Possible self as parent in Canadian, Italian, and Japanese young adults

We developed the Scale of Possible Selves (sps) and hypothesized that possi ble self-as-parent (pp;) items would predict favourable perceptions of infa nts, and that PPS scores would vary across gender and nations. Experiment 1 :683 Canadian undergraduates completed the sps; high and low parent possibl e-self subgroups (HPS or LPS) viewed and rated videotaped infants. The HPS group responded more quickly than the LPS group only to the parent items of the SPS, and the HPS group had significantly more favourable social percep tions of infants. Experiment 2: the PPS scores of Canadian young adults wer e compared with counterparts in Italy and Japan. Japanese participants had lower PFS scores than Canadians or Italians. The latter did not differ sign ificantly from each other. Italian women had higher PPS scores than Italian men. We suggest that the possible self-as-parent might be a useful concept for examining reproductive choices, career choices, and attitudes and reac tions to infants and children.