Value Change under Cultural Priming and its Impact on Subjective Wellbeing

Recent research on value change has shown that the structure of value change mirrors the circular structure of values, such that the increase in the importance of one value is accompanied by the increases in the importance of compatible values and by the decreases in the importance of conflicting values. However, little is known about how the two types of value changes take place in response to the changes of sociocultural contexts and its implications for subjective wellbeing. Among a sample of Hong Kong Chinese undergraduate students (n = 179), this research investigated how participants with different levels of dual (Chinese and Western) cultural selves changed their personal values in response to culture priming, and how the changes in values further led to changes in subjective wellbeing. The results provided support to the hypotheses and contributed to the current knowledge about value change and its impact on wellbeing.