Effects of Acculturation Types on Acculturative Stress and Adjustment to South Korean Society: Focusing on Chinese Immigrants

Abstract

This study aims to empirically analyze the effects of acculturation types of Chinese immigrants who have settled in South Korea on their acculturative stress and adjustment to South Korean society. For this, 200 Chinese immigrants residing in Korea were surveyed. Of these, 12 were excluded from the survey for insincere or omitted responses, and the final 188 were surveyed. The research results are as follows: First, the effects of the types of acculturation of Chinese immigrants on their acculturative stress were analyzed. According to the results, among the subfactors of acculturation type, integration and assimilation had significant negative effects on acculturative stress, and marginalization had significant positive effects. Second, the effects of immigrants’ acculturative stress on their adjustment to South Korean society were analyzed, and it was found that their acculturative stress had significant negative effects on their adjustment to South Korean society. Third, the effects of immigrants’ acculturation types on their adjustment to South Korean society were analyzed. Among the subfactors of the acculturation types, integration and assimilation were found to have significant positive effects on adjustment to South Korean society, while marginalization had significant negative effects. Fourth, the mediating effect of acculturative stress on the relationship between the integration of Chinese immigrants and their adjustment to South Korean society was analyzed. As a result, it was found that the integration, separation, and marginalization of immigrants had significant indirect effects on their adjustment to South Korean society through acculturative stress. This study can be regarded as meaningful in that it presented the acculturation types necessary for immigrants, who are steadily increasing in South Korea in this era of globalization, to relieve the acculturative stress they feel in an unfamiliar foreign country and adjust to South Korean society.