Cultural self-construction and identity formation in emerging adulthood: a study on Japanese university students and workers

Abstract

Cultural pathways of identity formation have been largely unexplored. In many Asian cultures, youth are expected to concentrate on adaptation to their groups or relationships rather than pursuing their own uniqueness. Then, how do they develop a sense of identity while considering groups or relationships to be important? The purposes of this study were (a) to examine relationships between cultural self-construction (i.e. independence and interdependence) and identity processes (i.e. commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration of commitment) in both societal and relational domains, and (b) to analyze the relationships of self-construction and identity processes with well-being, using a sample of Japanese emerging adults (i.e. university students and workers) aged 18–25 years. The findings indicated that relational identity was related to both independence and interdependence, whereas societal identity was mainly related to independence. Moreover, independence and identity in both societal and relational domains was positively related to well-being. Furthermore, the patterns of relationships among self-construction, identity, and well-being were found to be similar between university students and workers. These findings imply that while Japanese emerging adults have developmental needs to express one's own uniqueness, they are also directed to form a sense of identity emphasizing the maintenance of harmonious relationships with others.

Keywords:

• identity
• cultural self-construction
• employment
• higher education
• emerging adulthood
• Japan

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank Makoto Iwanaga, Yasumasa Otsuka, Kenichi Kukiyama, Takashi Tohyama, Masanori Urakami, Atsushi Oshio, Hideshi Kodaira, Yoko Matsuoka, Kuniko Takagi, Kazuyo Takamura, and Ken Kameda for their assistance in collecting data.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science [Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C), 24530823] to Kazumi Sugimura.