The moderating effects of acculturation strategies on the relationship between social support from host nationals and sociocultural adaptation

Past research on acculturation has documented the beneficial impact of social support from host nationals on the sociocultural adaptation of acculturating individuals. The current study sought to investigate whether acculturation strategies would moderate the relationship between social support from host nationals and sociocultural adaptation. Specifically, it was hypothesized that the integration and assimilation strategies would enhance the association between social support from host nationals and sociocultural adaptation, whereas the separation and marginalization strategies would reduce this association. A total of 2'2 Mainland Chinese students studying at a university in Hong Kong completed measures of sociocultural adaptation, social support from host nationals, and acculturation strategies. As predicted, the results of moderated regression analyses showed that the integration and assimilation strategies marginally significantly strengthened the effect of social support from host nationals. Conversely, the separation strategy significantly weakened the effect of social support from host nationals. Contrary to our prediction, the moderating role of the marginalization strategy was not supported. Implications of the present findings are discussed.