Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Ego-Identity Status And Life Satisfaction In Emerging Adult Third Culture Kids And Individuals With Multicultural Identities, Melody Young, Steven V. Rouse

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

We investigated life satisfaction and identity development in emerging adult (age 18-30) monocultural European American individuals, multicultural individuals, and Third Culture Kids (TCKs). TCKs are defined as individuals who lived for a significant amount of their developmental years in a country that their parents did not grow up in and that has a culture different from that of their parents’ native country. We hypothesized that in emerging adulthood TCKs and multicultural individuals experience (1) less life satisfaction and (2) different levels of identity exploration and commitment compared to monocultural European American individuals. Amazon Mechanical Turk workers were screened to qualify …