Self-Worth in Dignity and Honor Cultures

Scholars have made various attempts to distinguish variables useful for classifying cultures. Although the most popular distinction is the individualism-collectivism of cultures (e.g., ^{Hofstede, 1980}), some suggest that we may need to pay more attention to other cultural dimensions (Bond, 2002). Such approach was presented by ^{Leung and Cohen (2011}), who introduced a new theoretical framework, organising cultures around three general logics of dignity, honor, and face. The core concept underlying this classification is the sense of internal vs. socially conferred personal worth. In “dignity cultures,” occurring mostly in Northern states of the USA, Canada and North-Western Europe (In ^{Lee, Leung, & Kim, 2014}), self-worth is inalienable and valued internally. This means that self-worth is based on the individual’s accomplishments, decisions, and values (^{Aslani et al., 2016}). In dignity cultures nobody can deprive individuals of their worth, since its locus is deep inside the person. On the contrary, in “honor cultures,” one’s worth is based on both internal and external qualities. Honor can be taken away if a person breaks rules of social conduct. “Face cultures,” finally, occur mostly in East Asian societies, where self-worth is derived externally from social relations. One focuses mostly on protecting his or her face by following social rules, hierarchy, or by having personal connections with prestigious others (In ^{Lee, Leung, & Kim, 2014}). In this study, the logics of dignity and honor are relevant; therefore, we focused only on these two.

Each of the cultures links distinct values and codes of conduct, affecting the way people perceive an individual and his or her place in society. Dignity cultures usually build egalitarian societies, where individuals are, at least theoretically, equal, while honor cultures arise in “lawless” environments, where a weak state does not guarantee acting upon the law by all members of the society (Henry, 2009); therefore, individuals in honor cultures use “payback” as a method of establishing social hierarchy and regulating interpersonal relationships.

Although the distinction between cultures of dignity, honor, and face seems clear and simple, in reality it is difficult to provide a “pure” example of each. Nevertheless, in most cultures one may distinguish some prevailing features determining to which type of culture - dignity, honor, or face- they belong. Following this approach, we hypothesised that Polish culture belongs to honor cultures (^{Krys, et al., 2016}; ^{Szmajke, 2008}) and Norway to dignity cultures (^{Leung & Cohen, 2011}). Migration from one culture to another may cause a culture clash, as values manifested by migrants can be opposite to values and norms existing in the host society (^{Sung, 1985}; ^{Winkelman, 1994}). In our study, we thus analysed the change from honor culture to dignity culture among Polish migrants in Norway.

Acculturation Strategies

Migration forces people to answer two basic questions regarding the shape of their relationships with one’s heritage culture and with the host culture. The first question concerns cultural maintenance: Do I maintain heritage culture and identity? The second is related to the cultural adaptation: Do I adapt to the culture of the majority? (^{Bourhis, Moise, Perreault, & Senécal, 1997}). Having assorted these two variables, ^{Berry (1997}) introduced a concept of four acculturation strategies. The positive answer to both questions leads to the integration strategy, usually considered in the literature as the most beneficial for the individual (^{Zagefka & Brown, 2002}). If one sheds his or her heritage identity and decides to accommodate to the new culture, one undertakes the assimilation strategy. Finally, isolation happens when one maintains close and vivid connections with the home culture and does not participate in the host society. The least understood is the marginalisation strategy; an individual rejects both host and home cultures and excludes herself from participation in the social life (^{Berry, 1997}).

Since the integration strategy is usually the most beneficial for migrants (^{Zagefka & Brown, 2002}), we expect it should be related to the highest life satisfaction. This strategy is the most likely to be chosen when cultural distance, understood as a subjective discrepancy between home and host culture, is the smallest. The better the person-culture fit, the higher the subjective wellbeing (^{Angelini, Casi, & Corazzini, 2015}; ^{Friedman, et al., 2010}). When considering the internal vs external locus of self-worth (^{Gullestad, 2002}), Polish migrants valuating their self-more internally, i.e. being closer to Norwegian culture, should experience higher life satisfaction, since this way they fit better in the host society. In our study we tried to answer two questions: 1) does the internal locus of self-worth assure higher life satisfaction? and 2) what is the relationship between the chosen acculturation strategy, locus of self-worth, and satisfaction of life of Polish migrants in Norway?

To provide a thorough analysis of the relationship between life satisfaction, acculturation strategies and locus of self-worth, we carried out a quantitative study on Polish couples living in Poland (PP), Polish migrant couples living in Norway (PN), and Norwegian couples living in Norway (NN).

We expected that a more internally valued self would result in more satisfied Polish migrants with their lives, but not Poles living in their homeland. We also expected that integration and assimilation strategies for migrants with an internal locus of self-worth would be related to higher life satisfaction than for those with a more externally valued self. In case of migrants choosing the isolation or marginalisation strategy, we hypothesized that the internal locus of self-worth would not be a significant predictor of their well-being.

Method

The study presented here was a part of the large interdisciplinary project - PAR Migration Navigator - aimed at the thorough description of processes facilitating smooth acculturation of individuals migrating from a less egalitarian to a more egalitarian society. The analysis presented here is based on selected data collected in a quantitative investigation designed to examine issues related to the work-life balance and gender equality among couples living in their home and host country.

Results

As predicted, Norwegians (NN) turned out to be the most satisfied and the most internally valuating self, and on the contrary, Poles in their home country (PP) turned out to be the least satisfied and the most externally valuating self. Thus, in the first step, we used ANOVA to test if PP, PN, and NN differed in private life satisfaction, work satisfaction, and internal locus of self-worth. The level the three variables differed between Norwegians and Polish in Poland, while the Polish migrant group turned out to be in-between these two (Table 1). Furthermore, all groups were more satisfied with their private life than with their work.

In the second step, we calculated the correlation between internal locus of self-worth, private life satisfaction, and work satisfaction. As predicted, the correlation between the internal locus of self-worth and private life satisfaction was found only in the Polish migrant group (r _PN =.29, p< .05) but not for non-migrant groups rs< .08, ps> .40; for details see Table 1). Moreover, in the Polish migrants group, neither adaptation to host culture, nor own culture maintenance were correlated with internal locus of self-worth (both ps>.50).

In order to investigate more thoroughly the relationships between acculturation strategies, migrants’ life satisfaction, and their locus of self-worth, we calculated a series of four regression analyses. In the first step, to test if acculturation strategies and internal locus of self-worth are predictors of higher life satisfaction, we performed two separate linear regression analyses, with work satisfaction as the dependent variable in one regression analysis, private life satisfaction in the other one, and locus of self-worth, adaptation to host culture, own culture maintenance, and the interaction between the last two as dependent variables in both analyses. We did not include demographic variables, since no significant correlation between them and work and private life satisfaction was found. We confirmed that all independent variables were significant predictors of private life satisfaction. For work satisfaction, however, all variables but the interaction were significant predictors (Table 2).

Therefore, in the next step, we analysed the acculturation (OCM vs AHC) interaction by testing their moderating effects on the private life satisfaction of Polish migrants. First, following the approach of Bedyńska and ^{Książek (2012)}, we divided the sample into two groups based on the results on the OCM scale: (1) those characterised by a relatively strong attachment to Polish society (SAP), and (2) those characterised by a relatively weak attachment to Polish society (WAP); as a cut-off point we used the median of the OCM scale. Next, we ran again regression analyses, separately for SAP and WAP groups, with private life satisfaction as the dependent variable, and AHC and ILSW as predictors. In the SAP group, acculturation to Norwegian society positively predicted private life satisfaction. On the other hand, the result in the WAP group was the opposite - the weaker the acculturation to Norwegian society, the more satisfied were Polish migrants with their private life. In both groups, more internal locus of self-worth was related to higher private life satisfaction (Table 3).

To obtain a complete picture of the relations between the acculturation strategies, internal locus of self-worth, and life satisfaction, we calculated another linear regression separately for migrants with relatively strong attachment to Norwegian culture (SAN) and those relatively weakly attached (WAN). In the WAN group, the attachment to Polish culture predicted higher private life satisfaction, whereas in the SAN group we found no relation between attachment to Polish culture and private life satisfaction. In both groups, internal locus of self-worth turned out to be a significant predictor of higher private life satisfaction (Table 3).

Discussion

This study examined differences in life satisfaction between Polish couples in Poland, Polish migrant couples in Norway, and Norwegian couples in Norway. Our findings highlight the role of acculturation strategy and internal locus of self-worth in life satisfaction. We operationalised the acculturation strategies using two variables- the adaptation to host culture and own culture maintenance (^{Berry, 1997}). As our results confirmed, Polish culture may be regarded as a culture of honor, while Norwegian culture is a rather good example of culture of dignity (^{Leung & Cohen, 2011}). The core variable, on which the differentiation is based, is the internal vs. external locus of self-worth. Therefore, in the present research we focused on this variable as an important factor in acculturating Polish migrants to the Norwegian culture.

Our data confirmed that Poles valued their self relatively more externally and Norwegians relatively more internally. As predicted, Polish migrants in Norway valued their self-more internally than those who lived in Poland, but still not as internally as Norwegians did. We suggest two possible compatible explanations: having such a disposition as internal locus of self-worth might facilitate making the decision to migrate in general, but in particular, to choose Norway as a new land to live in, where this disposition seems to work as a strong asset/resource. The other explanation is that the experience of living in Norway and being exposed to Norwegian values trigger a shift in migrants’ locus of self-worth. Future studies should shed light on which of these explanations is valid.

Our data stands in line with the results of the ^{European Social Survey (2008)}: Poles are dissatisfied with their private lives, whereas Norwegians are highly satisfied. Polish migrants though are again in the middle. We assume that people coming to Norway benefit from the welfare state by obtaining higher income, better housing conditions, and social rights, although due to other factors they are unable to reach the same wellbeing level as hosts (Krys, Swidrak, Kwiatkowska, Kosakowska-Berezecka & Vedøy, in print). One of these factors is the chosen acculturation strategy: integration, assimilation, isolation, or marginalisation. Data support the hypothesis that different acculturation strategies influence migrants’ private life satisfaction. Which strategy is optimal does not seem obvious though. In our study, locus of self-worth, Polish culture maintenance, and adaptation to Norwegian culture turned out as significant factors of private life satisfaction in the migrant group. Moreover, we found a significant interaction effect between both relationships with Poland and Norway, which yields the surprising conclusion that, in some cases, marginalisation strategy might be more adaptive than assimilation.

Again, we propose two interpretations of the abovementioned effect. Norwegian culture is usually described as an example of individualistic culture, but in fact local communities and familism play an important role in people’s lives (^{Gullestad, 2002}). Norwegian, horizontal individualism emphasizes sameness and equality between individuals and thus enables interactions between two persons equal to each other. Following this logic, one is more open to other, similar people, which creates room for cooperation between them (^{Komarraju & Cokley, 2008}).This may hinder the blending in of newcomers into local social networks. Perhaps focusing on the relationship with one’s partner, maintaining close rapports with family and friends in Poland, and rejecting any contacts with Norwegians, actually make it, paradoxically, easier to feel higher satisfaction in the Norwegian society.

On the other hand, the role of the internal locus of self-worth seems to play a crucial role in shaping private life satisfaction. We hypothesise that migrants who value their self-more internally report higher satisfaction of life because they do not base their happiness on the external circumstances of their life, since their happiness is rather valued internally. This would explain why people who choose the separation strategy and whose self-worth is located internally are satisfied with their private lives.

We noted several limitations in this study. To begin with, there is a possibility that the relationship between life satisfaction and acculturation strategy is bidirectional (^{González & González, 2008}): perhaps people who are happy with their life in general adapt more easily to new environments (^{Scheier & Carver, 1992}; ^{Conversano, et al., 2010}). Furthermore, it also seems possible that a third variable, such as resilience (^{Ying, 1992}), uncontrolled for in this study, is responsible for both life satisfaction and better acculturation, understood here as a more internally valued self. It is also important to mention that our sample included heterosexual couples only. Non-heterosexual couples and single individuals may build their life satisfaction based on distinct factors than people in heterosexual relationships.

In the end, we would like to note that usually migrants report higher stress and must overcome difficulties unknown in their homeland. Nonetheless, migration to a welfare state like Norway may bring many benefits, called pull factors, including financial stabilization, new employment and self-development opportunities (^{Mara & Landesmann, 2013}; ^{Neto, 1995}).

To summarize, both locus of self-worth and the chosen acculturation strategy play important roles in shaping migrants’ life satisfaction, with a moderating role of attachment to home culture and adaptation to the host society.