2007 Butler

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Emotion Regulation and Culture: Are the Social Consequences of EmotionSuppression Culture-Specific?

Emily A. Butler, Tiane L. Lee, and James J. GrossStanford University

Emotional suppression has been associated with generally negative social consequences (Butler et al.,

2003; Gross & John, 2003). A cultural perspective suggests, however, that these consequences may be

moderated by cultural values. We tested this hypothesis in a two-part study, and found that, for

Americans holding Western-European values, habitual suppression was associated with self-protective

goals and negative emotion. In addition, experimentally elicited suppression resulted in reduced inter-

personal responsiveness during face-to-face interaction, along with negative partner-perceptions and

hostile behavior. These deleterious effects were reduced when individuals with more Asian values

suppressed, and these reductions were mediated by cultural differences in the responsiveness of the

suppressors. These findings suggest that many of suppression’s negative social impacts may be moder-

ated by cultural values.

Keywords: emotion regulation, emotion suppression, culture, social interaction

Emotions are critical for guiding interpersonal relationships (Frijda

& Mesquita, 1994; Keltner & Kring, 1998; Shiota, Campos, Keltner,

& Hertenstien, 2004). One corollary of this fact is that emotional

exchanges can have serious social consequences, either maintaining

and enhancing positive relationships, or becoming a source of antag-

onism and discord (Fredrickson, 1998; Gottman & Levenson, 1992;

Harker & Keltner, 2001; Keltner & Kring, 1998; Levenson & Gott-

man, 1983; Shiota et al., 2004; Tavris, 1984).

Unfortunately, there are at least two major barriers to achieving a

better understanding of how emotions influence social interactions.

First, self-regulatory efforts powerfully shape which emotions areexperienced and expressed in a given situation (Campos, Campos, &

Barrett, 1989; Eisenberg, Fabes, Guthrie, & Reiser, 2000; Frijda &

Mesquita, 1994; Gross, 1998b, 1999). Second, cultures differentially

encourage and reinforce emotional responding, resulting in differ-

ences in which emotional responses are sanctioned under what cir-

cumstances (Kitayama, Markus, & Kurokawa, 2000; Markus &

Kitayama, 1991; Matsumoto, 1990; Mesquita, 2001; Mesquita &

Frijda, 1992; Scherer, 1997). Thus, during a social interaction, both

the emotional ebb and flow and the impact on the relationship will

likely be a joint function of the participants’ self-regulatory efforts and

their cultural meaning systems.

Although there are growing literatures addressing emotion reg-

ulation on the one hand (e.g., Butler et al., 2003; Eisenberg et al.,

2000; Gross, 1998a, 2002; Gross & John, 2003; Gross & Leven-

son, 1993, 1997; John & Gross, 2004; Richards, Butler, & Gross,

2003; Richards & Gross, 2000; Totterdell & Parkinson, 1999), and

the influence of culture on emotion on the other (e.g., Kitayama et

al., 2000; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Matsumoto, 1990; Mesquita,

2001; Mesquita & Frijda, 1992; Scherer, 1997; Schimmack, Oishi,

Radhakrishnan, & Dzokoto, 2002; Semin, Gorts, Nandram, &

Semin-Goossens, 2002; Stephan, Saito, & Barnett, 1998; Suh,

Diener, Oishi, & Triandis, 1998; Tsai & Chentsova Dutton, 2003),the two bodies of work rarely intersect. As a result, it has been

demonstrated that different emotion regulation strategies have

differing social consequences in American samples when cultural

backgrounds are ignored (Butler et al., 2003; Gross, 2002; Gross &

John, 2003; John & Gross, 2004; Richards et al., 2003), but we can

only conjecture about how cultural values might produce variabil-

ity in these outcomes.

To address this gap in the literature, we focus on one particular

form of emotion regulation and one specific cultural contrast. For

the former we chose emotion suppression, which involves the

inhibition of emotional expression because it has been linked to

clear social consequences. For the latter we compare Americans

holding Western European values with those endorsing more

Asian ones, since there is some evidence that these cultural groups

differ in the functions and frequency of suppression, as well as in

the degree of negative emotion associated with it. In the following

sections we review prior research and suggest a model of how

cultural values might moderate the social impact of suppression.

We then present a two-part study designed to test our hypotheses.

The Social Consequences of Emotion Suppression

Emotion suppression involves the active reduction of emotion-

expressive behavior while the individual is emotionally aroused

(Gross & Levenson, 1993, 1997). As such, it is not merely a lack

Emily A. Butler, Tiane L. Lee, and James J. Gross, Department of

Psychology, Stanford University.

Emily A. Butler is now at the Division of Family Studies and Human

Development, University of Arizona; Tiane L. Lee is now at the Depart-

ment of Psychology, Princeton University.

This research was completed as part of Emily A. Butler’s Doctoral

dissertation and Tiane L. Lee’s Master’s thesis at Stanford University and

was supported by NIMH grant R01-MH58147 to James J. Gross.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Emily A.

Butler, Family Studies and Human Development, University of Arizona,

1110 East South Campus Drive, Tucson, AZ 85721-0033. E-mail:

[email protected]

Emotion Copyright 2007 by the American Psychological Association2007, Vol. 7, No. 1, 30 – 48 1528-3542/07/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/1528-3542.7.1.30

30

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of expression, but an active effort to inhibit the expressive com-

ponent of an emotional response.

Most suppression research has focused on inhibiting negative emo-

tions in American samples, ignoring cultural variability within those

samples. In this context, suppression has been repeatedly linked to

poor social outcomes.1 For example, more frequent use of suppression

in daily life is associated with avoidant attachment, reduced sharing of emotions, lower social support, lower peer-rated likeability, and re-

duced relationship closeness (Gross, 2002; Gross & John, 2003; John

& Gross, 2004). Similarly, in a study of face-to-face interaction,

experimentally manipulated suppression was found to have negative

consequences including poor interpersonal coordination, decreased

feelings of rapport and affiliation, and increased negative feelings

about the interaction (Butler et al., 2003). Suppression has also been

linked to poor outcomes in studies of marital interaction. In one such

line of research, “stonewalling” by husbands, which is very similar to

suppression, has been shown to be related to declining marital satis-

faction for both partners (Gottman & Levenson, 1988; Levenson &

Gottman, 1985).

Cultural Moderation of the Social Consequences of

Emotion Suppression

One important limitation of the prior research is that it does not

take into account cultural norms or values (Butler & Gross, 2004).

Indeed, there is very little direct research on suppression and

culture. However, the literature that does exist suggests that sup-

pression may fulfill a broader range of social functions, may be

more frequent, and may be less associated with negative emotion

in Asian cultures as compared to Western European ones. In the

following sections we consider this evidence and incorporate it

into a heuristic model for understanding how culture might mod-

erate the social impact of emotion suppression (see Figure 1).

Cultural Differences in Habitual Emotion Suppression

To ground our model, we adopt the viewpoint that cultural

values and practices are reciprocally self-constituting (Kitayama,

2002; Kitayama, Karasawa, & Mesquita, 2004; Markus &

Kitayama, 1991, 1994; Matsumoto, 1993; Miller, 2002; Wierz-

bicka, 1993). That is, cultural practices embody cultural values,

but those values are simultaneously reinforced by daily practices.

This is represented in our model by the bidirectional arrows

linking cultural values and cultural differences in the everyday

functions, frequency, and emotion associated with suppression.

More specifically, we join many other authors in proposing that

Western European values such as independence and self-assertionencourage open emotion expression in most situations, while con-

straining the use of emotion suppression to primarily self-protective

acts of withdrawal in the face of social threats (Markus & Kitayama,

1991; Matsumoto, 1990; Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002;

Tsai & Levenson, 1997; Wierzbicka, 1993, 1994). Suppression can

also function in a prosocial manner, however. For example, one can

hide glee when beating a peer at a competitive game (Friedman &

Miller-Herringer, 1991) or suppress anger with a friend to preserve

the relationship (Tavris, 1984). Again following previous authors, we

suggest that Asian values such as interdependence and relationship

harmony might encourage suppression equally often for these proso-

cial goals and during positive social interactions, rather than con-

straining it to relatively self-protective purposes.

Consistent with this view, Wierzbicka (1994) presents linguistic

and anthropological evidence that when European Americans en-

gage in suppression, it is in the service of asserting one’s will and

protecting the self. Additional evidence that suppression is often

used in this way by Americans, at least when ignoring culturalbackground, comes from the finding that suppression is associated

with avoidant attachment, which involves a lack of trust in others

and a tendency toward social withdrawal (Gross & John, 2003). In

contrast, Wierzbicka argues that Asian cultures encourage suppres-

sion in circumstances where there is a concern about hurting

someone else and in an effort to preserve relationships.

If Asian cultures encourage suppression in a broad range of

situations while Western European cultures constrain it to self-

protective functions, then this should be reflected in cultural dif-

ferences in its frequency of use. The only study to directly assess

this issue found that minorities in the United States, including

Asian Americans, reported higher levels of habitual suppression

than did Caucasians (Gross & John, 2003). A closely related

finding is that Asian Americans, as compared to their Caucasian

counterparts, reported higher levels of masking, which involves a

perceived discrepancy between inner feelings and outward expres-

sions (Gross & John, 1998). Going beyond self-report, peer ratings

of distress were less accurate when Asian Americans were the

target than when European Americans were, suggesting greater

suppression of distress cues by the Asian Americans (Okazaki,

2002). Finally, in a widely cited study, Japanese and European

participants showed the same facial expressions when watching an

emotional film alone, but the Japanese showed more positive and

less negative expressions when an experimenter was present

(Friesen, 1972). Friesen argued that this difference arose because

the Japanese suppressed their emotions more than the Europeans.

Finally, if suppression is typically associated with self-protectionfor Western Europeans, then it would not be surprising if it were also

associated with negative emotions such as fear and anger. Indeed,

there is evidence for this in North American samples if we ignore

cultural variability (Butler et al., 2003; Gross & John, 2003). In

contrast, if suppression was more normative for Asians, and often

used prosocially, then this association might not hold for them. Two

studies provide support for this conjecture. First, Suh and colleagues

(1998) found that emotional ambivalence, defined as a conflicting

desire to express versus inhibit emotions, was negatively related to life

satisfaction for European Americans, but not for Chinese. Second, in

a study of Chinese American children, suppression in response to peer

stressors reduced the link between stress and dysphoria for low-

acculturated children, although this was not true for high-acculturatedchildren (Huang, Leong, & Wagner, 1994). Thus, suppression was an

effective coping strategy for children who retained their Chinese

heritage, but not for children who had adopted more mainstream

American culture.

In summary, the first part of our model suggests the hypotheses

that: a) Americans holding Western European values will report

suppressing emotion less often in daily life than will Americans

1 There is also evidence that suppression has experiential, physiological,

and cognitive effects on the regulator and his or her social partner, but

those domains are beyond the scope of the present paper.

31EMOTION REGULATION AND CULTURE

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holding Asian values, and that b) for individuals holding Western

European values, habitual suppression will be associated with

self-protective social goals and high levels of negative emotion,

but b) these associations will be weakened or absent for Americans

holding Asian values.

Cultural Differences in Emotion Suppression During

Face-to-Face Interaction

The second half of our model concerns cultural differences in

the impact of suppression on face-to-face interaction. Here the

focus is interpersonal responsiveness, which is defined as the

provision of contingent, appropriate responses to a partner’s con-

versational contributions (Berg & Derlega, 1987; Davis, 1982;

Davis & Perkowitz, 1979; Laurenceau, Barrett, & Peitromonaco,

1998; Reis & Shaver, 1988). When it is present, responsiveness

facilitates interpersonal coordination and is associated with posi-

tive relationship outcomes such as increased affiliation and rap-

port. When it is absent, it signals a lack of interest in the partner

and desire to withdraw (Berg & Derlega, 1987; Davis, 1982; Davis

& Perkowitz, 1979; Laurenceau et al., 1998; Reis & Shaver, 1988).

Responsiveness requires the ability to attend to a social partner andto adapt one’s own behaviors to accommodate him or her. Sup-

pression may interfere with this because of the cognitive demands

of continuous self-monitoring and active inhibition (Richards et

al., 2003; Richards & Gross, 1999, 2000, in press). Consistent with

this possibility, in an experimental study of face-to-face interac-

tions we found that suppression increased distraction and led to

decreased responsiveness (Butler et al., 2003). Furthermore, this

reduced responsiveness was responsible for the negative impact of

suppression on interpersonal rapport.

We propose, however, that this effect of suppression on respon-

siveness should be modest or nonexistent for individuals holding

more Asian values. If they use suppression more frequently, under

more circumstances, and are less likely to be distressed when

doing so, then suppression may be more automatic and require

fewer cognitive resources to execute. This should then free them to

attend to the nuances of a conversation and to remain responsive to

a conversational partner. In support of this, when asked to try to

suppress their responses to a startling sound, Asian Americans

reported trying less hard to accomplish the task than did MexicanAmericans (Soto, Levenson, & Ebling, 2005).

If this line of reasoning is correct, and suppression results in

low responsiveness for individuals with Western European val-

ues, then a social partner would be very likely to interpret it as

a sign of withdrawal, disinterest, and even hostility. This could

lead the partner to be unwilling to form a friendship, and to

respond with less friendly and more hostile behaviors as well

(Berg & Derlega, 1987; Davis, 1982; Davis & Perkowitz, 1979;

Laurenceau et al., 1998; Reis & Shaver, 1988). In fact, these are

exactly the sorts of negative social consequences that have been

observed when cultural differences are ignored (Butler et al.,

2003; Gross, 2002; Gross & John, 2003; John & Gross, 2004).

In contrast, if suppression did not entail reduced responsivenessfor individuals with more Asian values, then they may be able

to remain socially connected despite suppressing, and any neg-

ative impacts on the social interaction and the relationship may

be avoided.

To summarize, the second part of our model suggests the hy-

potheses that: a) suppressing emotion during face-to-face interac-

tion will cause Americans with Western European values to be-

come less responsive, and b) this will lead their partners to see

them has hostile and withdrawn, and to be less friendly them-

selves, but c) these effects should be weak or absent for Americans

holding Asian values.

Figure 1. A model of the social consequences of suppression and culture.

32 BUTLER, LEE, AND GROSS

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In the present sample the two scales were negatively correlated

(r .26, p .01). Plotting the two scales against each other

(Figure 2) showed that the present sample ranged from holding

strongly dominant European values to holding fairly balanced

European and Asian values. In other words, no participants re-

ported strongly dominant Asian values or a rejection of both sets

of values, reflecting the bicultural status of the non-Europeanwomen in the study. Following Rudmin (2003), the two scales

were combined by subtracting the AVS from the EAVS.3 The

range for this composite measure was 5.50 (high European value

dominance) to 0.80 (fairly balanced European-Asian value pref-

erence), with a mean of 2.60 (moderate European value domi-

nance). It may be worth noting that this fairly limited range makes

it more difficult to demonstrate cultural effects, providing a con-

servative test of our hypotheses.

Suppression. To assess habitual suppression, we used Gross

and John’s (2003) Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ). An

example of a suppression item is, “I control my emotions by not

expressing them.” Alpha for the 4 item scale was .71.

Social goals. The Circumplex Scale of Interpersonal Values

(CSIV; Locke, 2000) is a 64-item measure that assesses interper-sonal goals throughout a space defined by the two dimensions of

affiliation and assertiveness. For each item, participants respond to

the question, “When I am in interpersonal situations (such as with

close friends, with strangers, at work, at social gatherings, and so

on), in general how important is it to me that I act or appear or am

treated this way?” using a 5-point scale ranging from “Not at all

important” to “Extremely important.” Items are clustered into

octants defined by their loadings on affiliation and assertiveness.

Three of the eight scales assess goals involving low affiliation and

high self-defense, making them relevant to our hypotheses. The

first of these is defined by low affiliation and indicates a desire to

remain detached. An example is, “When I am with him/her/them,

it is _________ they keep their distance from me.” The second ismarked by low affiliation combined with high assertiveness and

indicates a desire to actively defend the self, for example, “When

I am with him/her/them, it is _________ I attack back when I am

attacked.” The third is defined by low affiliation combined with

low assertiveness, indicating a desire to protect the self from

rejection or ridicule. An example is “When I am with him/her/

them, it is _________ I not show I care about them.” Although

these scales are distinct, they all index some form of self-protective

motivation and so we used the mean across the three scales as our

measure of self-protective goals ( .79).

Negative emotion. To assess negative emotion, participants

indicated the degree to which they “generally or usually felt” 10

clusters of emotions. Responses were on a 5-point scale ranging

from “none” to “more than most people.” The emotion terms were:angry/irritated/annoyed/frustrated, disgusted, self-conscious/

embarrassed, afraid/scared, guilty/ashamed, sad, lonely/isolated/

ignored, impersonal/distant/cold, anxious/nervous/tense, and neg-

ative ( .75).

Data Analysis

We ran two sets of analyses. The first used cultural background

as the measure of culture and the second used cultural values. For

each dependent variable of interest, we conducted a multiple

regression analysis predicting it from one of the culture measures,

self-reported suppression, and the interaction of the two. We also

conducted exploratory analyses including both cultural back-

ground and values, as well as the interaction of the two. Cultural

background had no significant effects, nor did it interact with

cultural values. As might be expected, however, the pattern of

effects for background was the same as that for values. On this

basis we present results from the models using cultural values, butwe report the means for background whenever there is a non-zero

(but nonsignificant) effect.

Results

Cultural Background and Values

As expected, European Americans reported higher European

values ( M 1.67, SD 0.57) than Asian Americans ( M 1.39,

SD 0.74; Dunnet’s MD 0.28 , SE 0.11, p .05, Cohen’s

d 0.43). Similarly, Asian Americans reported higher Asian

values ( M 0.59, SD 0.77) than European Americans ( M

1.36, SD 0.71; Dunnet’s MD 0.77 , SE 0.13, p .01,

Cohen’s d 1.04). Not surprisingly, therefore, European Ameri-

cans had higher scores on the composite measure (European minusAsian values; M 3.05, SD 0.96) than did Asian Americans

( M 1.99, SD 1.17, Dunnet’s MD 1.06 , SE 0.18, p .01,

Cohen’s d 0.99). All other cultural groups were intermediate

between the European and Asian Americans on both values mea-

sures and the composite, and did not differ significantly from

either. For subsequent analyses using cultural background, there-

fore, we combined African American, Latin American, and Other

into a single category that we will refer to as “Other.”

Frequency of Suppression

Based on our model we predicted that suppression would be

used less frequently in daily life by women holding Western

European values as compared to women with bicultural Asian-European values. This hypothesis was supported. Suppression was

negatively correlated with European value dominance, r (165)

.23, p .01. Although not significant, the effects of cultural

background were similar, with European American women report-

ing lower levels of habitual suppression ( M 2.95, SD 1.21)

than either the Asian American women ( M 3.19, SD 1.08,

Cohen’s d 0.21) or the Other women ( M 3.09, SD 0.89,

Cohen’s d 0.13). This is in accord with our suggestion that

suppression is used across a wider range of situations by Ameri-

cans with bicultural values, as compared to those with predomi-

nantly European ones.

Social GoalsWe predicted that habitual suppression would have a positive

association with self-protective goals for women with predomi-

3 Although difference scores entail more measurement error than the

original scores themselves, we felt that the loss of precision due to using a

difference score would be made up for by model parsimony. If both the

AVS and the EAVS were included separately in our models, then the

simplest model in Study 2 would entail 13 predictors as opposed to the 5

required using the difference score, making it more difficult to interpret the

outcomes and stretching the acceptable limits of the ratio of number of

predictors to data.


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nantly European values, but that the two would be unrelated forwomen with bicultural values. This hypothesis was supported by

the significant interaction of suppression and cultural values, F (1,

161) 5.53, p .05. The first panel of Figure 3 shows that

suppression had opposite associations with self-protective goals

depending on cultural values. For women with European values,

suppression was marginally positively associated with self-

protective goals b 0.26, B 0.55, t (162) 1.76, p .08, while

it was marginally negatively associated for women with bicultural

values b 0.37, B 0.78, t (162) 1.84, p .07. There

was no suggestion of this interaction when cultural background

was used as the measure of culture (F .10, ns). Despite the

failure of the less sensitive measure of culture to pick up this

effect, these findings are in accord with our conjecture that emo-

tion suppression often serves a self-protective function for womenwith predominantly European values, although this was clearly not

the case for the women with bicultural values. For them, if any-

thing, the reverse was true, with self-protective goals being served

by lower suppression.

Although not predicted, we also found a main effect of cultural

values, F (1, 161) 21.05, p .01, such that women with higher

European values reported holding less self-protective goals, given

an average level of suppression, than did women with more bicul-

tural values. A similar nonsignificant pattern emerged for cultural

background, with European American women reporting fewer

self-protective goals ( M 2.25, SD 0.55), than Asian American

women ( M 2.27, SD 0.57, Cohen’s d 0.04), but notcompared to Other women ( M 2.25, SD 0.53, Cohen’s d

0.00). Although not directly relevant to our hypotheses, this find-

ing is in accord with research showing that Asian Americans, as

compared to Caucasian Americans, typically report more social

anxiety (Okazaki, 2002; Okazaki, Liu, Longworth, & Minn, 2002)

and a higher prevention focus (Lee, Aaker, & Gardner, 2000).

Negative Emotion

The predicted interaction between habitual suppression and cul-

tural values on negative emotion also emerged, F (1, 161) 7.98,

p .01. The second panel of Figure 3 shows that for women with

strong European values, greater suppression was accompanied bygreater negative emotion, b 0.14, B 0.25, t (162) 2.54, p

.05, whereas for women with bicultural values the slope was

marginally negative, b 0.15, B 0.27, t (162) 1.90, p

.06. Although nonsignificant, the pattern of results was the same

for cultural background. For European American women, the slope

of negative emotion on suppression was positive b 0.057, B

0.10, SE 0.06, while it was essentially zero for Asian American

women, b 0.005, B 0.00, SE 0.09, and was negative for

Other women, b 0.113, B 0.21, SE 0.17. Thus, as

expected, habitual suppression was accompanied by high levels of

negative emotion for women with predominantly European values,

Figure 2. The joint distribution of the European American Values Scale and the Asian Values Scale.


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but for women with bicultural values higher suppression was

actually associated with less negative emotion.

As with social goals, there was also a main effect of cultural

values, F (1, 161) 12.94, p .01, because of women with

bicultural values reporting higher levels of negative emotion than

women with more European values, given an average level of suppression. Again a similar, nonsignificant pattern emerged for

cultural background. Asian American women ( M 2.03, SD

0.61, Cohen’s d 0.11) and Other women ( M 2.00, SD 0.62,

Cohen’s d 0.06) both reported higher levels of negative emotion

than European American women ( M 1.96, SD 0.66). Again

this finding was not predicted, but it is in accord with research

showing that Asian Americans report higher levels of anxiety than

do Caucasian Americans (Lee, Aaker, & Gardner, 2000; Okazaki,

2002; Okazaki et al., 2002).

Discussion

Based on the existing literature on cultural differences inemotion suppression, we proposed that cultural values should

predict differences in the frequency and functions of habitual

suppression, and in the amount of negative emotion associated

with it. Our findings generally supported these predictions.

Women with predominantly European values reported lower

levels of habitual suppression than did women with bicultural

European-Asian values. In addition, for the women with high

European values, suppression was associated with more self-

protective goals and higher levels of negative emotion, while

these associations were, if anything, reversed for the women

with bicultural values.

Two unpredicted effects also emerged. These were that

women with bicultural values reported more self-protective

social goals and higher levels of negative emotion than did

women with predominantly European values, given an average

level of suppression. Although these findings are in accord with

prior research showing that Asian Americans report higher

levels of social anxiety and prevention focused self-regulation

than do Caucasian Americans (Lee, Aaker, & Gardner, 2000;

Okazaki, 2002; Okazaki et al., 2002), they do not bear on our

hypotheses, which address cultural variations in the relationship

of suppression to socio-emotional outcomes, rather than cul-

tural differences in levels of those outcomes. The central issue

for our research is that habitual suppression was positively

linked to self-protective goals and negative emotion for women

with European values, and the reverse was true for women with

bicultural values.

Although never statistically reliable, the pattern of findings

using background as the measure of culture was very similar to

that obtained when using values. This is an important point,given the potential for psychometric problems with self-report

culture scales (for example see Kitayama, 2002). The fact that

both measures present the same general picture lends conver-

gent validity that the observed effects resulted from actual

cultural differences. The greater predictive power of cultural

values as opposed to background in the present study likely

arose because of a combination of the highly multi-cultural

sample and the relatively gross categorical measurement of

cultural background, combined with large within group vari-

ability in acculturation. Although this may not generalize to

situations where cultural groups are better defined and more

Figure 3. Part 1: The interaction of habitual suppression and cultural values in predicting social goals and

negative emotion.


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homogenous, we feel it attests to the power of cultural factors

to influence socio-emotional processes even in a relatively

blended cultural context.

In Part 1, we used self-report methodology, which was ide-

ally suited to testing our hypotheses regarding cultural differ-

ences in habitual suppression. This approach, however, did not

allow us to test our second set of hypotheses addressing culturaldifferences in the effects of suppression during actual social

interactions. Our model suggests that women with more Asian

values should be more practiced and comfortable with suppress-

ing emotion, and thus should be able to remain interpersonally

responsive while doing so during face-to-face interactions. As a

result, we predicted that when women with more Asian values

suppressed they would have fewer negative effects on their

partner, and on the relationship, than when women with more

European values suppressed. The second part of our study was

designed to afford the experimental control required to test

these hypotheses.

Part 2: Cultural Differences in Emotion Suppression

During Face-to-Face Interaction

The ideal situation for testing our second set of hypotheses

would be one in which we could compare cultural moderation of

social outcomes following experimentally manipulated low and

high levels of suppression in a controlled situation. To achieve this

we employed a paradigm that we knew from our prior research

would allow us to compare a control group, characterized by low

to moderate levels of spontaneous suppression, with an experimen-

tal group in which higher levels of suppression were elicited

(Butler et al., 2003). The paradigm we used involved randomly

assigning the participants from Part 1 to pairs and asking them to

watch and then discuss an upsetting documentary war film. Eachpair was randomly assigned to either a suppression group or a

control group. In the suppression group one woman in each pair

was randomly chosen to secretly receive suppression instructions

asking her to hide her emotions during the conversation. The

control participants, and the partners of the suppressors, heard

instructions asking them to discuss the film as the normally would.

During such discussions of a shared negative event, it is very

common for people to disclose their emotions, even if they did not

know each other before (Luminet, Bouts, Delie, Manstead, &

Rime, 2000; Rime, Mesquita, Philippot, & Boca, 1991). However,

it is also not unusual for people to inhibit their emotional expres-

sion at least somewhat because of interacting with a relative

stranger (Berg & Clark, 1986; Clark & Taraban, 1991). In keepingwith these expressive norms, we have shown in earlier research

that this situation elicits low to moderate levels of spontaneous

suppression when women are uninstructed, but that women can

increase their levels of suppression when requested to do so

(Butler et al., 2003).

Given this context, competing hypotheses present themselves

regarding the influence of cultural values on amounts of suppres-

sion. On the one hand, if women with Asian values use suppres-

sion more often, then they might be expected to suppress more in

this situation as well. On the other hand, there is evidence that

individuals from Asian cultures are more sensitive to social norms

and contextual constraints on behavior (Markus & Kitayama,

1991). Furthermore, all our participants would be immersed in the

same daily cultural framework (i.e., a North American university

setting), would have some familiarity with suppressing emotions,

and would be likely to comply with the fairly strong expressive

norms of the situation. These factors suggest that cultural values

may not predict differences in amounts of suppression in thisspecific situation. In order to evaluate these possibilities, we ob-

tained self-reports of how much the women had suppressed their

emotions during the conversation, and we also rated their expres-

sive behavior from videotapes. This gave us two methods for

assessing amounts of suppressive behavior, and thereby a means of

controlling for cultural influences on this variable, if they emerged,

when evaluating other outcomes.

Turning to our central hypotheses, our model suggests that

for women with Asian values, as compared to those with

European values, suppression may be more automatized and

demand fewer cognitive resources. This would enable them to

remain responsive while suppressing, unlike women with more

Western European values who may be distracted by the effort.Thus, we predicted that suppression would result in reduced

responsiveness for women with high European values, but that

this effect would be reduced or eliminated for women with more

Asian values.

We also expected that if cultural differences exist in the impact

of suppression on responsiveness, then there should be correspond-

ing cultural differences in the impact of suppression on a social

partner. Specifically, we predicted that when women with high

European values suppressed it would be interpreted by their part-

ners as a sign of hostility and social withdrawal. This should be

accompanied by an unwillingness to deepen the relationship and

by behavioral indicators of low affiliation along with increased

signs of hostility. Again, however, we expected these negativesocial consequences to be reduced or eliminated when women with

more Asian values suppressed.

Methods

Participants and Design

The same women participated in Part 2 as in Part 1. One

hundred and twenty of the original sample were randomly

assigned to one of the groups of interest (29 suppression dyads

vs. 31 uninstructed control control). The additional 46 women

were randomly assigned to a second regulation group that is not

relevant to this report. For the suppression dyads, the women ina pair were randomly assigned to be either the regulator or the

uninstructed partner. Participants were paid $40 for completing

Part 2.

On the basis of our findings in Part 1, we expected values to be

a more sensitive measure of culture than self-reported background.

Nevertheless, when interacting face-to-face, cultural background

may play a role since it is more observable (e.g., eye and hair

color) than values. Therefore, in order to control for potential

interactive effects of self-reported cultural background within

pairs, we constrained random assignment such that both the sup-

pression and the control group included roughly one third Euro-


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pean dyads, one third non-European dyads, and one third mixed

dyads.4

Procedure

Following Butler et al. (2003), when the participants arrived at

the lab, they were briefly introduced, and then seated 2 metersapart on either side of an opaque partition. A television monitor

was positioned so that participants could view the monitor but not

each other. The experimenter explained that the purpose of the

study was to better understand emotions during conversations.

Everyday emotion-laden conversations often revolve around a

shared emotional event. To provide such an event for the partici-

pants to discuss, we showed them an upsetting 11-minute docu-

mentary film about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

during World War II. Our prior research has shown that this film

elicits high levels of sadness, anger, and disgust as well as strong

religious and political opinions (Butler et al., 2003). Given the

cultural composition of the dyads in this study, we felt that this

film would provide a particularly provocative topic for conversa-tion and would be equally relevant and distressing to both Asian

and European women. To ensure there were no cultural differences

in emotional reactions to the film, however, we collected self-

reports of emotional experience following it.

Random assignment to conditions took place immediately after

viewing the war film. The first step was to assign a dyad to either

the suppression or the control group. Next, the women in the

suppression dyads were assigned to be either the regulator or the

uninstructed partner. After the film, but before the conversation,

and unbeknownst to their uninstructed partners, the suppression

regulators received tape-recorded instructions via headphones.

They were asked, “to try to behave in such a way that your partner

does not know that you’re feeling anything at all,” and “to try not

to show any emotion in your face or your voice.” The uninstructed

partners, plus the individuals in the control condition, were asked

“to try to interact normally,” followed by a bland musical segment.

Following the delivery of the instructions, the experimenter

removed the partition and asked participants to discuss their

thoughts and feelings during the film, the implications of the film

for human nature, and its relevance to their religious and political

beliefs. Participants were free to signal the end of the conversation

when they so chose. After the conversation, the opaque partition

was replaced, and participants privately responded to the self-

report measures (see below). Finally, participants were fully de-

briefed and given the opportunity to discuss the experiment

together.

Measures

Cultural background and values. Participants’ responses to

the cultural background item and their scores on the composite of

the cultural values measures were taken from Part 1 (see Measures

section from Part 1 for details).

Emotional response to the stimulus film. Following the film

participants reported how much they had experienced both positive

and negative emotions. They rated five positive items (amused/

entertained,happy/contented, loving/affectionate/caring,interested/

engaged, positive) and 10 negative items (angry/irritated/annoyed/

frustrated, disgusted, self-conscious/embarrassed, afraid/scared,

guilty/ashamed, sad, lonely/isolated/ignored, impersonal/distant/

cold, anxious/nervous/tense, negative) using a 5-point scale that

ranged from “None” to “The most you’ve felt in the last month.”

Alpha for the positive scale was .65 and for the negative it was .74.

Suppression. We included two measures to assess levels of

suppression. The first was a state version of the Emotion Regula-tion Questionnaire that was used in Part 1 (Gross & John, 2003).

This state measure was identical to the original ERQ, but asked the

participants to respond with respect to their emotion regulatory

efforts during the conversation, rather than their habitual tenden-

cies. Alpha for the 4-item suppression scale was .62. The second

index of suppression is described below in the section on behav-

ioral measures.

Emotion expression and responsiveness. By definition, sup-

pression involves reducing both positive and negative expres-

sive behavior. As a second measure of suppression levels,

therefore, we rated emotional expressions from videotapes of

the conversations. Emotional expression, however, can be dif-

ferentiated based upon whether it is “about” a referential topicor third party, or directed “at” a conversational partner. Al-

though the former is usually assumed to be a communication

about a person’s internal state, the latter typically functions as

a social signal of relationship intentions or goals (Davis, Hay-

maker, Hermecz, & Gilbert, 1988; Frijda & Mesquita, 1994;

Keltner & Kring, 1998; Kennedy-Moore & Watson, 2001;

Timmers, Fischer, & Manstead, 1998; Tomaka et al., 1999). For

example, smiling and laughing generally signal that a person is

willing to affiliate while a glare or sneer communicate hostility.

Although suppression should reduce all forms of emotional

expression, we expected the impact of suppression on the

partner to be reflected in the partner’s expressions of affiliation

and hostility. Thus, our measures of expressive behavior servedas an index of suppression levels and as a test of our hypotheses

regarding the partners’ behavioral responses to the suppressors.

Finally, we also rated nonresponsiveness (the failure to respond

appropriately) to test our hypotheses regarding cultural moder-

ation of the impact of suppression on responsive behavior.

Participants were videotaped using two cameras hidden be-

hind darkened glass and positioned so that one camera focused

on each participant’s face and upper torso. The two camera

images were then combined into a single split-screen image

using a special effects generator. The videos were scored for

each participants’ behavior using custom designed computer

software (CodeBlue, R. Levenson) that allows real-time coding

of behaviors with 1 second resolution. We used a “cultural

informant” approach to coding in which the gestalt of all

simultaneously occurring communicative signals, both verbal

4 Unconstrained random assignment would be adequate in a large sam-

ple to ensure an even distribution of dyadic cultural composition across

manipulation groups. Given our relatively small sample (dyads 60),

however, we were concerned that some cells of the design would be

under-represented. To avoid this we used a randomization procedure that

constrains group sizes to be equal, given a pre-specified number of

participants.


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and nonverbal, is taken into account when assigning a behav-

ioral segment to one of the coding categories.

Positive expressions about the topic were almost exclusively

verbal, such as, “Well, at least the bomb ended the war and

probably prevented a lot of other people from dying.” Negative

expressions about the topic came both in the form of explicit

statements, such as “The film was really upsetting,” as well as innonverbal grimaces and frowns that clearly referred to the topic.

Positive expressions directed at the partner (affiliative expressions)

included smiling, laughing, and agreements, which could be either

verbal or nonverbal (e.g., a nod of agreement). Negative expres-

sions directed at the partner (hostile expressions) were exclusively

nonverbal and included looks of disgust, annoyance, and frustra-

tion. Finally, as in our prior research (Butler et al., 2003), we

defined a nonresponse (the failure to respond appropriately) as a

sequence in which one person finished an utterance and the other

person either did not respond within 2 seconds, or they responded

with an utterance of less than three words followed by silence, or

they responded with content that was unrelated to the previous

person’s contribution. Because conversations differed in length,we used proportions for all analyses.

Coders were blind to the participants’ experimental condition.

One person coded all videotapes, while four others provided reli-

ability ratings on eight tapes each. Thus 32 of the 60 tapes were

coded by two raters. Reliabilities were excellent (positive expres-

sion about topic: average r .90; negative expression about topic:

average r .95; responsiveness: average r .90; positive expres-

sions at partner: average r .78; negative expressions at partner:

average r .82). For tapes that were coded by two raters the mean

of the ratings was used for final analyses.

Partners’ perceptions. To measure partner perceptions of the

suppressors’ hostility and social withdrawal we used the Impact

Message Inventory (IMI; Kiesler, 1985). Like the CSIV used in

Part 1, the 56-item IMI is based on circumplex theories of inter-

personal behavior and includes eight scales defined by combina-

tions of affiliation and assertiveness (Horowitz, Dryer, &

Krasnoperova, 1997; Kiesler, 1983; Wiggins, 1979). Participants

are asked to rate their partners with items such as “She made me

feel unappreciated,” using a 4-point scale ranging from “Not at all”

to “Very much.” As in Part 1, the three scales defined by low

affiliation, either by itself or combined with high or low assertive-

ness, are relevant to our hypotheses. The first scale indexes per-

ceptions that a partner is cold and distant. The second indicates that

a partner appears rude and aggressive. The third indexes percep-

tions that a partner is nervous and withdrawn. We used the mean

across these scales as a measure of the perception that a partner is

generally hostile and withdrawn ( .87). Affiliation. As an index of the extent to which a participant

liked her partner and would be interested in developing a friend-

ship, we combined items used in research on the affiliative con-

sequences of self-disclosure (Collins & Miller, 1994), of respon-

s iv en es s ( Da vi s & P er ko wi tz , 1 97 9) , a nd o f r ap po rt

(Tickle-Degnan & Rosenthal, 1990). The resulting scale included

10 statements, such as “I would be interested in talking to my

partner again,” “I like my partner,” and “I think my partner is the

kind of person I could become close friends with.” Responses were

on a 5-point scale ranging from “Very much disagree” to “Very

much agree.” The for this scale was .91.

Data Analysis

Data arising from face-to-face interactions are likely to violate

the assumption of independence that is required for standard

ANOVA and regression approaches. For example, friendly people

are likely to elicit friendly responses, resulting in correlated error

terms. This lack of independence can result in inaccurate signifi-

cance tests and erroneous conclusions (Campbell & Kashy, 2002;

Kashy & Kenny, 1997; Kenny, 1996a, 1996b; Kenny, Mannetti,

Pierro, Livi, & Kashy, 2002). To test our hypotheses, therefore, we

used SAS PROC MIXED to implement Kenny’s Actor-Partner

Interdependence Model (APIM; Campbell & Kashy, 2002; Kashy

& Kenny, 1997; Kenny, 1996a, 1996b). This model deals appro-

priately with nonindependent data and allowed us to investigate

the simultaneous effects of both partners’ cultural background or

values, the manipulation, and the interaction of each partner’s

culture with her manipulation status.

General implementation details for the APIM are provided in

Campbell and Kashy (2002). The regulation manipulation was

dummy-coded and treated as a fixed factor with three levels

(suppression, suppression partner, control). As in Study 1, weconducted two sets of analyses, first using cultural background,

then using cultural values. For each dependent variable of interest,

we conducted an APIM analysis including the dummy-coded

manipulation, both partners’ cultural background or values, and

the two interaction terms (partner-1’s culture measure* manipula-

tion, partner-2’s culture measure* manipulation). We also ran

these analyses including the interaction of the partners’ cultural

values, the interaction of their backgrounds, and the interactions of

both person’s values by their backgrounds. None of these addi-

tional interaction effects substantively altered the findings so we

report results without them. As in Study 1, the pattern of results

from cultural background was very similar to that provided by

cultural values, but was generally not significant, so we provide

the pattern of means from cultural background whenever there is a

non-zero effect.

Finally, the behavioral measures were non-normally distributed,

because of being in the form of proportions. To accommodate this,

for analyses in which the dependent variable was behavioral, we

used a SAS macro (GLIMMIX) to embed the APIM within a

generalized model using a log link function and a poisson error

distribution (Littell, Milliken, Stroup, & Wolfinger, 1996). This

approach provides accurate significance tests in the transformed

space. Descriptive measures, however, are presented in the original

units.

Results

Film Manipulation Check

We assumed that the stimulus film would induce strong emo-

tions to be suppressed, and that there would not be cultural

differences in emotional responses to it. These assumptions were

verified. Participants reported very low levels of positive emotion

in response to the film ( M 0.9, SD 0.5) and very high levels

of negative emotion ( M 2.6, SD 1.0). These means corre-

sponded to an answer of “a little” for positive emotions and “a lot”

for negative emotions. There were also no cultural differences in

these responses using either the measure of values or of back-

ground (all F s 1, ns).


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Suppression Levels

Spontaneous suppression. We had competing hypotheses re-

garding the influence of cultural values on spontaneous suppres-

sion levels in the uninstructed control group. On the one hand,

women with bicultural values may suppress more in this situation,

since they had reported doing so in daily life. On the other hand,

they may conform to the expressive norms of the situation and join

the women with more European values in relatively low levels of

suppression. The results are in accord with the latter prediction,

since we did not find any evidence that the women’s own cultural

values influenced either their self-reported suppression or any of

the emotional expression variables (all Fs 1.0, ns). Cultural

background similarly did not show any suggestion of influencing

suppression levels (all Fs 1.5, ns). Although it is not possible to

establish the null hypothesis, this lack of results suggests that all of

our participants were sensitive to, and complied with, the expres-

sive norms of the situation regardless of their cultural values.

Experimentally elicited suppression. As a manipulation check,

we expected the participants who had received suppression in-

structions to report suppressing more, and to be less expressive of all categories of emotion, as compared to the control participants.

These predictions were generally supported. The manipulation had

the predicted main effects on self-reported suppression, F (2, 56)

70.17, p .01, positive, F (2, 56) 5.22, p .01, and negative,

F (2, 56) 16.78, p .01, expression about the topic, and on

affiliative expressions, F (2, 56) 48.98; p .01. Specifically,

suppressors reported suppressing more than the controls, t (104)

11.50, p .01; Cohen’s d 0.38, and they expressed less positive

emotion about the topic, t (89) 3.22, p .01; Cohen’s d

0.11 and less negative emotion about it, t (106) 5.71, p

.01; Cohen’s d 0.20. Also as predicted, they showed fewer

affiliative expressions (b 0.05, t (93) 9.17, p .01;

Cohen’s d 0.39). They did not, however, express less hostility

towards their partners (t (95) 1.00, ns; Cohen’s d 0.00), but

this is likely because of the very low rates of this behavior in the

control group (see Table 1).

As with spontaneous suppression, we were unsure of whether

the effects of the manipulation on suppression levels would inter-

act with cultural values. Again the results suggest the null hypoth-

esis, with all interaction F s 2.25, ns This was also true when

cultural background was used as the predictor. Given the lack of

significant interactions, estimated suppressor and control group

means and standard errors are given in Table 1 with both partners’

cultural values set to the mean. These main effects, and the lack of

significant interactions, suggest that all participants were equally

capable of fulfilling the experimenter’s request to suppress regard-

less of cultural values or background.

Responsiveness

We expected that our suppression manipulation would lead tononresponsiveness to a greater degree for women with European

values than for women with bicultural values. This hypothesis was

supported by a significant interaction between a woman’s own

cultural values and the suppression manipulation in predicting her

lack of responsiveness, F (2, 104) 3.89, p .05. As shown in

Figure 4, a simple slopes analysis demonstrated that having high

European values was associated with being more nonresponsive

for suppressors, b 0.02, B .50, t (106) 3.48, p .01, but

there was no relationship between these variables for the controls

or the suppressors’ partners. The same significant interaction

emerged for cultural background, F (4, 111) 2.91, p .05.

European American women who suppressed were more nonre-

sponsive ( M .085, SD .33) than European American women

in the control group ( M .019, SD .42, Cohen’s d 0.18), butthis effect was smaller for Asian American women (Suppress M

.065, SD .36; Control M .021, SD .48, Cohen’s d 0.10)

and nonexistent for Other women (Suppress M .015, SD .60;

Control M .019, SD .78, Cohen’s d 0.00).

There was also a main effect of the manipulation such that

suppressors were less responsive than the controls, given an aver-

age level of own and partner’s cultural values, t (89) 5.19, p

.01; Cohen’s d 0.12. This suggests that suppression is accom-

panied by reduced responsiveness over a range of cultural values,

although the significant interactions demonstrate that this associ-

ation was stronger when the suppressor held high European values

or came from a European background.

Partners’ Perceptions

We expected that if suppressors with more European values

were less responsive than those with more Asian values, then their

partners should see them as more hostile and withdrawn. This

hypothesis was supported by the significant interaction between a

partner’s cultural values and the manipulation in predicting per-

ceptions of the partner’s hostility/withdrawal, F (2, 106) 6.04,

p .01. As shown in Figure 5, the suppressors’ cultural values

were associated with their partners’ perceptions, such that suppres-

sors with higher European values were seen as more hostile and

withdrawn than suppressors with more bicultural values, b 0.27,

B 0.67, t (107) 4.21, p .01. Again, there was no association

between cultural values and perceptions of hostility/withdrawal forthe controls or the suppressors’ partners. As with responsiveness,

there was also a main effect of the manipulation, F (2, 55) 16.63,

p .01, such that suppressors were seen as more hostile and

withdrawn than the controls, given an average level of own and

partner’s cultural values, t (91) 5.62, p .01; Cohen’s d 0.11.

Although not significant, cultural background displayed the

same pattern of means. European American women who sup-

pressed were seen as more hostile than European American

women in the control group (Suppress M 0.90, SD 3.72;

Control M 0.33, SD 5.76, Cohen’s d 0.12), but this effect

was smaller for Asian women (Suppress M 0.61, SD 4.29;

Table 1 Estimated Suppression and Control Group Means and SEs for

Dependent Variables in the Absence of Significant Interaction

Effect

Variable Suppressors Controls

Self-reported suppression 5.7 (0.2) 2.8 (0.1)Positive expression about the topic 1% (.05%) 4% (.04%)Negative expression about the topic 8% (2%) 19% (1%)Positive expression at partner 2% (.04%) 6% (.03%)Negative expression at partner .05% (.03%) .02% (.02%)

Note. Both partners’ cultural values are set to the mean.


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Control M 0.25, SD 5.52, Cohen’s d 0.07) and nonexistent

for Other women (Suppress M 0.55, SD 6.87; Control M

0.43, SD 8.64, Cohen’s d 0.01).

In contrast to the prior results, self-reported affiliation did not

show the expected interaction effect. We predicted that suppres-

sors with higher European values would be less liked by their

partners than suppressors with more bicultural values, but this was

not the case. Cultural background also showed no signs of an

interaction effect (both Fs 1.0, ns). Only the main effect of the

manipulation was significant, F (2, 55) 18.10, p .01. Thus

compared to the controls, the partners of suppressors reported less

willingness to affiliate, t (90) 5.42, p .01; Cohen’s d

0.18, regardless of cultural values. Estimated group means and

standard errors with both partners’ cultural values set to the mean

are provided in Table 2.

Partners’ Behavioral Response

We predicted that suppressors with higher European values, as

compared to those with bicultural values, would have partners who

would show more behavioral signs of hostility, and fewer signs of

affiliation. Although the first part of this hypothesis was supported,

the second was not. For expressions of hostility, the expected

interaction was found, F (2, 109) 3.93, p .05. Figure 6 shows

that suppressors with higher European values had partners who

expressed more hostility towards them than did bicultural suppres-

sors, b 0.008, B 0.58, t (110) 3.51, p .01, but that cultural

values were unrelated to being the target of hostile expressions for

the controls and suppressors’ partners. The main effect of the

manipulation was also significant, F (2, 55) 11.23, p .01.

Suppressors were shown more hostility by their partners than the

controls, given an average level of own and partner’s cultural

values, t (95) 4.65, p .01; Cohen’s d 0.11.

Again, the same pattern emerged for cultural background but

was not significant. European American women who suppressed

had partners who expressed more hostility than did European

American women in the control group (Suppress M .011, SD

.12; Control M .001, SD .18, Cohen’s d 0.06), but thiseffect was smaller for Asian women (Suppress M .003, SD

.12; Control M .001, SD .18, Cohen’s d 0.01) and

nonexistent for Other women (Suppress M .005, SD .24;

Control M .004, SD .12, Cohen’s d 0.00).

For affiliative behaviors, we did not find the predicted inter-

action, although the main effect of the manipulation was sig-

nificant, F (2, 55) 48.79, p .01. Overall, partners of

suppressors showed fewer behavioral signs of affiliation than

the controls, t (93) 7.32, p .01; Cohen’s d 0.25,

regardless of cultural values or cultural background. Estimated

group means and standard errors with both partners’ cultural

Figure 4. Part 2: The interaction of the manipulation and cultural values in predicting lack of responsiveness

during the conversation.


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values set to the mean are provided in Table 2. This finding isin accord with the lack of an interaction for self-reported

affiliation, suggesting that although suppressors with more bi-

cultural values were able to be more responsive, appeared less

hostile and withdrawn, and had fewer expressions of hostility

directed at them, these mitigating influences were not enough to

completely offset the negative impact of suppression on

affiliation.

Mediation Analyses

The prior results provide evidence for two aspects of our model:

a) cultural values moderated the impact of suppression on the

regulators’ responsiveness, and b) cultural values moderated theimpact of suppression on the partners’ perceptions of the suppres-

sors’ hostility/withdrawal, and the partners’ own hostile behavior.

Our model additionally suggests that these effects should be con-

nected in the form of a mediated moderation model. Specifically,

we predicted that the reduced responsiveness of suppressors with

high European values should mediate their increased negative

effect on their partners. Following Baron and Kenny (1986) we

conducted a three-step analysis to test for this. This approach is

extremely conservative, so it provided a very stringent test of our

model (MacKinnon, Lockwood, Hoffman, West, & Sheets, 2002).

Step 1. First, we wish to show that the suppression manipula-

tion had differential social consequences depending upon cultural

values. This has already been demonstrated above for the suppres-sors’ partners’ perceptions of the regulators’ hostility/withdrawal,

and for the partners’ own hostile behavior.

Step 2. Second, we wish to show that the manipulation had

differential effects on the suppressors’ responsiveness depending

upon cultural values. Again, this has already been demonstrated

above.

Step 3. In the third step we predict each dependent variable

identified in Step 1 from a model containing the manipulation,

both partners’ cultural values, both interaction terms

(manipulation*person1-values, manipulation*person2-values), and

both persons’ responsivity scores. Mediated moderation would be

Figure 5. Part 2: The interaction of the manipulation and cultural values in predicting perceptions of a partner’s

hostility and social withdrawal.

Table 2 Estimated Suppression Partner and Control Group Means and

SEs for Dependent Variables in the Absence of Significant

Interaction Effects

VariableSuppressors’

partners Controls

Affiliation 1.6 (0.1) 2.5 (0.1)Positive expression at partner 3% (.04%) 6% (.03%)Positive expression about the topic 2% (.05%) 4% (.04%)Negative expression about the topic 15% (2%) 19% (1%)

Note. Both partners’ cultural values are set to the mean.


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suggested if Steps 1 and 2 were met, and additionally in Step 3

responsivity predicted social outcomes while the differential impact of

the manipulation depending on cultural values was reduced. Finally,

this indirect path can be tested for significance (Baron & Kenny,

1986; MacKinnon et al., 2002; Preacher & Leonardelli, 2001).

Given these criteria we found evidence for mediated moder-

ation for both dependent variables identified in Step 1. When all

predictors were included in the model, we found significant

main effects of partner’s responsivity on perceptions of hositil-

ity/withdrawal, F (1, 106) 22.65, p .01, and on hostile

expressions directed at a partner, F (1, 109) 27.23, p .01.

Less responsive women were seen as more hostile/withdrawn,

b 9.44, B 0.93, t (106) 4.76, p .01, and had more

hostile expressions directed at them, b 0.16, B 0.46,t (109) 5.22, p .01. Meanwhile, the interaction of the

manipulation and cultural values no longer predicted differ-

ences in the suppressors’ partners’ perceptions or hostile ex-

pressions. The tests of the indirect effects were also significant

(Perception of partner hostility/withdrawal: Sobel test statis-

tic 2.40, p .02; Hostile expressions at partner: Sobel test

statistic 2.45, p .02), suggesting that the reason that

suppressors with more European values were seen as more

hostile and withdrawn, and had more hostile expressions di-

rected at them, was because of them being less responsive than

suppressors with bicultural values.

Discussion

In Part 2, we investigated the moderating influence of cultural

values on the acute social consequences of suppression during

face-to-face interaction. We found that suppression resulted in

multiple negative outcomes, and that these effects were greatest for

women with European values, and least for women with bicultural

Asian-European values. In general, suppressors were seen as hos-

tile and withdrawn, and their partners engaged in actively hostile

behavior towards them. However, these consequences were mod-

erated by cultural values in ways predicted by our model. Sup-

pressors with more bicultural Asian-European values were seen

less hostile and withdrawn than suppressors with predominantly

European values. Their partners were also less hostile in theirbehavioral responses. In addition, these cultural differences in the

outcomes of suppression were mediated by cultural differences in

the suppressors’ responsiveness. Suppressors with bicultural val-

ues were more responsive than those with primarily European

values, and this difference accounted for the reduction in negative

outcomes. This same pattern of findings was obtained, although in

a weaker form, when cultural background was considered instead

of cultural values.

Despite this clear evidence of cultural moderation, some of the

social impacts of suppression appeared to be independent of cul-

ture. In particular, regardless of cultural values, socially rewarding

Figure 6. Part 2: The interaction of the manipulation and cultural values in predicting expressions of hostility

during the conversation.


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behaviors such as emotional disclosure, smiling, and laughing

were reduced in both partners when one woman suppressed. In

keeping with this, relationship formation was hindered, with the

partners of the suppressors reporting an unwillingness to pursue a

friendship. It appears that holding bicultural values reduced the

socially punishing aspects of suppression but could not off-set the

lack of rewards that accompanied it.

General Discussion

Are the social consequences of emotion suppression culture-

specific? Based on a two-part study the answer appears to be a

qualified “yes.” As predicted by our model, we found fairly

extensive cultural moderation of both the correlates of habitual

suppression and its immediate consequences during social inter-

action. In Part 1, women with predominantly European values

reported suppressing emotions less frequently in daily life than did

women with bicultural Asian-European values. In addition, habit-

ual suppression was related to self-protective social goals and

negative emotional experience for women holding European val-ues, but these associations were actually reversed for women

holding bicultural values. Thus, higher levels of habitual suppres-

sion appeared to be problematic for women with European values,

while the reverse was true for women with more Asian values.

Also in support of our model, experimentally elicited suppression

in Part 2 led to reduced responsiveness and negative social out-

comes for women with high European values, but these effects

were reduced for women with bicultural values. Furthermore,

cultural differences in responsiveness accounted for the observed

cultural differences in suppression’s negative social impact. De-

spite this fairly extensive evidence in accord with our hypotheses,

however, we also found some signs of cross-cultural consistency.

Thus, the qualification to our “yes” regarding the cultural speci-

ficity of suppression’s impact comes from our finding that sup-pression uniformly reduced emotional disclosure, smiling, laugh-

ing, and affiliation during face-to-face interactions, regardless of

cultural values.

Implications for Relationship Formation

In contemporary metropolitan settings we all interact on a

regular basis with people from cultures other than our own. The

present results are encouraging in that they suggest that holding

different cultural values should not by itself interfere with devel-

oping friendships. We found no evidence of cultural values di-

rectly predicting social outcomes. One place where this is notable

is the control group in Part 2. Women with more bicultural valuesreported suppressing more in daily life, and we thought they might

also do so in the laboratory situation. If so, cultural differences in

spontaneous suppression might have created social discord in

dyads from different cultural backgrounds. It appears, however,

that the women with bicultural values adapted their behavior to fit

the expressive norms of the situation and suppressed at similarly

low levels to their more European counterparts. This is in keeping

with research suggesting that Asian cultures encourage norm con-

formity and are willing to sacrifice individual consistency in order

to encourage social cohesion (Kim et al., 1999; Markus &

Kitayama, 1991).

We did find, however, that cultural values can influence the

relationship impact of self-regulatory efforts. When women with

predominantly European values controlled their emotions by sup-

pressing them, it resulted in actively hostile interactions. In con-

trast, when women with bicultural Asian-European values sup-

pressed emotion, it was seen by their partners as less hostile and

withdrawn, and resulted in less hostile conversations. Although weall suppress our emotions some of the time (Gross & John, 2003),

these findings suggest that those of us holding predominantly

European values would do well to limit those occasions, while

those of us with more bicultural values can afford to do so more

often.

The present results also demonstrate, however, that even women

with bicultural values can incur some social costs for suppressing.

Regardless of cultural values, suppressing emotion while discuss-

ing a shared negative experience uniformly reduced smiling,

laughing, emotional disclosure, and the willingness to establish a

friendship. The fact that the women in the control condition of our

study spontaneously suppressed at relatively low levels suggests

that, to some extent, they may have been aware of this potential

outcome. Indeed, there is some research suggesting that the most

important determinant of the outcome of suppression is how flex-

ibly it is used. For example, the ability to flexibly enhance and

suppress emotion expression during an experimental task predicted

levels of distress two years later (Bonnano, Papa, O’Neill,

Westphal, & Coifman, 2004). Perhaps one of the reasons that

habitual suppression was associated with high levels of negative

emotion for women with high European values was a tendency to

use suppression rigidly, without sensitivity to contextual con-

straints. In contrast, perhaps the emphasis Asian cultures place on

accommodating social demands and adjusting to others (Morling,

Kitayama, & Miyamoto, 2002) enables women with bicultural

values to avoid using suppression in situations where it would have

a negative social impact.

Limitations and Future Directions

To our knowledge, the present research represents the first

investigation of the joint influence of culture and emotion regula-

tion on social outcomes. As such, we had to make numerous

limiting decisions regarding methods and theoretical focus, and a

wealth of research remains to be done. Perhaps the greatest limi-

tation is the sample we used. Our participants were highly edu-

cated, privileged, urban female students in an unusually multicul-

tural part of the world. In this context we found that values were

a better predictor of cultural effects than was self-reported back-

ground; however, it is quite possible that this aspect of the researchis specific to this sample. Nevertheless, the fact that cultural values

related to cultural background in the expected way, and that the

same general pattern of results emerged from both values and

background, suggests that the effects we observed were because of

genuine cultural influences despite the high levels of acculturation

and cultural blending in our sample. We expect that the cultural

moderation of the social consequences of suppression would be

even more dramatic if more homogenous, clearly differentiated

cultural groups were studied. For example, suppression may have

even fewer negative effects when Asians living in Asia engage in

it, but this hypothesis awaits future research.


8/3/2019 2007 Butler


Other limitations of the present research stem from the inherent

constraints of an experimental protocol. For example, we used an

evocative film to induce a shared emotional experience for partic-

ipants to discuss, which ensured that the conversations were sim-

ilar in content and emotional tone. It is possible, however, that the

particular characteristics of that film may have influenced our

results. For example, Asian participants may have been morefamiliar with the events depicted (the bombing of Hiroshima and

Nagasaki), and hence may have been better able to control their

emotional responses.5 Although we cannot rule out this possibility,

it seems unlikely given that we found no cultural differences in

either emotional experience or expressive behavior regarding the

film. Other methodological constraints included a focus on previ-

ously unacquainted dyads as opposed to established relationships,

a single relatively short conversation, and same-sex female dyads.

Clearly further research is required to establish the boundary

conditions on the effects we observed.

As with any initial research in a new area, we have not elimi-

nated alternate explanations for our findings. One open question,

in particular, is why the suppressors with bicultural values were

more responsive. One possible reason for this, and the one that wehave maintained so far, is that suppression is used more frequently

by women with bicultural values and is therefore more automa-

tized for them. Other possibilities exist, however. Several studies

have shown that emotion regulation strategies other than suppres-

sion can have a negative impact on concurrent cognitive function-

ing, and therefore presumably on responsiveness. For example,

trying to distract oneself by thinking of other things (Richards &

Gross, in press) and trying to exaggerate emotional expression

(Bonnano et al., 2004) both produced memory decrements of the

same magnitude as suppression. This suggests that any self-

focused task might negatively impact responsiveness. Perhaps the

emphasis that Asian cultures place on attending to relationships

enabled our bicultural women to maintain a greater degree of other-focus despite engaging in a self-focused task. This possibil-

ity is in accord with research showing that Japanese are more

attuned to situations involving adjustment to others, while Amer-

icans are more attuned to influencing others (Morling, Kitayama,

& Miyamoto, 2002), and with a recent study suggesting that

Western cultures foster focused attention, and hence may be less

able to divide attention between suppressing and attending to a

social partner, while Asian cultures support holistic attention and

hence may be better able to multitask (Miyamoto, Nisbett, &

Takahiko, 2006). Another possibility is that the bicultural women

had a larger repertoire of responsive behaviors to replace emotion

expression with. For example, they may have been quicker to ask

their partner questions and to encourage their partners to elaborate.

Or the women with more European values may have been moreexplicit and overt in their compliance with our suppression instruc-

tions, leading to overly blunt and insensitive suppression. Disen-

tangling such possibilities offers a rich direction for future research

that would shed light on the interface of emotion, self-regulation,

cognition, social interaction, and culture.

Concluding Comment

The present research serves as a reminder that cultural differ-

ences exist within very small geographic areas, in the present case

within a university population. Furthermore, when we ignore cul-

tural influences, we risk drawing erroneous conclusions about a

large portion of contemporary North America, not to mention

about the rest of the world. Prior research on the social conse-

quences of suppression, including our own, points towards the

conclusion that suppression is typically an undesirable form of

emotion regulation. The present results suggest, however, that at

least some cultural groups are able to suppress without becomingless responsive, and without provoking negative responses from

their partners. Above all, the present research reminds us that

emotion regulation is not something that occurs purely within an

individual, but rather occurs within a cultural context and with

implications that extend to the regulator’s social partners and

relationships.

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( Appendix follows)


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Appendix

Items taken from the Asian Values Scale (Kim et al., 1999).

1. Children should not place their parents in retirement

homes.

2. The worst thing one can do is bring disgrace to one’s

family reputation.

3. One need not achieve academically to make one’s par-

ents proud. (Reverse scored)

4. Parental love should be implicitly understood and not

openly expressed.

5. When one receives a gift, one should reciprocate with a

gift of equal or greater value.

6. One should not make waves.

7. One need not follow the role expectations (gender,

family hierarchy) of one’s family. (Reverse scored)

8. Educational and career achievements need not be one’s

top priority. (Reverse scored)

9. One should be able to question a person in an authority

position. (Reverse scored)

10. One need not remain reserved and tranquil. (Reverse

scored)

Items taken from the European American Values Scale (Wolfe

et al., 2001).

1. Sometimes, it is necessary for the government to stifle

individual development. (Reverse scored)

2. A woman who is living alone should be able to have

children.

3. I’m confident in my ability to handle most things.

4. It is important for me to serve as a role model for others.

5. The idea that one spouse does all the housework is

outdated.

6. I am rarely unsure about how I should behave.

7. I prefer not to take on responsibilities unless I must.

(Reverse scored)

8. I do not like to serve as a model for others (Reverse

scored)

9. Good relationships are based on mutual respect.

10. Abortion is okay when the mother’s health is at risk.

Received December 20, 2005

Revision received May 8, 2006

Accepted May 11, 2006


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