Bicultural Work Motivation Scale For Asian American PDF

Int J Educ Vocat Guidance (2016) 16:275–297
DOI 10.1007/s10775-015-9305-7
Bicultural Work Motivation Scale for Asian American

college students
Yung-Lung Chen1 • Nadya A. Fouad2
Received: 23 June 2014 / Accepted: 6 May 2015 / Published online: 13 June 2015
Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015
Abstract The bicultural work motivations of Asian Americans have not yet been
comprehensively captured by contemporary vocational constructs and scales. For
this study, we conducted two studies on the initial reliability and validity of the
Bicultural Work Motivation Scale (BWMS) by combining qualitative and quanti-
tative methods. First, a pilot study was conducted with 14 Asian American college
students to assess their motivation to work, and items were generated from the
themes developed in the qualitative analysis. Results from the exploratory and
confirmatory factor analyses supported a stable four-factor structure of the BWMS:
Honoring Parents, Family Financial Obligation, Fulfilling Personal Interest, and
Being Independent. Adequate reliability and evidence for concurrent and discrim-
inant validity are presented. Implications of the scale for further vocational
assessment and research are discussed.
Résumé. Échelle de motivation au travail biculturelle pour les étudiants

universitaires américains d’origine asiatique. Les auteurs présentent deux études
portant sur le développement de l’Échelle de motivation au travail biculturelle
(BWMS) en combinant des méthodes qualitatives et quantitatives. Une étude pilote
a été menée auprès de 14 étudiants universitaires américains d’origine asiatique
pour évaluer leur motivation au travail, et des items ont été générés à partir des
thèmes développés dans les analyses qualitatives. Les résultats des analyses facto-
rielles exploratoire et confirmatoire soutenaient une structure stable en quatre fac-
teurs de la BWMS : honorer les parents, rembourser les emprunts familiaux,
& Yung-Lung Chen

yunglung@mx.nthu.edu.tw
1
The Center for General Education, National Tsing Hua University, 101 Sec. 2, Kuang-Fu Road,
Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan, ROC
2
Department of Educational Psychology, University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, Enderis Hall
773, 2400 E. Hartford Ave., Milwaukee, WI 53211, USA
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276 Int J Educ Vocat Guidance (2016) 16:275–297
satisfaire les intérêts personnels, et être indépendant. Une fiabilité adéquate et des
preuves de validité concurrente et discriminante sont présentées.
Zusammenfassung. Bikulturelle Arbeitsmotivations-Skala für asiatisch-ame-

rikanische Studierende. Die Forscher beabsichtigen mit Hilfe zweier Studien die
Entwicklung der Bicultural Work Motivation Scale (BWMS) zu prüfen, indem sie
qualitative und quantitative Methoden kombinieren. Zuerst wurde eine Pilotstudie
mit asiatisch-amerikanischen Studenten durchgeführt, um ihre Arbeitsmotivation
einzustufen. Aus der qualitativen Analyse der Themen wurden Items generiert.
Ergebnisse der explorativen und konfirmatorischen Faktorenanalyse unterstützen
die vier-Faktoren Struktur der BWMS: Eltern wertschätzen, familiäre und finanzi-
elle Verpflichtungen, Erfüllung persönlicher Interessen und unabhängig sein. Eine
adäquate Reliabilität und Hinweise für kongruente und diskriminante Validität sind
gegeben.
Resumen. Escala de motivación laboral bicultural para estudiantes asiático-

americanos. Los investigadores tenı́an por objetivo investigar dos estudios en el
desarrollo de una escala laboral bicultural (Bicultural Work Motivation Scale
BWMS) combinando métodos cuantitativos y cualitativos. Primero se desarrollo un
estudio piloto con 14 estudiantes asiático-americanos de enseñanza superior para
evaluar su motivación laboral y se desarrollaron ı́tems para las temáticas desarro-
lladas en los análisis cualitativos. Los resultados de los análisis factoriales explo-
ratorios y confirmatorios dieron soporte a una estructura estable de cuatro factores
de la escala BWMS: honrar a los padres, obligaciones financieras familiares,
satisfacer el interés personal y ser independiente. Se presentan también la fiabilidad
y las evidencias para la validez discriminante y concurrente.
Keywords Work motivation Bicultural Asian American
Introduction
As immigrant populations in the United States continue to grow and to come from
diverse countries, research on racial and ethnic minorities has helped to enhance our
understanding about the complexity of human behaviors (e.g., Flores et al., 2006).
As part of this, Asian Americans are one of the fastest growing populations.
Researchers have found that, as a group, Asian Americans tend to have a strong
emphasis on family life (e.g., Fuligni, Tseng, & Lam, 1999; Kim, Wong, & Maffini,
2010). In terms of vocational development, the parents of Asian Americans are
more likely to influence their children’s career choice, when compared with
European Americans (Tang, Fouad, & Smith, 1999). However, while some research
has helped to understand the vocational decisions of Asian Americans, there are
other important career constructs, such as career maturity, that remain grounded in
primarily mainstream Euro-American middle-class culture. Due to the strong
cultural emphasis on autonomy and individualism, these constructs may not
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Int J Educ Vocat Guidance (2016) 16:275–297 277
comprehensively address the vocational concerns of Asian Americans (e.g., Flores

& Heppner, 2002; Hardin, Leong, & Osipow, 2001).
Over the past few decades, vocational psychologists have suggested the need to
rigorously investigate the influence of family on Asian American vocational
development (Chen & Fouad, 2013; Leong & Gupta, 2007). However, a major
challenge in achieving this goal has been the lack of appropriate and sound
assessment instruments. Although developmental psychologists have identified the
specific components for family obligations and developed appropriate scales to
measure them (e.g., Fuligni et al., 1999), these have been mainly used to assess
adolescents’ attitudes in assisting and respecting supporting their family members.
These scales might not comprehensively represent the family obligations Asian
American adults employ in their work life. Furthermore, many Asian Americans
live in two cultures, and their work motivation may be influenced by their cross-
cultural experiences (Kim, 2007). While maintaining the cultural heritage from their
country of origin, they also learn how to adapt to the lifestyles of mainstream
culture. To fit into the mainstream of U.S. society, they may feel the need to also
adopt individualistic cultural values and behaviors (Kim, 2007). Thus, there is a
need to develop a bicultural scale to understand the influence of family obligation in
their work and vocational-related acculturation.
Family-based work motivation
According to cross-cultural research, adolescents from Asian and Latino back-

grounds often endorse greater importance of family obligation than do youth from
European families (e.g., Fuligni et al., 1999). Although there are within-group
differences among Asian cultures, family obligation is one construct they have in
common (Chao & Tseng, 2002). Family obligation can be conceptualized as
mutually coordinated interdependence and reciprocity among family members.
Although generational status (e.g., first or second generation) might not be
necessarily associated with the development of family obligations, family immi-
gration experiences could lead to different shaping for the conceptualizations of
family obligations and related parental socialization strategies within family
contexts (Greenfield, Keller, Fuligni, & Maynard, 2003). For example, filial piety
has been a respected value in East Asian cultures, where children are expected to
fulfill their responsibilities to care for their parents in return for their parents’
immense devotion to them (e.g., Yeh, 2006). Filial piety has been regarded as one of
the most important parenting goals by recent Chinese American grandmothers.
However, they also perceived themselves as having less power to discipline their
grandchildren for this value in the context of United States where their
grandchildren could have developed different understanding about family relation-
ships and their role as grandchildren from theirs under the influence of school and
community. They also reported that their previously recognized socialization
strategies, such as corporal punishment, were less practical in the new environment
(Nagata, Cheng, & Tsai-Chae, 2010). Conversely, maintaining traditional family
values in Asian Indian-American families, such as respecting the elderly and
continuing intra-ethnic marriage, is considered one of the highest priorities for
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transmitting ethnic identity, and was being challenged by their minority status (e.g.,
Inman, Howard, Beaumont, & Walker, 2007).
Life stages may also significantly moderate the approaches that Asian Americans
adopt to fulfill their family obligations. Before adulthood, most teenagers were
expected to stay close to their families so they could provide assistance such as
running errands and treating their elders with respect (e.g., Fuligni et al., 1999).
However, as they grow older, these young people may develop financial and
instrumental obligations with the goals of fulfilling the survival and social needs of
family as their immediate family assistance gradually declined (Fouad et al., 2008).
Therefore, their adult family-related work motivations need to be further identified
and assessed.
Vocational-related acculturation
As a racial and ethnic minority group, Asian Americans may adopt acculturation
through embracing the values, attitudes and behaviors of mainstream society in
order to enhance their adaptation (e.g., Hardin et al., 2001). In the area of vocational
development, several researchers have indicated that acculturation could potentially
have a significant impact on individuals’ career decisions, interests, and cross-
cultural adjustment (e.g., Leong, 2001; Miller & Kerlow-Myers, 2009). For
example, acculturation was positively associated with Asian Americans’ job
satisfaction and supervisors’ ratings of their performance and negatively related to
their occupational stress in organizational settings (Leong, 2001). Furthermore,
Hardin et al. (2001) found that Asian American college students tended to utilize
their dependent styles in the decision-making process for a career, such as relying
on parental guidance more than their European counterparts. However, with the
increased degree of acculturation in Asian American college students, their
independent attitudes towards career decisions were found not to be different from
those of Euro-American students. Similarly, they were more likely to develop career
interests and choices in less traditional vocational areas such as artistic, social, and
enterprising areas than those with lower acculturation (e.g., Park & Harrison, 1995;
Tang et al., 1999). Thus, acculturation seems to enhance Asian Americans’
intentions to focus on their internal needs and self-actualization in their careers
(Leong, 2001).
Since there have been limited studies to investigate the impact of acculturation on
Asian American vocational development, further research is needed to validate the
findings described above (Leong, 2001; Park & Harrison, 1995; Tang et al., 1999).
In a more recent study, Hansen and Lee (2007) found that there was no association
between acculturation and career interest, which was contradictory to contradictory
to Tang et al. (1999) and others’ findings (e.g., Park & Harrison, 1995). Several
factors could influence the differences in their findings, such as the characteristics of
their samples and research design. However, it is important to note that all of these
quantitative studies had adopted a unidimensional acculturation scale from the
Suinn-Lew Asian Self-Identity Acculturation Scale (e.g., Hansen & Lee, 2007;
Hardin et al., 2001; Tang et al., 1999), assuming that cultural heritage and adopting
host culture were on the same continuum of the same latent trait (e.g., Miller &
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Kerlow-Myers, 2009). Nonetheless, the complexity of bicultural experiences and

motivations in Asian American vocational development has not been effectively
conceptualized and investigated through a unidimensional approach (e.g., Ward,
2008). Therefore, vocational research needs to identify the specific elements of
bicultural work motivations while considering their developmental characteristics in
multicultural contexts.
Current study
Across a variety of disciplines in psychology (e.g., vocational and industrial/

organizational psychology), work motivation is often defined as an individualistic
construct, particularly based on personal interest, autonomy, and choices (e.g.,
Hardin et al., 2001). Nonetheless, this approach has neglected the forces that drive
adults to work beyond an individualistic level. There has been a call within
psychological research to re-examine the validity of contemporary vocational
constructs and related assessment tools with diverse populations and to expand these
conceptualizations in ways that will consider the unique vocational experiences of
racial and ethnic minorities (e.g., Blustein, 2006; Latham & Pinder, 2005; Savickas
& Porfeli, 2012). Due to the lack of sound vocational constructs and related scales to
capture Asian Americans’ work motivation associated with family-based and
vocational-related acculturative concerns, a Bicultural Work Motivation Scale
(BWMS) emerged from this research. To investigate bicultural work motivation,
college students were selected as a research population because they are in the stage
of young adulthood, and they are starting to explore and understand their career or
vocational concerns.
Overall, BWMS is defined as work motivation and can be defined as a bicultural
vocational construct. Work motivation on the BWMS specifically focuses on forces
that energize, guide, and sustain Asian American college students to pursue work-
related behaviors. These forces allow the need-based well-being and value-based
recognition of themselves and their families of origin during and after college.
Study 1: scale construction and an exploratory factor analysis
The purpose of Study 1 was to identify the underlying constructs of work motivation
for Asian American college students and to develop appropriate items measuring the
corresponding constructs. The factor structure of these items was also explored
through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) along with concurrent and discriminant
validity from other established scales that had an emphasis on bicultural
dimensions. Two validity scales, including the Self-Construal Scale (Singelis,
1994) and The Vancouver Index of Acculturation (Ryder, Alden, & Paulhus, 2000),
were chosen since both measured bicultural self, including individualistic and
collectivistic domains. Concerning concurrent validity, we hypothesized that there
was a positive association between the two family-driven work motivations and the
validity subscales related to collectivistic self as well as between acculturated work
motivation and the validity subscales related to individualistic self. Regarding
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discriminant validity, we also hypothesized that there was a small or no association

between two family-driven work motivation and the validity subscales related to
individualistic self as well as between acculturated work motivation and the validity
subscales related to collectivistic self.
Method
Scale construction
A mixed approach combining both qualitative and quantitative methods was

adopted to capture work motivation for Asian Americans (Luyt, 2012). Fourteen
Asian American students at a Midwest university were recruited using the snowball
sampling technique. In terms of their ethnicity, 1 self-identified as Indian-American,
1 as Japanese-American, 4 as Chinese-American, 2 as Laotian-American, 1 as
Vietnamese-American, and 5 as Hmong-Americans. There were 8 female students
and 6 male students, ranging from 18 to 25 years of age. Three of them were
graduate students and 11 of them were undergraduate students and were all
interviewed in person by the first author for 20–35 min. The vast majority of
students had one to three part-time jobs.
Interview questions mainly focused on three parts: first, their work experiences
from current, and previous jobs (e.g., ‘‘What do you do in the job?’’); secondly, their
decisions to choose the jobs that they described (e.g., ‘‘How did you decide to take
this job?’’); and thirdly, the meaning and importance of their jobs (e.g., ‘‘How
important is this job to you?’’ ‘‘What does it mean to you to have this job?’’). After
the interviews were transcribed, the first author analyzed them using content
analysis. The second author checked and confirmed the congruence between the
themes and corresponding quotes.
Five work motivation themes during the college years were identified with
corresponding quotes. The frequency and examples of each theme were provided in
Table 1. These five themes of work motivations included Honoring Parents, Family
Financial Obligation, Fulfilling Personal Interest, Future Career, and Being
Independent. The first two themes were related to work for their families, but
Family Financial Obligation seemed to motivate Asian Americans to provide
tangible and monetary support to their parents, whereas Honoring Parents focused
on working to make their parents proud of them. The third theme captured Asian
Americans’ intentions to work in a personally fulfilling job. The fourth theme
captured their need to work to advance their career path with a long-term
perspective, and the fifth theme focused on working to support themselves in the
transition to adulthood. Items were generated together with a review of the
definitions and transcripts. In sum, seven items were written in terms of clarity,
representation, and cultural appropriateness for each construct. A total of 35 items
were initially generated by the authors, with feedback and comment on the criteria
of each construct from one psychometric professor and one Asian American
doctoral student in a counseling psychology program. In each item, a 6-point Likert-
type scale was used (1 = strongly disagree, 6 = strongly agree).
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Table 1 Themes of bicultural work motivations, corresponding quotes, and numbers of interviewees
(N = 14)
Themes Examples f (%)
Honoring Parents Well, if I have a good job, other parents would [give] respect to my 9 (64.3 %)
parents that all [sic], you know… she can raise her children and
they are good children, and they have gone to college, get a good
job.
I want to follow my dad’s footstep [to be a doctor]…. I want to make
him proud. I can make my father proud because I can help someone
else.
Family Financial I give [money] directly, they [the participant’ parents] won’t take it. 10 (71.4 %)
Obligation So, … I took them grocery shopping with my money. That saved
[his mother] some money.
When I was working in the Skype company, I saved money, … So
for my sister, she studies medicine. Whenever I visit her, I give her
money because she doesn’t have time and she doesn’t have work.
Fulfilling Personal It’s back to the Chinese family; sometimes I feel that the people in 9 (64.3 %)
Interest my family work only to make money, because they make money,
because they want to support their family, and that’s wonderful. I,
however, … I want to have a job, where I wake up in the morning
and I’m so happy about my job, that doesn’t feel like a job.
I like another job [at blood donate center], which is more people-
involved.
Future Career The job here [in a computer lab] won’t pay me that much. … Just 5 (35.7 %)
make sure I have related experiences on my resume.
…I don’t want to limit myself in their (his parents’) business. I want
to start something for myself too. That’s one of my concerns right
now.
Being In American society, everybody should be more independent, so… 9 (64.3 %)
Independent because of that, I worked so hard, so that I don’t have to depend on
my family and I’ve actually supported myself at school and I never
asked my parents for money.
What make[s] me want to have a job? Because I don’t want to ask
my parents for money, [I] just want to have my own money and pay
for gas and food….
Participants
We collected initial validity evidence for 35 items by surveying 250 Asian

American college students. This self-identified group included 1 Cambodian, 114
Chinese, 9 Filipino, 6 Indian, 9 Japanese, 25 Korean, 1 Laotian, 1 Nepalese, 51
Taiwanese, 1 Thailander, 9 Vietnamese, 17 Asians from multiple ethnicities, and 6
who did not specify their ethnicities. Most of the participants were female
(n = 186), and they ranged in age from 16 to 31 years (Mage = 20.33, SD = 2.07).
In addition, 20 (8.0 %) self-identified as first-year students (freshmen), 69 (27.6 %)
as second-year (sophomore), 61 (24.4 %) as third-year (junior), 82 (32.8 %) as
fourth-year (senior), and 18 (7.2 %) as graduate students. Furthermore, 95 (38 %)
self-identified as first-generation Americans (i.e., they were born in a country other
than the US). An additional 140 (56 %) self-identified as second-generation
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Americans (i.e., U.S. born children of immigrants), 4 (1.6 %) as third-generation

Americans, 6 (2.4 %) as fourth-generation Americans, and 4 (1.6 %) as fifth-
generation Americans. One did not indicate her generation status (0.4 %).
Procedure
All participants were recruited online through 25 Asian American student

organizations and 3 offices of Asian American student affairs at various campuses
with a broad geographic representation. Part of the data was used in another study
(cf. Chen & Fouad, 2013). Four of 254 cases were deleted because these participants
did not identify themselves as Asian Americans. During the survey, all participants
were asked to respond to the work-motivation items based on how they felt about
future work. In particular, 93 participants (37.2 %) indicated having no part-time,
seasonal, or formal employment.
Other measures
Acculturation and enculturation
The Vancouver Index of Acculturation (VIA; Ryder et al., 2000) was adopted to
measure acculturation and enculturation. This scale is comprised of 20 items, with
10 measuring the Heritage dimension (e.g., ‘‘It is important for me to maintain or
develop practices of my heritage culture’’) and 10 measuring the Mainstream
dimension (‘‘It is important for me to maintain or develop North American cultural
practices’’). Each item used a 9-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly disagree,
9 = strongly agree). The Cronbach’s as for enculturation and acculturation in this
study were .85 and .84, respectively.
Self-construal scale
Singelis’s (1994) self-construal scale is one of the most common measurements to

assess independent and interdependent self-construal constructs. The Independent
Self-construal Subscale assessed the relatively individualistic characteristics
particularly related to separateness and uniqueness with 15 items (e.g., ‘‘I enjoy
being unique and different from others in many respects’’). The Interdependent Self-
construal Subscale assessed the connectedness and relationships in relatively
collective life styles with 15 items (e.g., ‘‘Even when I strongly disagree with group
members, I avoid an argument’’). Each item was rated on a 7-point scale
(1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). Previous research reported that its
reliability was in an acceptable range and the Cronbach’s as for Independent and
Interdependent Self-Construal subscales in this study were .78 and .75, respectively
(e.g., Singelis, 1994).
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Results
Psychometric scale properties
Exploratory factor analysis
Based on the factor structure in PFA with non-orthogonal rotation (e.g., Promax
in SPSS), four to seven factors were examined carefully with their extractions.
Seven factors were difficult to interpret and in the six-factor result, the last
factor only had one item, thus not forming a solid factor. Both the four-factor
and five-factor solutions produced similar results, except that the first factor of
the four-factor result combined the items from Honoring Parents and Family
Financial Obligation. However, conceptually these two constructs were differ-
ent, thus, four factors were not chosen. Therefore, five factors were chosen
because their factor structures were more easily interpreted because they were
congruent with the five themes in the previous qualitative analyses; and all
eigenvalues were over 1.
Furthermore, two approaches were adopted for item reduction for the five-
factor result. First, in terms of factor pattern matrix, items were eliminated if
they had either a factor loading under .40 or cross-loadings on other factors
exceeding .25. Secondly, items were eliminated that loaded on factors other
than the conceptual definition of these five themes, thus reducing the clarity
and representativeness of a unidimensional construct (cf. Luyt, 2012; Messick,
1995). After close scrutiny of data based on these three criteria, 7 items were
dropped. A second EFA with PAF was conducted with forced choice of five
factors, accounting for 58.62 % of the total variance after rotation (see
Table 2).
Internal consistency
As shown in Table 2, the final 28 items included 7 items for Honoring Parents, 7
items for Fulfilling Personal Interest, 6 items for Being Independent, 5 items for
Future Career, and 3 items for Family Financial Obligation. The reliabilities for
these subscales ranged from .77 to .86.
Intercorrelations among subscales
Honoring Parents had a significant positive correlation with Family Financial

Obligation (r = .31, p \ .001), but had no correlation with Fulfilling Personal
Interest (r = .06, p = .351). Similarly, Family Financial Obligation was not
correlated with Fulfilling Personal Interest (r = .04, p = .541). In addition,
Being Independent had a moderately significant positive correlation with all the
motivation subscales except Honoring Parents (r = -.01, p = .935) and Future
Career had a slightly and moderately significant positive correlation with all
subscales.
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Table 2 Items, factor loadings, communality estimates, means, and standard deviations of BWMS for
Asian American college students in Study 1
Items 1 2 3 4 5 h2 M SD
Honoring Parents
7. I want to get a good job to make my .80 .06 .07 .03 -.10 .63 5.14 1.13
parents proud of me.
32. It’s very important to me that my parents .76 .01 .01 -.02 .01 .58 3.80 1.29
approve of my jobs.
27. I try to find a job that my parents also .75 -.01 -.06 -.04 .01 .55 3.91 1.37
like.
12. I want to find a good job because I don’t .71 .03 .07 .11 -.05 .57 4.79 1.33
want to disappoint my parents.
2. I want to get a good job so my parents are .67 -.03 -.08 -.04 .13 .50 4.27 1.49
respected in the community.
22. If my parents like my job, it makes me .59 .01 .06 -.04 .11 .38 3.85 1.37
work harder.
17. When I find a job, it doesn’t really matter .49 -.02 -.14 .02 -.01 .27 4.02 1.35
to me what my parents think about the job.
(reverse scored).
Fulfilling Personal Interest
15. Having fun at work is very important to -.01 .81 .07 -.20 -.04 .62 5.15 .95
me.
25. I try to find jobs that I can enjoy. -.04 .78 -.06 .13 -.01 .65 5.23 .81
5. Having an interesting job is very important .07 .72 -.06 .03 .02 .56 5.57 .72
to me.
10. I want to find jobs that inspire me. .07 .67 -.12 .05 .12 .46 5.43 .75
20. Having a job that I like very much is a top .04 .66 .13 -.05 -.16 .50 5.24 .88
priority for me.
30. I always try to make work more -.01 .66 .06 -.01 .08 .47 5.07 .94
interesting.
35. It’s hard for me to stay in a boring job. -.04 .50 -.09 .05 .01 .24 4.47 1.27
Being Independent
23. I make as much money as I can so I do .12 -.19 .78 -.01 .04 .57 4.74 1.33
not have to rely on my family financially.
28. I work to be a self-sufficient adult. -.01 .13 .75 -.06 -.05 .60 5.33 .96
33. I want to have a job so I don’t have to -.01 -.01 .70 .02 -.05 .45 5.33 .96
depend on others.
18. Working allows me to live on my own. .02 -.04 .70 .02 -.06 .45 4.79 1.26
13. I work hard so I can pay my own bills. -.07 .01 .62 .03 .22 .52 4.94 1.26
3. I work so that I can support myself. -.13 .04 .46 .01 .13 .29 5.52 .84
Future Career
24. I always think about what kind of work .09 -.11 .06 .73 -.03 .55 4.62 1.17
experiences I should have on my resume to
get a good job with good pay.
9. I take certain jobs that help me build my .04 -.04 -.15 .72 -.06 .46 4.97 1.10
resume.
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Table 2 continued
Items 1 2 3 4 5 h2 M SD
4. I know what I want to do in my future -.04 .04 .01 .66 .04 .45 4.70 1.31
career, so I always try to find related work
experiences.
34. I try to find jobs that are related to my .03 .04 .12 .65 -.03 .53 4.93 1.18
educational background so that I can build
up my expertise.
29. When I find a job, I think about whether -.13 .15 .09 .63 .07 .51 4.98 1.02
or not it fits my career goals.
Family Financial Obligation
1. I work to help my family financially. -.05 .01 -.08 -.09 .87 .69 4.27 1.58
31. I use part of my earnings from work to .05 .03 .03 .03 .64 .57 4.93 1.18
support my parents and family.
6. I try to work as much as I can to reduce my .14 -.02 .12 .06 .62 .54 4.44 1.53
parents’ financial burden.
Concurrent and discriminant validity
Honoring Parents had significant positive correlations with heritage dimension of

VIA (r = .29, p \ .001) and interdependent self (r = .46, p \ .001), but did not
correlate with the mainstream dimension of VIA (r = -.04, p = .521) and
independent self (r = -.09, p = .175). Family Financial Obligation had significant
positive correlations with the heritage dimension of VIA (r = .15, p = .015) and
interdependent self (r = .23, p \ .001), but had no correlation with independent self
(r = -.05, p = .474) and had a significant negative correlation with the main-
stream dimension of VIA (r = -.15, p = .016).
Furthermore, Fulfilling Personal Interest had significant positive correlations with
the mainstream dimension of VIA (r = .23, p \ .001), independent self (r = .35,
p \ .001) and the heritage dimension of VIA (r = .14, p = .023), but had no
correlation with interdependent self (r = .09, p = .139). Future Career had
significant positive correlations with interdependent self (r = .15, p = .016), the
Heritage dimension of VIA (r = .18, p = .005), and independent self (r = .12,
p = .051), however, had no correlation with the mainstream dimension of VIA
(r = .12, p = .060). Being Independent had significant positive correlations with
interdependent self (r = .18, p = .005) and the mainstream dimension of VIA
(r = .21, p = .001), but had no correlations with the heritage dimension of VIA
(r = .06, p = .320) and independent self (r = .08, p = .205).
Family backgrounds were also associated with various types of work motivation.
Specifically, it was found that participants whose mothers (Mfinancial obligation = 3.96,
SD = 1.21) had a degree beyond college indicated significantly lower Family Financial
Obligation than those with whose mothers (Mfinancial obligation = 4.48, SD = 1.21) had less
than a college degree, F (1, 248) = 10.34, p \ .001. Furthermore, under the violation of
homogeneity of variance, the Welch F-ratio is reported in the following effects of parents’
123
educational and annual family income on their work motivations. Participants whose
fathers (Mfinancial obligation = 3.93, SD = 1.31) had a degree beyond college indicated
significantly lower Family Financial Obligation than those with whose fathers
(Mfinancial obligation = 4.65, SD = 1.04) had less than a college degree, F (1, 187.42) =
21.61, p \ .001. Similarly, participants whose mothers (Mpersonal interest = 5.27,
SD = 0.56) and fathers (Mpersonal interest = 5.24, SD = 0.57) had degrees beyond college
indicated significantly stronger Fulfilling Personal Interest than those with whose mothers
(Mpersonal interest = 5.01, SD = 0.76) and fathers (Mpersonal interest = 4.99, SD = 0.80) had
less than a college degree, F (1, 167.38) = 8.14, p \ .001 and, F (1, 116.31) = 6.45,
p \ .001. On the other hand, using USD 75,000 as a cut point for the approximate median
of participants’ self-reported annual family income, participants who came from a family
below this annual income level (Mfinancial obligation = 4.67, SD = 0.99) showed signif-
icantly higher Family Financial Obligation than those with higher than this annual income
(Mfinancial obligation = 3.77, SD = 1.33), F (1, 247.19) = 37.93, p \ .001.
Overall, the results supported our hypotheses. First, Honoring Parents and Family
Financial Obligation were closely tied to the Asian collective culture. In addition, a
feeling of family financial obligation was more likely to be influenced by the family
financial condition. On the other hand, although Fulfilling Personal Interest slightly
correlated with the Heritage dimension of VIA, Fulfilling Personal Interest seemed
to be mainly cultivated under individualistic culture, possibly associated with
acculturation. Future Career could be slightly influenced by both individualistic and
collectivistic culture as the results indicated that Future Career had relatively and
significantly lower association with bicultural variables. Although Being Indepen-
dent was associated with the mainstream dimension of the VIA, Being Independent
may be shaped by the ideas of Asian cultural heritage for the wellbeing of
significant others, explaining the mild association between Being Independent with
Interdependent Self as shown in qualitative interviews.
Study 2: scale refinement and additional validity evidence
There were three purposes in Study 2. First, because Study 1 primarily included
Chinese and Taiwanese participants, participants with more ethnically diverse
backgrounds were recruited to examine the factor structure of the scale with
confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Secondly, additional validity evidence to
support BWMS was needed, presenting through the association among the subscales
of BWMS and other established collectivistic and individualistic scales. Family
Obligation (FO) was one of most commonly scales used to measure the obligations
to support family needs with substantial and emotional assistance (Fuligni et al.,
1999). Furthermore, the Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure (MEIM) could capture
Asian college students’ collective attitudes toward family and ethnic community,
whereas the Other-Group Orientation Scale (OGOS) was correlated with accultur-
ation and autonomy (e.g., Phinney, 1992; Ponterotto, Gretchen, Utsey, Stracuzzi, &
Saya, 2003; Roberts et al., 1999).
In terms of concurrent validity, we hypothesized that Honoring Parents and
Family Financial Obligation were positively associated with both family obligation
123
and multigroup ethnic identity under the influence of collective culture. Further-
more, Being Independent and Future Career could be all positively related to family
obligation, multigroup ethnic identity, and other-group orientation as well since
both could be influenced by mainstream U.S. and traditional Asian cultures.
Conversely, with regard to discriminant validity, both Honoring Parents and Family
Financial Obligation were predicted to have small or no association with other-
group orientation because these two types of work motivations did not directly
emphasize the importance of socially networking with diverse groups (e.g.,
Ponterotto et al., 2003). Similarly, because individuals with high Fulfilling Personal
Interest could develop less intention to fulfill family needs, Fulfilling Personal
Interest could have low or no associations with family obligation and multigroup
ethnic identity.
Participants
A total of 359 Asian Americans with diverse backgrounds were recruited online.
The participants ranged from 18 and 46 yeas of age (Mage = 23.08, SD = 4.15).
They were from 42 states, particularly from California (30.1 %), New York
(10.0 %), Florida (7.0 %), and Massachusetts (4.5 %). Self-identified ethnic groups
included 117 Chinese, 20 Filipino, 3 Hmong, 14 Indian, 2 Indonesian, 65 Japanese,
40 Korean, 1 Laotian, 1 Malaysian, 1 Pakistani, 7 Taiwanese, 1 Thailander, 24
Vietnamese, 35 Asian from multiple ethnicities, and 28 who did not provide detailed
information about their specific ethnicity. Of the participants, 125 were male
(34.8 %), and 234 were female (65.2 %).
In addition, 65 (18.1 %) self-identified as first-year students (freshmen), 100
(27.9 %) as second-year (sophomore), 83 (23.1 %) as third-year (junior), 80
(22.3 %) as fourth-year (senior), 30 (8.3 %) as graduate students, and 1 did not
specify his or her year in college (0.3 %). Furthermore, 112 (31.20 %) self-
identified as first-generation Americans (i.e., they were born in a country other than
the US). Furthermore, 176 (49 %) self-identified as second-generation Americans
(i.e., U.S. children of immigrants), 50 (14 %) as third-generation Americans, 18
(5.0 %) as fourth-generation Americans, and three (0.8 %) as fifth-generation
Americans.
Other measures
Family obligation (FO)
FO consists of three subscales, including current assistance, respect for family, and
future support (Fuligni et al., 1999). Current assistance measured college students’
activities engaged in supporting their family with 12 items such as ‘‘Helping out
around the house.’’ Students rated their experiences on a 5-point Likert-type scale
(1 = almost never, 5 = almost always). Respect for family assessed young adults’
beliefs about the importance of incorporating the needs and opinions of the family
into their lives using 7 items, such as ‘‘Respect your older brothers and sisters.’’
123
Future support measured students’ belief in the importance of supporting and being
near their families using 6 items, such as ‘‘Spend time with your parents even after
you no longer live with them.’’ The second and third subscales used a 5-point
Likert-type scale (1 = not at all important, 5 = very important) to measure
students’ belief and attitudes. Cronbach’s as for current assistance, respect for
family, and future support in this study were .83, .82, and .76, respectively.
The Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure (MEIM)
The MEIM is a 12-item scale assessing ethnic identity development during the stages
of adolescence and young adulthood (Phinney, 1992; Roberts et al., 1999). The scale
included two subscales, Ethnic Identity Exploration and Ethnic Commitment. Ethnic
Identity Exploration measures individuals’ intentions to search for more information
and better understanding of the meaning of their ethnic background. Ethnic
Commitment assesses the sense of belonging to their own ethnic group. Examples
of the items for the two subscales included, ‘‘I have spent time trying to find out more
about my ethnic group, such as its history, traditions, and customs (measuring identity
exploration)’’ and, ‘‘I have a clear sense of my ethnic background and what it means
for me (measuring identity commitment).’’ Each item was rated on a 5-point Likert-
type scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). The Cronbach’s as for ethnic
search and for commitment were .72 and .87, respectively.
Other-Group Orientation Scale (OGOS)
Six items were developed to measure individuals’ attitudes towards building

relationships with other ethnic groups according to the OGOS (Phinney, 1992).
These examples included, ‘‘I like meeting and getting to know people from ethnic
groups other than my own’’ and, ‘‘I am involved in activities with people from other
ethnic groups.’’ Each item was rated on a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly
disagree, 5 = strongly agree). The Cronbach’s a for other-group orientation .75.
Procedure
All of the participants were compensated for participating in the panel from an
online firm, which could contact these participants and was able to keep track of
their survey completion. About 6800 invitations were sent out to Asian American
college students who qualified for the survey, and a total of 401 participants joined
the study initially; 42 were not included in our analyses because they indicated one
of their parents was European, African, Hispanic, or American Indian. During the
time in which they completed the survey, 122 participants (34.0 %) indicated that
they did not have a job, including part-time or seasonal job; and all the participants
were asked to respond to the work-motivation items based on how they felt about
their future work.
123
Results
Psychometric scale properties
Exploratory factor analysis
Because these participants had more diverse backgrounds than those in Study 1, the
factor structure again was explored through PFA with non-orthogonal rotation (e.g.,
Promax Method). Four to seven factors were examined carefully with their
extractions. Six and seven factors were hard to interpret; in the five-factor result, 13
items were cross-loaded in more than two factors. Four factors were chosen with
considerations of interpretability and previous conceptualization, along with
eigenvalue more than 1. Ten items were eliminated from the factor pattern matrix
with the two major approaches described in Study 1 (cf. Luyt, 2012). The items
from Future Career and Being Independent from Study 1 were formed as a new
factor and the other three factors were identified as the same as previous ones in
Study 1, including Honoring Parents, Fulfilling Personal Interest, and Family
Financial Obligation. A second EFA with PAF was conducted with the forced
choice of four factors, accounting for 57.88 % of the total variance after rotation.
The factor loadings on these four factors fulfilled these three criteria. Finally, 18
items were retained, as shown in Table 3. The newly formed factor in Study 2 was
named Being Independent because the first four items in this factor were from this
factor in Study 1 (see Table 3).
Validating factor structure
To further validate the scale, CFA was conducted to examine the four-factor oblique
model based on the results in Study 1. As shown in Table 4, alternative models were
also investigated to compare the fit of these models with the proposed model,
including (a) a one-factor model with all 18 items loading on one factor, (b) a four-
factor orthogonal model, and (c) a second-order model (i.e., the four factors caused
by a second-order factor).
Since the four-factor oblique model and the four-factor orthogonal model are
nested, a Satorra and Bentler (SB) scaled v2 difference test was adopted to compare
the fit of these two models with data under the violation of multivariate normality
assumption (e.g., Curran, West, & Finch, 1996). The former provided a statistically
significant improvement in model fit when compared to the latter, Td (6,
N = 359) = 186.36, p \ .001 (Bryant & Satorra, 2013). Furthermore, because
the one-factor model was nested within the four-factor oblique model, the
correlations among these four variables in one-factor model were set to a value
of 1.0. The four-factor oblique model also demonstrated a significant improvement
over the one-factor model, Td (6, N = 359) = 595.95, p \ .001 (Bryant & Satorra,
2013). In addition, the four-factor oblique model was compared with the second-
order model in terms of the Akaike’s information criterion (AIC; Akaike, 1987) and
the expected cross-validation index (ECVI; Kline, 2005) to determine a better
123
Table 3 Items, factor loadings, communality estimates, means, and standard deviations of BWMS for
Asian American college students in Study 2
Items 1 2 3 4 h2 M SD
Being Independent
23. I make as much money as I can so I do not have .75 -.18 -.18 .21 .48 5.00 1.13
to rely on my family financially.
28. I work to be a self-sufficient adult. .73 .01 -.04 -.02 .50 5.20 1.06
33. I want to have a job so I don’t have to depend on .70 .01 .02 -.05 .48 5.26 1.05
others.
18. Working allows me to live on my own. .54 -.14 .07 -.01 .27 4.81 1.25
29. When I find a job, I think about whether or not it .51 .14 .09 -.12 .36 4.83 1.16
fits my career goals.
24. I always think about what kind of work .45 .19 .13 .04 .45 4.89 1.08
experiences I should have on my resume to get a
good job with good pay.
34. I try to find jobs that are related to my .42 .21 .08 -.04 .33 5.05 1.06
educational background so that I can build up my
expertise.
Honoring Parents
27. I try to find a job that my parents also like. -.05 .81 .01 -.08 .59 4.40 1.27
32. It’s very important to me that my parents approve -.02 .78 -.11 -.01 .55 4.44 1.42
of my jobs.
22. If my parents like my job, it makes me work -.03 .68 -.07 .14 .51 4.57 1.27
harder.
12. I want to find a good job because I don’t want to .03 .49 .13 .11 .38 4.99 1.24
disappoint my parents.
Fulfilling Personal Interest
5. Having an interesting job is very important to me. -.15 -.03 .80 .10 .56 5.07 1.18
15. Having fun at work is very important to me. .01 -.04 .66 -.07 .41 4.65 1.23
10. I want to find jobs that inspire me. .11 -.09 .66 .17 .57 5.15 1.06
20. Having a job that I like very much is a top .15 .05 .52 -.19 .37 5.04 1.12
priority for me.
Family Financial Obligation
1. I work to help my family financially. -.01 .01 -.03 .80 .58 4.25 1.50
6. I try to work as much as I can to reduce my -.03 .09 .09 .67 .53 4.69 1.32
parents’ financial burden.
31. I use part of my earnings from work to support .06 .18 -.04 .58 .47 4.42 1.40
my parents and family.
model because these were not nested models. The findings suggested the four-factor
oblique model was slightly better than the second-order model (see Table 4),
although only these two of the four models met three fit indices (i.e., CFI = .95,
RMSEA = .06; SRMR = .08). More importantly, the four-factor oblique model
was also consistent with our theoretical conceptualization.
123
Table 4 Goodness-of-fit indicators for the competing models of the 18-item BWMS
Mode df SB v2 CFI SRMR RMSEA [CI] AIC ECVI [CI]
1. One first-order 135 788.11 .84 .11 .12 [.11, .13] 860.11 2.40 [2.17, 2.66]
2. Four-factor orthogonal 135 440.43 .93 .19 .08 [.07, .09] 512.43 1.43 [1.26, 1.62]
3. One second-order 131 271.14 .97 .07 .06 [.05, .07] 351.13 0.98 [0.86, 1.12]
4. Four-factor oblique 129 258.25 .97 .06 .05 [.04, .06] 342.25 0.96 [0.84, 1.10]
CFI = comparative fit index, SRMR = standardized root-mean-square residual, RMSEA = root-mean-
square error of approximation, CI = 90 % confidence intervals for RMSEA, AIC = Aikaike’s information
criterion, ECVI = expected cross-validation index
Internal consistency
Four factors with 18 items were kept, including 7 items for Being Independent, 4
items for Honoring Parents, 4 items for Fulfilling Personal Interest, 3 items for
Family Financial Obligation. The reliabilities for these subscales ranged from .76 to
.80.
Intercorrelations among subscales
Four factors for work motivation were somewhat interrelated, but still demonstrated
the distinctiveness of the constructs. In particular, the association between Honoring
Parents and Family Financial Obligation appeared moderately interrelated (r = .39,
p \ .001), though the association between Honoring Parents and Fulfilling Personal
Interest (r = .22, p \ .001) and between Family Financial Obligation and Fulfilling
Personal Interest appeared small (r = .22, p \ .001).
Concurrent and discriminant validity
Honoring Parents had significant positive correlations with multigroup ethnic

identity exploration (r = .47, p \ .001) and ethnic commitment (r = .48,
p \ .001), but had no association with other-group orientation (r = .08,
p = .123). Honoring Parents also had positively and significantly high correlations
with current assistance (r = .50, p \ .001), respect for family (r = .61, p \ .001),
and future support (r = .50, p \ .001) of FO. Furthermore, Family Financial
Obligation had significant positive correlation with multigroup ethnic identity
exploration (r = .35, p \ .001) and commitment (r = .31, p \ .001), but had no
correlations with other-group orientation (r = .06, p = .257). Similarly, Family
Financial Obligation also had significant positive correlations with current
assistance (r = .43, p \ .001), respect for family (r = .37, p \ .001), and future
support (r = .43, p \ .001) of FO.
On the other hand, Fulfilling Personal Interest also had significant positive
correlations with other-group orientation (r = .28, p \ .001), multigroup ethnic
identity exploration (r = .16, p \ .005), ethnic commitment (r = .26, p \ .001),
123
current assistance (r = .21, p \ .001), as well as respect for family (r = .13,

p = .013) of FO. However, Fulfilling Personal Interest had no association with
future support (r = .08, p = .150) of FO. Overall, Fulfilling Personal Interest had
relatively smaller association with all these validity scales. Furthermore, Being
Independent had significant positive correlations with multigroup ethnic identity
exploration (r = .29, p \ .001), ethnic commitment (r = .40, p \ .001), and other-
group orientation (r = .43, p \ .001). Being Independent also had significant
positive correlations with current assistance (r = .44, p \ .001), respect for family
(r = .45, p \ .001), and future support (r = .21, p \ .001) of FO.
Under the violation of homogeneity of variance, the Welch F-ratio was reported in
the following effects of parents’ educational and annual family income on their work
motivations. First, it was found that participants whose fathers had a degree beyond
college (Mfinancial obligation = 4.36, SD = 1.20) demonstrated lower Family Financial
Obligation than those whose fathers had less than a college degree (Mfinancial obligation =
4.64, SD = 1.02), F (1, 256.28) = 5.30, p = .022. Conversely, using USD 70,000 as a
cut point for the approximate median of participants’ self-reported annual family
income, participants who came from a household below this income level
(Mfamily income = 4.63, SD = 0.99) showed significantly higher Family Financial
Obligation than those with higher than this annual income (Mfamily income = 4.29,
SD = 1.27), F (1, 349.21) = 8.21, p = .004.
Overall, the results generally supported our hypotheses in Study 2 that this four-
factor work motivation confirmed by a broader sample using CFA, represented
distinctive elements that energized participants to work. More specifically,
Honoring Parents and Family Financial Obligation were tied with collective
cultures, whereas Fulfilling Personal Interest was less cultivated by the influence of
family and ethnic orientation. By contrast, Being Independent moderately correlated
with all of validity variables, suggesting that this factor was associated with the
concerns about both personal and family well-being under the influence of
individualism and collectivism. The result suggested that Future Career might not
be a solid factor influencing college students’ vocational development during the
early adult stage. However, it could be also influenced by the sample characteristics,
such as low career aspirations.
Discussion
Although contemporary researchers have paid significant attention to how relational

issues correlate to vocational development, few researchers have systematically
investigated the family-based work motivation for Asian Americans. Therefore,
their family-based work motivations could not be simply captured by current
instruments and could be overlooked in career counseling and assessment that
followed individualistic European American middle-class norms (Hardin et al.,
2001). Furthermore, growing up in a multicultural society, many Asian Americans
have developed bicultural identities, including ethnic and American identities,
together with the capacity to effectively navigate in cross-cultural contexts (e.g.,
Inman et al., 2007; Kim, 2007). The current research findings highlighted the
123
importance of work for Honoring Parents and Family Financial Obligation among
Asian Americans college students.
Both Honoring Parents and Family Financial Obligation were associated with
interdependent self in family contexts. However, these two motivations shape their
lives and vocational development through different pathways. Our research findings
suggested that Family Financial Obligation might support individuals in focusing on
fulfilling their family’s financial or survival needs, particularly when their families
had relatively lower social economic status. However, Honoring Parents motivated
individuals to bring honor back to their family through their work achievements
(e.g., Chen & Fouad, 2013). In other words, Honoring Parents seemed to enhance
the status of their families in the community beyond their families’ survival needs.
Across both these studies, only the fathers’ education level correlated with
participants’ Family Financial Obligation. Several factors could explain this
inconsistent finding, such as the sample characteristics, parent–child relationships,
and measurement errors. This might suggest that Asian cultures value the
patriarchal relationship, where property and title are inherited by male lineage, so
the father might be the parent that children look to more to please and to show
support (e.g., Nagata et al., 2010).
As a racial and ethnic minority group, Asian American college students have
adapted themselves into the lifestyle of mainstream American culture; thus
Fulfilling Personal Interest was associated with independent self, acculturation and
was more likely to motivate them to engage with others with diverse ethnic or
cultural backgrounds in order to enhance their social network and career
development. The dimension of Fulfilling Personal Interest may highlight a strength
of Asian Americans in shifting their traditional family-oriented worldview to
accommodate their new environment with a new perspective on individualistic
curiosity and rewards. In Study 1, parental education was associated with Fulfilling
Personal Interest, but this was not found in Study 2. The factors contributing to this
difference could be similar to those explaining different parental effects on family-
based work motivation in the two studies described above. For example, most
participants in Study 1 were Chinese Americans whereas those in Study 2 had more
diverse ethnic backgrounds.
Being Independent was influenced by the individualistic and collectivistic
cultures, so it was associated with bicultural scales in these two studies and three
work motivation scales in the second study. The underlying meaning of Being
Independent could vary by situations and personal definitions. For example,
when Being Independent is inspired by personal autonomy, the meaning of work
is defined by the individual; but when the development of Being Independent
derives from the family, the meaning of work could be interwoven with their
internalized family obligations. Being Independent may have played an
important role in facilitating Asian Americans to take responsibility for their
career as well as for reducing their family’s burden. This dimension of
motivation could serve as a motivation factor in their developmental transition
from adolescence to young adulthood. But because there is limited understand-
ing about how Asian Americans develop their work identities, the construction
of this construct and subscale could contribute to our understanding about the
123
integration of bicultural work motivation from developmental perspectives of

career development (e.g., Ward, 2008).
Implications for practice
Because family obligations and acculturation are separate domains of individuals’

lives, the change of any one domain is not certain to influence the other. If these two
types of motivations are in the different directions, practitioners may need to help
the clients explore the feelings behind the conflicts in their motivations, and discuss
the possibility of integrating them or reducing the needs of one of the motivations.
Because family backgrounds were associated with the students’ motivations to
work, practitioners could discuss with the clients how their family experiences and
backgrounds are related to their work motivation and future career planning.
Furthermore, practitioners could brainstorm with the client to develop a list of all
potential career options, with consideration for the conflicting motivations in
personal and familial systems, and then discuss the pros and cons of each
alternative. Additional information and support could be gained before the client
makes a decision. Furthermore, if the score of Being Independent is relatively high,
they might have a strong intention to develop plans for their current and future
career development. Practitioners may help clients clarify whether their motivations
were related more to their personal interests or to family obligations and the
meaning behind these motivations.
Limitations of the study
There are several limitations to this study. First, it included only four validity scales.
Additional validity scales, such as work motivations and job satisfaction from
organization research should be incorporated as part of our validity evidence.
Secondly, these two studies were conducted via an online survey, so participants
were still self-selected in terms of Internet usage and population. Although Study 2
recruited a more diverse sample, a vast majority of them were East Asian
Americans; thus, the generalization of our research findings could be limited.
Furthermore, the online survey could produce measurement errors and confounding
variables due to the variation of computer screens (Umbach, 2004). Thirdly, test–
retest reliability was not investigated, so stability of the scale could be restricted.
Lastly, this study did not investigate respondents’ particular work motivations
associated with certain important life experiences and stages, such as refugee status
and religious belief. For example, many Asian Americans could have a spiritual
belief in Islam, however, there has been little research conducted understanding how
the effects of particular spiritual beliefs or minority status have influenced people’s
work motivations. Furthermore, the work motivations identified in this study might
not be applicable to non-college student adult populations.
123
Implications for future research
Adopting a mixed method, this study captured the complexity of multidimensional

work motivations for Asian Americans and developed a better understanding of
their vocational development. In future studies, this work motivation scale can be
potentially validated through additional samples with diverse backgrounds,
including different ethnicities, together with socioeconomic status, as well as
incorporating other validity scales. Cross-cultural studies among different ethnic
groups could provide additional concurrent validity, however, this approach could
limit the opportunity to identify other culture-specific work motivations that could
be embedded in spiritual, historical, or social contexts. Therefore, researchers may
adopt a qualitative research design to develop new scales or additional subscales of
work motivations for individuals with diverse backgrounds (e.g., Cheung, van de
Vijver, & Leong, 2011). It is also important to further identify the contextual factors
such as families’ immigration experiences, parent–child relationships, parenting
styles, as well as the adult children’s personal characteristics that could contribute to
the development of these four types of work motivation in longitudinal studies, such
as self-efficacy.
Acknowledgments We extend our appreciation and gratitude to Dr. Cindy Walker and Dr. Jane Liu for
their support of the scale development in Study 1. This study was supported in part by funding from
National Tsing Hua University to the first author.
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Int J Educ Vocat Guidance (2016) 16:275–297

Bicultural Work Motivation Scale for Asian American

Yung-Lung Chen1 • Nadya A. Fouad2

Résumé. Échelle de motivation au travail biculturelle pour les étudiants

& Yung-Lung Chen

Zusammenfassung. Bikulturelle Arbeitsmotivations-Skala für asiatisch-ame-

Resumen. Escala de motivación laboral bicultural para estudiantes asiático-

Keywords Work motivation Bicultural Asian American

comprehensively address the vocational concerns of Asian Americans (e.g., Flores

Family-based work motivation

According to cross-cultural research, adolescents from Asian and Latino back-

Kerlow-Myers, 2009). Nonetheless, the complexity of bicultural experiences and

Across a variety of disciplines in psychology (e.g., vocational and industrial/

Study 1: scale construction and an exploratory factor analysis

discriminant validity, we also hypothesized that there was a small or no association

A mixed approach combining both qualitative and quantitative methods was

We collected initial validity evidence for 35 items by surveying 250 Asian

Americans (i.e., U.S. born children of immigrants), 4 (1.6 %) as third-generation

All participants were recruited online through 25 Asian American student

Acculturation and enculturation

Singelis’s (1994) self-construal scale is one of the most common measurements to

Psychometric scale properties

Exploratory factor analysis

Intercorrelations among subscales

Honoring Parents had a significant positive correlation with Family Financial

Concurrent and discriminant validity

Honoring Parents had significant positive correlations with heritage dimension of

Study 2: scale refinement and additional validity evidence

Family obligation (FO)

The Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure (MEIM)

Other-Group Orientation Scale (OGOS)

Six items were developed to measure individuals’ attitudes towards building

Psychometric scale properties

Exploratory factor analysis

Validating factor structure

Intercorrelations among subscales

Concurrent and discriminant validity

Honoring Parents had significant positive correlations with multigroup ethnic

current assistance (r = .21, p \ .001), as well as respect for family (r = .13,

Although contemporary researchers have paid significant attention to how relational

integration of bicultural work motivation from developmental perspectives of

Implications for practice

Because family obligations and acculturation are separate domains of individuals’

Limitations of the study

Implications for future research

Adopting a mixed method, this study captured the complexity of multidimensional

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