NCJ Number
221442
Journal
Journal of Youth and Adolescence Volume: 37 Issue: 2 Dated: February 2008 Pages: 142-154
Date Published
February 2008
Length
13 pages
Annotation
A total of 1,338 adolescents from 2 individualistic nations (Ireland and the United States) and 2 collective nations (China and South Korea) were administered the Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale, which assesses general life satisfaction and satisfaction with family, friends, school, self, and living environment.
Abstract
As expected, U.S. and Irish adolescents reported the highest self-satisfaction, and these groups in turn reported significantly higher mean self-satisfaction scores than Chinese and Korean adolescents. Moreover, U.S. and Irish youth reported higher satisfaction with their friendships than their Asian peers. On the other hand, Chinese youth reported the highest mean family satisfaction score; this score was higher than those reported by youth from the other three nations. Korean youth also reported their family satisfaction as one of the highest among the instrument domains, and this mean score was significantly higher than their self-satisfaction mean score. Since gender differences are often not observed for general or global life satisfaction scores of adolescents within nations, these findings indicate the need for further study of gender differences across various nations in order to assess generalizability. The findings also indicate the need for researchers to focus on the specific domains that comprise the general score for the particular life-satisfaction measures used in particular studies with specific age groups. The study findings may also reflect real-time political, social, and economic changes that have occurred in collective nations over time. Of the total sample, 308 youth were Americans, 224 were Irish, 369 were Chinese, and 437 were South Korean. Fifty-six percent of the sample was female. 4 tables and 73 references