Attributional Style and Depression in Taiwanese and Chinese American Adolescents: The Moderating Role of Acculturation and Enculturation

The aim of this current investigation was to examine the relationships between attributional style for negative events, depression, and acculturation/enculturation in a sample of 80 Chinese and Taiwanese American adolescents ages 11--19. It was hypothesized that stable and global attributions would be positively associated with depression while internal attributions would be negatively associated with depression. Acculturation or enculturation were also examined as potential moderators in the relationship between the 3 dimensions of attributional style and depression. Results indicated no statistically significant relationships between depression and internal, stable, and global attributions. Results also indicated no statistically significant interactive relationships between internal, stable, and global attributions and acculturation or enculturation. Of note, the current sample did demonstrate support for the unique effect of acculturation and enculturation in predicting depression. Specifically, acculturation was negatively related to depression while enculturation was positively related to depression. Although results failed to demonstrate statistically significant findings for several of the hypotheses, an investigation of the magnitude of effect size specified that of the 3 dimensions of attributional style, stability was the most highly correlated with depression in the current sample. Further, notable effect sizes in the interaction between acculturation and internality, acculturation and globality, as well as enculturation and globality were demonstrated. A larger sample is needed to test these interactive relationships to determine statistical significance. The results of the study support the need to consider acculturation and enculturation as distinct constructs in the study of depression.