Publication Type
Journal Article
Version
publishedVersion
Publication Date
4-2014
Abstract
There is increasing evidence for emotional fit in couples and groups, but also within cultures. In the current research, we investigated the consequences of emotional fit at the cultural level. Given that emotions reflect people’s view on the world, and that shared views are associated with good social relationships, we expected that an individual’s fit to the average cultural patterns of emotion would be associated with relational well-being. Using an implicit measure of cultural fit of emotions, we found across 3 different cultural contexts (United States, Belgium, and Korea) that (1) individuals’ emotional fit is associated with their level of relational well-being, and that (2) the link between emotional fit and relational well-being is particularly strong when emotional fit is measured for situations pertaining to relationships (rather than for situations that are self-focused). Together, the current studies suggest that people may benefit from emotionally “fitting in” to their culture.
Keywords
emotion, culture, fit, relationships, well-being
Discipline
Personality and Social Contexts | Social Psychology
Research Areas
Psychology
Publication
Emotion
Volume
14
Issue
2
First Page
241
Last Page
245
ISSN
1528-3542
Identifier
10.1037/a0035296
Publisher
American Psychological Association
Citation
DE LEERSNYDER, Jozefien, MESQUITA, Batja, KIM, Heejung, EOM, Kimin, & CHOI, Hyewon.(2014). Emotional fit with culture: Predictor of individual differences in relational well-being. Emotion, 14(2), 241-245.
Available at: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/2561
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Additional URL
https://doi.org/10.1037/a0035296