improvement in open employment (Nagelkerke R2: 36.7, Model χ2 = 13.214, p < .001). Therefore, overall QoL and recovery were predicted by different factors. These results indicate that recovery and QoL should be conceptualized as two different outcome measures. Community-based psychosocial programs should include both recovery and QoL as outcome measures and adopt different strategies to facilitate recovery and QoL for consumers.

Effectiveness of Cognitive Behavioral Group Intervention on Acculturation A Study of Students in Hong Kong from Mainland China

Objective: This study examined the effectiveness of group cognitive behavioral intervention (CBI) in improving mental health and promoting postmigration growth for Mainland university students in Hong Kong. Methods: Thirty-six Mainland students with mild-to-moderate levels of psychological distress have completed a 8-session CBI group. Various mental health measures have been administered at the pre-, post-, and 3-month follow-up tests. Results: The levels of psychological distress, acculturative stress, and negative emotions and negative thoughts of the participants were significantly reduced, while their positive emotions and postmigration growth were significantly increased upon completion of the CBI group. The positive effects were maintained at 3-month follow-up. Conclusions: CBI group appears to be an effective intervention approach for improving the mental health and promoting postmigration growth for Mainland university students in Hong Kong. Implications for social work practices when engaging with Chinese international students were provided.