ACCULTURATION MODE, IDENTITY VARIATION, AND PSYCHOSOCIAL ADJUSTMENT

The hypothesis that it is the variability of a person's identity-as op posed to the particular combinations of identities-that produces stres s during the acculturation process was examined. Two hundred ninety-fi ve native Anglophone students at the University of Ottawa, Ontario, Ca nada, provided demographic data and completed the following measures: the Beck Depression Inventory (Beck & Beck, 1972), Rosenberg's Self-Es teem Scale (1965), the Situated Identity Measure (Clement & Noels, 199 2), and the Psychological Stress Measure (Lemyre, Tessier, & Fillion, 1990). Results of ANOVAs contrasting level of identification and varia bility of identification indicated that an exclusively Anglophone iden tity was related to a higher level of depression, lower self-esteem, a nd a higher level of stress than the other modes of acculturation, but only when the variability in identity with the English group was high . Thus, the participants who identified strongly with the English grou p but were not committed to this identity experienced more psychologic al adjustment problems.