Previous research has shown that pets provide emotional benefits for human beings and thus are an indispensable part of human life. However, there is no research that particularly looks into the social support people receive during human-animal interaction in comparison with human-human interaction from a cultural psychology perspective. Previously, Asian Americans have been shown to use more implicit social support and less explicit social support than European Americans because Asian Americans have higher levels of relational concern (Kim et al., 2006). In the current study, I hypothesized that people mainly receive implicit social support from pets, and therefore, people with higher typical usage of implicit social support, lower typical usage of explicit social support, and higher level of relational concern will have less negative affect, less stress, and more positive affect after thinking of their pets versus their friends. On a group level, I hypothesized that Asian Americans (compared to European Americans) will have less negative affect, less stress, and more positive affect, after thinking of their pet versus their friend. In Study 1, we obtained results that were contradictory to our hypothesis within a sample of European and Asian/Asian American undergraduates. In Studies 2 and 3, we found partial support for our hypotheses among European American pet owners recruited from an online platform (Mturk). Future investigation is necessary to fully uncover the social support people receive from pets in comparison with human partners across cultural orientations.

Past research found a mixed relationship between age and subjective well-being. The current research advances the understanding of these findings by incorporating a cultural perspective. We tested whether the relationship between age and well-being is moderated by uncertainty avoidance (UA), a cultural dimension that deals with a society’s tolerance for ambiguity. In Study 1, using a multilevel approach with a large international database (N = 61,256), we found that older age is associated with lower well-being in countries higher in UA, but not in countries lower in UA, and this cultural variation is mediated by sense of control. In Study 2, we compared a low (United States) and high (Romania) UA culture (N=1,025) and found a consistent pattern; age is negatively associated with well-being in Romania but not the United States. This cultural difference is mediated by use of different coping strategies reflective of different levels of sense of control.