Approach and Avoidance Motivation across Cultures

Takeshi Hamamura
Steven J. Heine

University of British Columbia

To appear in A. J. Elliot (Ed.), Handbook of approach and avoidance motivation.

Version: January, 2007

Approach and Avoidance Motivation across Cultures
The distinction between approach and avoidance motivation has been of enormous value for understanding the functioning of the mind. It has also been of much use in aiding cultural psychologists to better understand the interplay between culture and mind. Cultural psychology has primarily been concerned with how culture and mind influence each other (Shweder, 1991). In particular, much research has been conducted exploring how individuals from different cultures vary in terms of how they evaluate themselves (e.g., Cousins, 1989; Markus & Kitayama, 1991).  Various findings about cultural differences in the self-concept have led to a number of different accounts for why people view themselves in the ways that they do (e.g., Cohen, Hoshino-Browne, & Leung, in press; Heine, Lehman, Markus, & Kitayama, 1999; Kitayama, Markus, Matsumoto, & Norasakkunkit, 1997).  It is the thesis of this chapter that the framework of approach and avoidance motivation can integrate many of the findings from the cross-cultural exploration of the self-concept.
This chapter first introduces how the approach and avoidance distinction fits with cross-cultural research on self-evaluation. Then, we discuss how the approach and avoidance framework can be utilized in developing a number of novel hypotheses in cross-cultural research.  Last, we review how cross-cultural research can, in turn, be utilized to inform the mechanisms underlying approach and avoidance motivation.  As the majority of this research has contrasted East Asians and Westerners, our focus for the review is also on research with these cultures.
Cultural Variation in Self-Enhancement Motivation
	How do individuals from different cultures vary in their self-evaluations? At one level, it would seem that there should be much universality with respect to how people evaluate themselves. For example, people everywhere should be motivated to view themselves as living up to the cultural norms with respect to what it is to be a good person (Norenzayan & Heine, 2005). At the same time, however, to the extent that the nature of social relations varies across cultures, what constitutes a culturally valued person should also vary across cultures (Heine et al., 1999). In individualistic cultures such as much of the West, people learn (via their socialization, participating in cultural institutions, interaction with others) that it is valued to think of themselves as a unique and self-sufficient entity. Toward this objective, individuals come to focus on their positive self-characteristics in order to positively distinguish themselves from others – that is, they come to have high self-esteem. According to this view, strategies which help enable individuals to have high self-esteem should be favored in individualistic cultures. Self-enhancement, defined as the motivation to elaborate on positive self-characteristics relative to negative ones, is a motivation that should thus serve to bring one closer to the culturally-shared ideals of a good person in such cultural contexts.
In contrast, in hierarchical collectivistic cultural environments such as East Asia, where the self is embedded in a social network, being a culturally-valued person importantly entails maintaining one’s “face.” Face has been defined as “the respectability and/or deference which a person can claim for himself from others by virtue of the relative position he occupies in his social network and the degree to which he is judged to have functioned adequately in that position” (p. 883, Ho, 1976). Being a good person in East Asian contexts is associated with being a person with a successfully maintained face. We submit that concepts such as face and self-esteem are universally accessible (they can be seen as existential universals; Norenzayan & Heine, 2005), however, we argue that self-esteem is prioritized more in the West whereas face is prioritized more in East Asia (Hamamura & Heine, in press; Heine, 2005). In the following sections, we explore some of the psychological implications of the notion that the conception of a “good person” held commonly among East Asians differs from that typically held among Westerners.
If the motivation to view the self in a positive light is prioritized to a greater extent among Westerners than it is for East Asians, it follows that there should be cultural variation in the extent to which Westerners and East Asians self-enhance (Heine et al., 1999). This rationale is supported by many studies. A recent meta-analysis of all published cross-cultural self-enhancement studies (k = 46) showed a striking absence of self-enhancement among East Asians (d = -.01) compared to strong evidence for self-enhancement among Westerners (d = .87; Heine & Hamamura, 2007). The conclusion we draw from these findings is that self-enhancing motivations are more prevalent among Westerners than among East Asians.
There are three objections that are commonly made regarding this conclusion: (1) Cross-cultural self-enhancement research does not take account the fact that different cultures value different characteristics: People everywhere self-enhance on those characteristics that are important to them, and the cultural differences would be greatly reduced if East Asians were asked to evaluate themselves in domains that are of much concern to them (e.g., Kobayashi & Brown, 2003; Sedikides, Gaertner, & Toguchi, 2003); (2) Collectivistic East Asians self-enhance by enhancing their group selves (Brown & Kobayashi, 2002; Muramoto & Yamaguchi, 1997); and (3) The cultural differences reflect different self-presentation norms across cultures, not differences in people’s motivations (Kobayashi & Greenwald, 2003; Kurman, 2003). We discuss each of these alternative accounts below.
The first account predicts universal self-enhancement on those characteristics that an individual views to be important, and it suggests that this pattern should hold across cultures. A few studies have indeed found this pattern (e.g., Brown, & Kobayashi, 2002; Sedikides et al., 2003) although the opposite pattern (i.e., East Asians show less self-enhancement for more important traits) has been found in other studies (e.g., Heine & Lehman, 1995; Heine & Renshaw, 2002; Kitayama et al., 1997). A meta-analysis of all cross-cultural studies on this topic reveals that cultures differ significantly on the correlation between traits importance and self-enhancement in that East Asians do not exhibit the pattern of greater self-enhancement for traits that are especially important to them (r = -.01) whereas Westerners do (r = .18; Heine, Kitayama, & Hamamura, in press; note that a meta-analysis with different inclusion criteria conducted by Sedikides, Gaertner, & Vevea, 2005, concluded that East Asians do self-enhance more for important traits; also see Sedikides, Gaertner, & Vevea, in press. We invite readers to compare the different meta-analyses and draw their own conclusions). Furthermore, the few studies that do identify tendencies among East Asians to self-enhance more on especially important domains do so almost exclusively with measures of the “better-than-average effect,” a measure that is compromised by a person positivity bias (Klar & Giladi, 1997; Sears, 1983). When this bias is circumvented, the better-than-average effect no longer reveals self-enhancement among East Asians for especially important traits (Hamamura & Heine, 2007; Heine et al., in press). Hence, although this alternative account benefits from a certain intuitive appeal, overall, the data do not support it.
The second account, that East Asians direct their self-enhancing motivations to their groups, has also been explored in a number of different studies. Two cross-cultural studies have found no difference between Westerners and East Asians in their group-enhancing tendencies (Brown & Kobayashi, 2002; Endo, Heine, & Lehman, 2000).  These two studies are in support of this alternative account. On the other hand, eight studies have found that Westerners enhance their groups more than East Asians. This cultural difference has emerged for people’s evaluations of their romantic relationships (Endo et al., 2000), their family members, universities, and social groups (Heine & Lehman, 1997), their evaluations of their countries (Rose, 1985), their cities (Kitayama, Palm, Masuda, Karasawa & Carroll, , 1996), their children (Stevenson & Stigler, 1992), their sports teams (Snibbe, Markus, & Kitayama, 2003), their gender (Bond, Hewstone, Wan, & Chiu, 1985), and in their collective self-esteem (Crocker, Luhtanen, Blaine, & Broadnax, 1994). In contrast, we are not aware of any published studies that have found greater group-enhancing tendencies among East Asians compared with Westerners which would be expected if this alternative account was correct. In sum, a consideration of the cross-cultural research on this topic finds that, overall, group-enhancing tendencies are stronger among North Americans than among East Asians. Hence, the observed cultural variation in self-enhancement cannot be explained in terms of any purported East Asian group-enhancing motivations.  
The third alternative account for cultural variation in self-enhancement is that the differences arise from self-presentational norms and not from genuine cultural differences in motivations. That is, either East Asians are feigning modesty or Westerners are feigning bravado, and this is preventing us from having an accurate view of each culture’s self-enhancing motivations.  This is a very difficult question to assess with confidence as our ability to assess the private thoughts of individuals is limited by our methods. Nonetheless, two studies that sought private behavioral measures of self-enhancement found that whereas Westerners showed a self-enhancing pattern of responses, East Asians showed an overall self-critical pattern of responses (Heine, Kitayama, Lehman, Takata, Ide, & Leung, 2001; Heine, Takata, & Lehman, 2000). That the East Asian responses were, if anything, more self-critical in these studies than in questionnaire studies would argue against the account that East Asians are feigning modesty. Furthermore, a number of other studies have also found clear evidence for a lack of East Asian self-enhancement using measures that would seem protected from self-presentational concerns (e.g., Oishi & Diener, 2003; Ross, Heine, Wilson, & Sugimori, 2005; White & Lehman, 2005). 
However, research conducted with implicit measures of self-esteem, such as the Implicit Associates Test and the birthday-number effect, reveal that East Asians have as positive views of themselves as do Westerners (Kitayama & Karasawa, 1997; Kitayama & Uchida, 2003; Kobayashi & Greenwald, 2003). We submit that these latter findings might indicate that cultures do not differ in the extent to which people come to have warm feelings about themselves.  Rather, the cultural differences primarily lie with respect to how positively people assess their own competence (cf., Tafarodi & Swann, 1996). The question of what cross-cultural comparisons of implicit measures of self-esteem are telling us will be further illuminated once we have a better understanding of what these measures are assessing (Bosson, Swann, & Pennebaker, 2000; Hofmann, Gawronski, Gschwendner, Le, & Schmitt, 2005). 
Summary of section. The available evidence converges to indicate a pronounced cultural discrepancy in tendencies to self-enhance. Whereas Westerners consistently show evidence for strong self-enhancing motivations, East Asians do not (Heine & Hamamura, 2007). The relative absence of evidence for self-enhancing motivations among East Asians calls into question the ways that East Asians evaluate themselves. As the next section discusses, the distinction of approach and avoidance motivation is of much utility for illuminating how East Asians and Westerners work toward becoming a good person in their respective cultures.
Cultures and Self-Regulation: Approach and Avoidance Motivation
Self-regulation coordinates cognitions, emotions, and behaviors and is essential for the attainment of goals and the adherence to social norms (Baumeister & Heatherton, 1996). To the extent that social norms and goals which govern psychological processes are importantly influenced by culture, patterns of self-regulation should also differ across cultures. 
Self-esteem and face are two ways to instantiate the motivation to be a culturally valued person, and their relative prioritization varies across cultures. These two conceptions of being a good person can be distinguished from each other in a number of ways. One important distinction is with respect to their ease of management. On the one hand, self-esteem is something that is relatively easy to manage as individuals have at least some control over it. People have a variety of self-deceptive tactics at their disposal by which they can interpret self-relevant information in a way that is flattering to themselves. For example, they can attend to and elaborate more on positive informative, they can exaggerate the positivity of their self-assessments, or they can make attributions for their performance in a self-serving way (see Taylor & Brown, 1988, for a review). In Western contexts these can be viewed as adaptive strategies, as they bring the self closer to the culturally-valued goal of having a positive view of one’s self. These various self-deceptive tactics can be seen as examples of an approach motivation, as they are all consistent with the goal of securing positive information about the self. People who are self-enhancing work towards securing a positive self-view and largely ignore, or discount, information that would threaten this conception. According to this view, approach motivation are integral in Westerners’ attempts to build upon the self-resource that they tend to prioritize: namely, self-esteem.
In contrast, compared to self-esteem, face is considerably more difficult to manage. On the one hand, there are few opportunities for people to increase their face because the amount of face that people can claim is determined by their position in the social hierarchy. Such opportunities are limited to occasions in which one moves up the social hierarchy (e.g., a graduate student becomes a professor). On the other hand, face is chronically vulnerable for loss because it is successfully managed only to the extent that the individual is able to live up to the expectations of others  - expectations that are often unknown to the individual and that vary depending on the audience.  In other words, unlike self-esteem, the fate of one’s face is largely determined by relevant others’ evaluations. For example, if a teacher is perceived as incompetent by students, his or her face as a teacher may be in jeopardy. Hence, face is something that is difficult to gain but easy to lose. To the extent that East Asians are concerned about this inherently vulnerable resource, their self-regulation should be oriented more towards avoiding the loss of face. In other words, an avoidance orientation should be more adaptive for East Asians in their quest to become a culturally-valued person (Hamamura & Heine, in press; Heine, 2005).
In sum, we propose that different conceptions of what it entails to be a good person, and an inherent asymmetry between the ease of acquiring self-esteem and of not losing face, gives rise to cultural variation in self-regulation: an approach focus is more adaptive and should be more common among North Americans, whereas an avoidance focus is more adaptive and should predominate more among East Asians. 
This rationale is confirmed by a growing corpus of cross-cultural research.  First, there is evidence that people are socialized to develop particular motivational styles in culturally distinct ways from a very young age.  For example, in their investigation of Japanese and American mothers’ behaviors, Caudill and Weinstein (1969) identified a strong positive correlation between the frequency of American mothers’ chatting with their babies and their infants’ “happy vocals.” In contrast, there was no correlation between the mothers’ chatting and the babies’ “unhappy vocals.”  The American mother thus appears to elicit and reinforce her baby’s happy vocalizations, reflecting an approach orientation in her mothering style.  In contrast, the chatting of Japanese mothers was significantly correlated with their babies’ unhappy vocals and not with their happy vocals.  Caudill and Weinstein argued that the Japanese mothers’ chatting served to soothe their babies – an effort to eliminate their problems, rather than to approach happy states.  Similar findings have been documented from a set of studies in which parents in Taiwan and the US were interviewed regarding their attitudes towards child-rearing (Miller, Wang, Sandel, & Cho, 2002; Miller, Wiley, Fung, & Liang, 1997).  The researchers explored the stories that parents often used about the child’s past behaviors to socialize them.  European-American parents more frequently described telling stories that focused on a past success of the child.  In contrast, the Taiwanese parents were more likely to tell stories about past transgressions of the child (Miller et al., 1997; also see similar findings by Wang, 2004).  East Asians thus appear to be socialized to adopt a predominantly avoidance outlook, whereas Westerners are socialized more towards an approach orientation.  
These cultural differences in socialization are paralleled by many findings for cultural differences in approach-avoidance motivation later in life.  For example, Elliot, Chirkov, Kim and Sheldon (2001) found that Asian-Americans and Koreans were more likely to embrace avoidance personal goals relative to European-Americans.  Quite often, for many participants of Asian background, important concerns are to avoid not living up to others’ expectations.  Likewise, Lee, Aaker, and Gardner (2000) found that Americans rated a tennis game that was framed as an opportunity to win as more important than one that was framed as an opportunity to avoid a loss, whereas the reverse pattern was observed among Chinese participants. Winning is thus not necessarily the name of the game – in some cultures it may be better labeled “not losing.”  Similarly, Lockwood, Marshall, and Sadler (2005) found that negative role models – someone that people want to ensure they do not become like – are more motivating for Asian-Canadians, whereas positive role models are more motivating for European-Canadians. The findings of these studies converge across methods to demonstrate that a concern with not failing is of greater motivational significance among East Asians than Westerners.
Cultural variation in approach and avoidance motivation is also evident in studies that have explored people’s reactions to successes and failures. On the one hand, successes are diagnostic of one’s strengths and they thus should be particularly motivating for individuals with an approach focus (Idson & Higgins, 2000). Moreover, in Western cultural contexts where motivations to positively distinguish the self from others are prioritized, individuals would fare better by adopting an approach focus to reveal their strengths. According to this reasoning, Westerners who succeed on a task should be more motivated to continue working on the task relative to East Asians. In contrast, failures are diagnostic of one’s shortcomings and these should be especially motivating for those with an avoidance focus (Idson & Higgins, 2000). The identification of shortcomings is particularly informative for the purpose of self-improvement and face management as shortcomings indicate where one’s face might be vulnerable to loss. It follows, then, that East Asians who have failed on a task and have identified a shortcoming should be more motivated to continue working on that task, in an effort to correct the shortcoming, compared to Westerners.
This rationale has been confirmed in a number of studies. In one series of studies, Canadians and Japanese participants received either success or failure feedback on a task (Heine et al., 2001). When they were subsequently given an opportunity to work again on that task in private, Canadians who received success feedback persisted longer compared to those receiving failure feedback (replicating a pattern that has been identified in a number of Western studies; Feather, 1966; Shrauger & Rosenberg, 1970), indicating an approach orientation. In stark contrast, Japanese who received failure feedback persisted longer than those receiving success feedback, indicating an avoidance orientation. Similarly, Oishi and Diener (2003) found that whereas European-American participants who performed well on a task tended to choose the same task over a different task two weeks later, such a pattern was not observed among Asian-Americans; that is their successful performance did not affect Asian-Americans’ subsequent choice of which task to choose. Again, this is evidence for cultural variation in approach-avoidance motivation.
Similarly, much research finds that East Asians tend to view negative feedback as more useful to them, whereas Westerners are more likely to show the opposite pattern (e.g., Heine et al., 2000; White & Lehman, 2005). To the extent that cultural differences in approach and avoidance motivation underlie this observed difference, an experimental procedure that manipulates one’s motivation should reverse this pattern. Indeed, when an approach motivation is experimentally induced to Japanese participants (by reading a scenario of someone receiving a bonus for good performance), positive feedback was evaluated as equally useful as negative feedback eliminating the pattern observed in a control as well as in an avoidance condition (a scenario of a salary reduction for poor performance) in which participants evaluated negative feedback to be more useful than positive (Ozaki, 2005).  In other words, Japanese evaluations of positive and negative feedback became more similar to Western norms when they explicitly adopted an approach orientation. This suggests that a key reason for cultural differences in the perceived utility of positive feedback relates to chronic cultural differences in approach motivation. 
Furthermore, manipulations that prime East Asian identity have also been shown to affect approach-avoidance motivation in ways that are parallel to the findings from cross-cultural studies. For example, in one study, Briley and Wyer (2002) gave Hong Kong Chinese a questionnaire that was written either in English or Cantonese. The rationale was that the language should prime bilingual participants’ respective networks of cultural information (see Ross, Xun, & Wilson, 2002). They found that those participants who answered the questionnaires in English were more approach focused as indicated by their greater endorsement of approach-oriented proverbs (e.g., “try any doctor when critically ill”), compared to those who answered the questionnaire in Cantonese, who showed greater endorsement of avoidance proverbs (e.g., “ponder your faults and you will avert misfortune”; also see conceptually similar findings from Briley, Morris, & Simonson, 2005).  That is, bilingual participants would switch between motivational states depending on the language that they spoke, indicating that their two languages were each associated with motivational states that paralleled the cultural differences.
	The above studies provide convergent evidence that East Asians are more likely to adopt an avoidance outlook compared with Westerners. However, there is one area of research that consistently reveals the opposite pattern of results.  When it comes to taking risks in financial ventures, a number of studies indicate that, relative to Westerners, East Asians are more likely to prefer pursuing more risky, although potentially lucrative, strategies. For example, Hsee and Weber (1999) compared the financial decision making of Chinese and Americans in response to a number of hypothetical scenarios. In these studies, when participants were asked to choose between an uncertain loss of a large amount of money (e.g., 50% chance of losing $2000) and a certain loss of a smaller amount of money (e.g., losing $1000 for sure), the Chinese were less risk averse (i.e., they were more willing to take a risk and choose the uncertain option) in comparison with Americans. This pattern of cultural differences was replicated by Mandel (2003) with a prime of independence-interdependence, which suggests that financial risk-seeking is associated with feelings of interdependence.  Hsee and Weber (1999) explained these findings in terms of a “social cushion” that protects interdependent individuals from financial misfortune.  If times go bad, the reasoning goes, people with a stronger social network have a greater social cushion (e.g., friends, extended family) that can help absorb the blow of their misfortune. However, this kind of cushion should only be able to mitigate the impact of financial misfortunes. A social network is of less utility for absorbing the negative consequences of risky behavior that makes one’s health or social reputation vulnerable (Mandel, 2003). Hence, there appears to be an important boundary condition regarding cultural variation in terms of an avoidance focus. In domains, such as making investment choices, where one’s interdependent network can potentially cushion the harmful effects of a loss, East Asians do not show more of an avoidance orientation compared to Westerners.
Summary of section. A growing body of cross-cultural research on approach-avoidance motivation yields a converging set of findings. East Asians tend to adopt more of an avoidance outlook compared with Westerners. These cultural differences have been identified with a number of different East Asian and Western samples, with a wide variety of different experimental methods, and for a number of domains, with the important exception of investment choices. 
Cross-Cultural Research of Phenomena Implicated in an Approach-Avoidance Framework
The distinction of approach-avoidance motivation is an integral aspect of many psychological theories (e.g., Cacioppo, Gardner & Berntson, 1999; Elliot & Church, 1997; Higgins, 1997). As such, the observed cultural variation in approach and avoidance motivation allows for the generation of a number of novel hypotheses regarding cultural differences in a variety of psychological phenomena.  We discuss some of these below.
Regulatory fit. Much recent research has suggested that regulatory fit, or the concordance between one’s chronic regulatory focus (approach or avoidance focus) and the regulatory strategy that is demanded by a particular task at hand (e.g., trying to win or trying to prevent a loss) serves to boost one’s motivation (Aaker, & Lee, 2006; Higgins & Spiegel, 2004). To the extent that there are cultural differences in chronic regulatory focus, it follows that the framing of tasks will affect East Asians and Westerners differently. For example, when Canadian and Japanese participants were instructed that performance on a puzzle was to either be monetarily rewarded for each correct response (approach condition) or punished for each incorrect response (avoidance condition), Canadians were able to perform better on the puzzle in the approach condition relative to the avoidance condition.  In contrast, Japanese tended to perform better in the avoidance condition compared to the approach condition (Hamamura & Heine, 2006). This demonstrates that regulatory fit is associated with positive motivational consequences across cultures although Canadians and Japanese differ in terms of what kinds of strategies tend to fit better with their chronic orientations.
In contrast, situations where one’s chronic regulatory focus is mismatched with the demands of a task may give rise to negative consequences.  One such potential negative consequence is in terms of health outcomes.  Much prior research conducted in North America reports a link between having an avoidance focus and poor physical and mental health (Elliot & Sheldon, 1997; Elliot & Sheldon, 1998).  One possible conclusion is that this relation reflects some universal disadvantages associated with an avoidance focus.  However, another possibility is that this relation reflects the consequences of having a mismatch between culturally-encouraged approach orientations among Westerners and an individual-level avoidance focus.  Perhaps having goals that are at odds with dominant cultural values leads to negative outcomes because of a lack of regulatory fit.  This latter alternative suggests that the negative health consequences that have been observed among Western individuals with an avoidance focus should not be as prevalent among East Asians. A few studies find evidence that is consistent with this reasoning.  For example, Elliot et al. (2001) found that an avoidance orientation was not a negative predictor of subjective well-being for Asian-Americans or Koreans, although it was for Americans. Likewise, Takagi (2005) found that whereas avoidance personal goals were predictive of greater loneliness and worse health outcomes among Canadians, they actually predicted lower levels of loneliness and better health among Japanese. Furthermore, Heine and Lehman (1999) found that a correlation between an actual-ideal self-discrepancy (which indicates the extent to which one is failing at an approach goal) and depression was significantly weaker among Japanese compared to Canadians, suggesting that unsatisfied approach motivation was less of a problem for Japanese individuals. In sum, these studies indicate that negative mental and physical health outcomes of particular kinds of regulatory focus that are found among North Americans are largely absent among East Asians. These findings suggest that such negative outcomes might arise from a lack of regulatory fit rather than being due to an avoidance orientation per se.
Temporal construal. Approach and avoidance motivations have also been linked to temporal construals.  Temporal construal theory states that future events are construed differently depending on their temporal distance: that is, distant future events tend to be represented in an abstract, general, and decontextualized manner, whereas, in contrast,  near-future events tend to be represented in a concrete and contextualized manner (Trope & Liberman, 2003). A recent study has demonstrated that an approach focus is more common when a distant future perspective is taken, whereas an avoidance focus comes to predominate when a near future perspective is adopted (Pennington & Roese, 2003; see also Forster & Higgins, 2005). The rationale is that the concern with security that characterizes an avoidance focus is better achieved when people direct their attention to concrete aspects of events where potential threats might lie.   On the other hand, the concern with growth which characterizes an approach focus is better achieved people concentrate on abstract aspects of events where opportunities for growth can be more commonly found. 
	This line of research suggests that there may be potential cultural differences in temporal construals.  It follows that East Asians, with their relatively more dominant avoidance orientation, should tend to be more near-future oriented in their construal of future events.  In contrast, Westerners, with a more pronounced approach orientation, should be relatively more distant-future oriented. A few preliminary studies have found evidence for such a pattern. For example, Hamamura and Heine (2006) found that the personal goals of Japanese tend to be of a shorter time frame relative to the personal goals of Canadians (i.e., goals that can be achieved in days and weeks as opposed to months and years).  Likewise, Lee (2006) reported that when Asian-Americans and Koreans were asked to imagine an event that they would be responsible for organizing, they tended to assume that it would occur nearer in the future (e.g., the event will take place in 2 weeks) compared to European-Americans who tended to have more distant future orientations (e.g., 2 years from now). Hence, preliminary findings suggest that temporal construal is another phenomenon that is implicated by cross-cultural research on approach-avoidance motivation.
Anticipating future events. Cultural differences in approach-avoidance motivation also have implications for how people from different cultures anticipate future events. Whereas anticipating positive events should enhance the motivation of those with an approach focus, anticipating negative events should be more motivating and lead to more productive outcomes among those with an avoidance focus (Grant & Higgins, 2003).  Consistent with this rationale, cross-cultural research has found greater optimism for Westerners relative to East Asians (Lee & Seligman, 1997). For example, Heine and Lehman (1995) found that, compared to Canadians, Japanese were less optimistic in that they were much less likely to believe that positive events (e.g., living past the age of 80, owning a home sometime in the future) would happen to them. Furthermore, Japanese were more pessimistic than Canadians in that they were more likely to believe that negative events (e.g., have a heart attack before the age of 50, drop out of university) would happen to them. Other studies have found further support for this cultural difference (e.g., Chang & Asakawa, 2003; Hamamura, Heine, & Takemoto, 2007). In sum, North Americans and East Asians differ in terms of the kinds of future events they anticipate as cultural variation in approach-avoidance motivation would predict. 
Motivated information processing. Another area where the application of the approach-avoidance motivation distinction has been fruitful is the field of information processing. Prior research has identified that a chronic motivational orientation sensitizes one to stimuli that are consistent with their orientation (i.e., approach focused individuals should become more sensitive to stimuli that are framed in terms of the presence or absence of positive outcomes). Moreover, research shows that this pattern extends even to stimuli that are not relevant to the self.  For example, Higgins and Tykocinski (1992) found that when chronically approach and avoidant oriented participants read a list of events that a stranger had experienced, approach-oriented individuals recalled more events pertaining to the presence or absence of positive outcomes (e.g., finding a 20 dollar bill on street, or finding that a movie one wanted to see was no longer showing) whereas avoidance oriented individuals recalled more events pertaining to the presence or absence of negative outcomes (e.g., getting stuck in the subway, or having an unpleasant class canceled).
	Attending to the approach-avoidance distinction provides a foundation for predicting cultural variation in information processing.  Specifically, Westerners with a more chronic approach focus should be more sensitive to information pertaining to positive rather than negative outcomes whereas East Asians, with a more chronic avoidance orientation should show the opposite preference. A few studies support this rationale.  For example, in a study of autobiographical memory, Endo and Meijer (2004) found that, among Americans, memories of successes were more accessible relative to memories of failures.  In contrast, among Japanese, memories of successes and failures were equally accessible.  In addition, Endo and Meijer (2004) found that Americans perceived the positive impact of their success memories to be greater than the negative impact of their failure memories, whereas Japanese showed the opposite pattern. This difference in information processing may even affect people’s evaluations of their subjective well-being. Oishi (2002) found that European-Americans’ overall satisfaction ratings across a week were better predicted by the level of satisfaction that was reached in their happiest day of the week.  In contrast, for Asian-Americans, their overall satisfaction was better predicted by the level that was reached in their unhappiest day of the week.  In a cross-cultural replication of Higgins and Tykocinski (1992), Meijer, Heine and Yamagami (1999) found that after studying a list of events that happened in a stranger’s life, Japanese participants better recalled information pertaining to negative outcomes, whereas Americans had better recall for information regarding positive outcomes. Likewise, Hamamura and Heine (2006) extended this research by investigating people’s recall of movie reviews. They found that Japanese participants recalled movie reviews that were framed in terms of the presence or absence of negative information relatively better.  In contrast, Canadians tended to have better recall of reviews framed in terms of the presence or absence of positive information. Similarly, Aaker and Lee (2001) found that Hong Kong Chinese had better recall for the details from a tennis match when the game was framed as preventing a loss whereas European-Americans exhibited better recall when the game was framed as an opportunity to win.  In sum, these studies provide converging evidence that cultural variation in approach-avoidance motivation orientation affects memory in predictable ways.
	Emotional consequences. Much research has revealed that approach and avoidance motivations are associated with different emotional states.  Specifically, emotional experiences associated with approach motivation tend to be located along a dimension that ranges from cheerfulness to dejection (e.g., happy, disappointed).  In contrast, the emotional experiences that are associated with an avoidance focus tend to fall along a dimension that runs from relaxation to agitation (e.g., calm, uneasy; Carver and Scheier, 1998; Higgins, Shah, & Friedman, 1997; Mowrer, 1960).  The different emotional consequences of approach and avoidance motivation predict that there should be cultural variation in the kinds of emotions that people experience and seek.  For example, Lee et al (2000) found that when Americans reacted to a scenario of a tennis match, they more strongly experienced emotions that were associated with an approach motivation (i.e., happiness, dejection) compared with those associated with an avoidance focus (i.e., relaxation, agitation). In contrast, Chinese participants showed the precise opposite pattern, and experienced avoidance related emotions more strongly than they did approach related emotions. 
	This proposed cultural difference in emotional experience has also been observed in recent research by Tsai and her colleagues (Tsai, Knutson, & Fung, 2006a; Tsai, Louie, Chen, & Uchida, 2006b; Tsai, Miao, & Seppala, in press). They propose that cultures vary in the kinds of emotional states that people are motivated to pursue – something which they term “ideal affect.” Westerners, they argue, are more likely to seek out high arousal positive (HAP) emotional states, such as feeling enthusiastic, or excited. These states would seem to parallel those achieved through the successful completion of approach goals.  In contrast, East Asians, they argue, strive to attain low arousal positive (LAP) emotional states, such as feeling calm and relaxed. These parallel those states achieved by successfully completing avoidance goals. 
	Evidence for these cultural differences has been found in several studies. For example, Chinese were found to value LAP emotions more and HAP emotions less compared with Americans (Tsai et al., 2006a). Furthermore, these preferred emotional states appear to be learned through socialization. An investigation of bestselling children’s storybooks in Taiwan and the US revealed that Taiwanese storybooks contained more characters with calm expressions, and who were engaged in less arousing activities, compared to American storybooks, and children preferred those characters who demonstrated the culturally-appropriate emotions (Tsai et al., 2006b). Further evidence for this cultural difference has been identified in the dominant religious teachings and practices of the respective cultures. A content analysis of classic Christian and Buddhist texts (e.g., the Gospels of the Bible and the Lotus Sutra), as well as contemporary Christian and Buddhist self-help books, revealed that high arousal states were encouraged more in the Christian texts whereas the low arousal states were more encouraged in the Buddhist texts.  Moreover, Tsai and colleagues noted that some Christian sects include enthusiastic religious practices such as jumping, shouting, and applause, whereas Buddhist religious practices more often emphasize meditation and the calming of one’s mind (Tsai et al., in press). In sum, these studies indicate that different emotional states are preferred across cultures, and these are consistent with predictions that are derived from cultural variation in approach-avoidance motivation.
	Summary of section. Approach-avoidance motivation has been found to implicate a number of psychological phenomena. Given the cultural variability that has been documented with respect to approach and avoidance orientations, it follows that East Asians and Westerners should also differ in terms of the various phenomena that are influenced by different motivational outlooks. Convergent cross-cultural differences have been documented for studies of regulatory fit, temporal construal, optimism and pessimism, motivated informational processing, and emotional consequences.
Mechanisms Underlying Cross-Cultural Variation in Approach-Avoidance Motivation
As reviewed above, many studies have found evidence for cross-cultural variation in approach-avoidance motivation and in psychological phenomena that are implicated by the respective motivations. However, it is important to underscore that these cultural differences do not suggest that either type of motivation is absent across cultures. Indeed, the distinction between approach and avoidance motivation is evident across species, even for the most basic organisms (e.g., amoebas), underscoring the fundamental role both modes of motivation play for many, if not all, living organisms (Elliot, 1999). It seems reasonable to assume that the two modes of motivation are functional universals, or mental process that universally serve the same function, although their accessibility may differ importantly across cultures (Norenzayan, & Heine, 2005). To the extent that approach-avoidance motivation is universally available, it suggests that observed cultural differences could be reduced or even reversed with appropriate experimental manipulations. Cross-cultural studies that investigate how the correlates of approach and avoidance motivation are influenced by various manipulations are critical for identifying the mechanisms that underlie these motivations. This is one way that cultural variation can be used to inform the nature of universal theories: it serves to spotlight where one should more effectively target the search for mechanisms. Whatever variables underlie observed cultural differences in motivations likely play a key role in the manifestation of the motivations in other contexts as well.
For example, one way to consider why East Asian and Western cultures differ in their reliance on approach and avoidance motivation is to explore another variable for which East Asians and Westerners have been shown to reliably differ: lay theories of achievement (Dweck & Legget, 1988).  Many studies have found evidence for heightened entity theories of achievement among Westerners compared with East Asians (e.g., Norenzayan, Choi, & Nisbett, 2002; Stevenson & Stigler, 1992). How might entity theories of achievement be associated with an approach motivation? To the extent that people view abilities as largely fixed and entity-like, it follows that they should not devote much effort towards tasks in which they perform poorly. Entity theorists would fare better by avoiding tasks in which they fail, as future efforts would be unlikely to lead to successes.  In contrast, entity theorists should focus their effort on tasks in which they perform well, as they will likely continue to succeed on those tasks in the future. Hence, entity theorists are able to approach positive outcomes by devoting effort to tasks at which they are especially talented. On the other hand, incremental theorists would seem to fare better by devoting their effort to those tasks for which there is the most room for improvement. Future failures can be avoided if one is able to improve one’s abilities on the tasks by making sufficient efforts.  If this reasoning is correct, entity theorists should be more likely to demonstrate an approach motivation and incremental theorists should evince more of an avoidance motivation. 
One study tested this hypothesis by manipulating American and Japanese participants’ theories of achievement (Heine et al., 2001b, Study 3). Participants in one condition were led to believe that a task had an incremental basis (i.e., trying harder would improve one’s performance), whereas those in another condition were led to believe the task had an entity basis (i.e., performance was largely unrelated to efforts). A third condition, a control group, received no manipulation.  Participants’ persistence on a task following failure was then assessed. For Americans, the entity manipulation had no effect on their performance: they persisted as long on the task if they had received entity instructions as they did in the control group.  Apparently, the entity instructions were redundant with most American participants’ lay theory of achievement regarding this task.  In contrast, Americans who received incremental instructions persisted significantly longer on the task, suggesting that the incremental instructions heightened American participants’ avoidance focus.  On the other hand, Japanese who received incremental instructions persisted as long as those who were in the control group – these instructions did not appear to contain novel information to them. In contrast, Japanese who received the entity instructions persisted less than those in the other conditions, suggesting that the instruction heightened their approach focus.  In sum, manipulations of lay theories yield parallel findings as those from previous cross-cultural studies, and suggest that entity theorists should be more likely to demonstrate approach motivations, whereas incremental theorists should be more likely to demonstrate avoidance motivations.
Cultural differences in approach and avoidance orientations have also been explained in another way. The most commonly discussed psychological difference between East Asians and Westerners is that East Asians tend to view the self as part of an interdependent network, whereas Westerners more commonly view the self as an independent agent (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Could these cultural differences in self-concept help make sense of the observed cultural differences in approach-avoidance motivation?  In one study, Lee et al. (2000, Study 3) contrasted how Americans viewed a tennis game depending on whether it was described as a team event (which should prime thoughts of interdependence) or as a solo event (which should prime thoughts of independence). When Americans received the interdependence prime, they viewed tennis games framed as an opportunity to avoid a loss as more important than those games framed as opportunities for victories – the precise pattern that Lee et al. had demonstrated among Chinese.  
Another source of evidence that cultural differences in the self-concept underlie differences in approach-avoidance motivation comes from research on regulatory fit.  Regulatory fit theory, as discussed earlier, suggests that a fit between regulatory focus that a particular task at hand demands (i.e., approaching a success or avoiding a failure) and people’s chronic motivation focus (i.e., approach or avoidance) serves to intensify emotional and motivational reactions (Aaker, & Lee, 2006; Higgins & Spiegel, 2004). To the extent that independence and interdependence are associated with approach and avoidance motivations, respectively, it follows that when independence is primed people should experience regulatory fit with approach stimuli, whereas when interdependence is primed people should experience regulatory fit with avoidance stimuli. This rationale was tested in a study by Aaker and Lee (2001). They had participants evaluate a product that was presented to them either in approach or avoidance terms (i.e., participants were asked to focus on the presence or absence of positive or negative qualities) after they were primed with independence or interdependence. The participants had a more favorable evaluation of the product presented in approach terms under the independence priming whereas the product presented in avoidance term was evaluated more favorably in the interdependence condition. These studies suggest that self-concept is importantly related to approach-avoidance orientation. 
	Summary of section. Cultural variation in psychological processes can serve to spotlight the underlying mechanisms of those processes. Knowing that East Asians are more likely to adopt an avoidance orientation compared with Westerners has led to research that demonstrates that avoidance orientations are facilitated by other variables which are more characteristic of those from East Asian cultures: namely, incremental theories of abilities and interdependent self-concepts.
Conclusion
	The distinction of approach and avoidance orientations provides new insight into cross-cultural research on motivations. We suggest that cultural differences exist in approach-avoidance motivation because cultures shape the kinds of self-resources that people come to prioritize. In Western contexts, people come to prioritize a self-view that includes the sense that one is an autonomous and self-sufficient entity; a view that is fostered by having high self-esteem. Furthermore, self-esteem is a resource that is accumulated relatively easily given people’s abilities to selectively attend to information that bolsters it. For this reason, a chronic approach focus is favored. In contrast, in East Asian contexts, people come to favor a self-view that includes the sense that one maintains a valuable position within a social network; a view that is fostered by successfully maintaining one’s face. Because face, in comparison with self-esteem, is a resource that is always vulnerable as it is subject to the whims of others in one’s social network, a habitual avoidant outlook is more functional. These different ways of evaluating the self importantly shape the relative predominance of approach and avoidance motivation across cultures.  
	Approach and avoidance motivations are fundamental and universal psychological processes.  It is precisely these kinds of core psychological processes which should provide some of the most interesting vistas from which to observe how the mind is shaped by culture.  As the research reviewed in this chapter reveals, many of the identified differences in the ways of thinking between East Asians and Westerners can be better understood by considering them from the perspective of approach-avoidance motivation.  Although approach and avoidance motivations are universally available, that they are prioritized differently across cultures leads to an array of different psychological consequences that cut across a number of topics of research that are typically viewed as largely unrelated.  East Asians are more likely to chronically take on an avoidance perspective than are Westerners, and this increasingly well-documented fact can help to explain why a wide variety of other psychological differences emerge between the two cultures.  

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