ARE AMERICANS MORE OPTIMISTIC THAN THE CHINESE

A total of 613 subjects, including 257 White American students, 312 ma inland Chinese students and 44 Chinese American students, completed th e Attributional Style Questionnaire. It was found that (a) mainland Ch inese were more pessimistic than Chinese Americans, who were more pess imistic than White Americans, (b) mainland Chinese were less self-blam ing (i.e., attributed their failure less internally than the tradition al Chinese culture expects) and attributed their success to other peop le or circumstances, and (c) White Americans had more lopsidedness or self-serving bias than Chinese Americans and mainland Chinese-that is, White Americans attributed their success to themselves and their fail ure to others or circumstances more often than did mainland Chinese Th e authors also found that mainland Chinese optimism was associated mor e with academic and financial accomplishment, psychological confidence and persistence, and physical health.