The present study investigated whether satisfaction and frustration of the psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence, as identified within Basic Psychological Need Theory (BPNT; Deci and Ryan, Psychol Inquiry 11:227-268, 2000; Ryan and Deci, Psychol Inquiry 11:319-338, 2000), contributes to participants' well-being and ill-being, regardless of their cultural background and interpersonal differences in need strength, as indexed by either need valuation (i.e., the stated importance of the need to the person) or need desire (i.e., the desire to get a need met). In Study 1, involving late adolescents from Belgium and China (total N = 685; Mean age = 17 years), autonomy and competence satisfaction had unique associations with well-being and individual differences in need valuation did not moderate these associations. Study 2 involved participants from four culturally diverse nations (Belgium, China, USA, and Peru; total N = 1,051; Mean age = 20 years). Results provided evidence for the measurement equivalence of an adapted scale tapping into both need satisfaction and need frustration. Satisfaction of each of the three needs was found to contribute uniquely to the prediction of well-being, whereas frustration of each of the three needs contributed uniquely to the prediction of ill-being. Consistent with Study 1, the effects of need satisfaction and need frustration were found to be equivalent across the four countries and were not moderated by individual differences in the desire for need satisfaction. These findings underscore BPNT's universality claim, which states that the satisfaction of basic needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence represent essential nutrients for optimal functioning across cultures and across individual differences in need strength

Grounded in Self-Determination Theory, the present study addressed the question whether the relation between satisfaction of the psychological needs for relatedness, competence, and autonomy and well-being would be constrained by satisfaction of the need for safety. In Study 1, we investigated environmental safety in a sample of young adults (N = 224) in South Africa, a country known for its low public safety. In Study 2, we focused on financial safety within a socio-economically deprived adult Chinese sample (N = 357). Although safety satisfaction yielded a positive relation to well-being in both studies, satisfaction of the psychological needs contributed to well-being above and beyond safety satisfaction and its contribution was not dependent upon the level of safety satisfaction. Further, across both studies, individuals high in safety satisfaction desired less psychological need satisfaction.Supplementary analyses in Study 2 indicated that whereas financial safety yielded a positive relation to well-being, materialism yielded a negative association. Together, these results point to the important role of basic psychological need satisfaction beyond safety satisfaction in the prediction of well-being.Key terms: Safety, Basic Psychological Need Satisfaction, Need Desire, Well-being, SelfDetermination Theory *AbstractSafety and Psychological Need Satisfaction 3 Does Psychological Need Satisfaction Matter when Environmental or Financial Safety is at Risk?Do human beings need certain basic psychological nutrients to be mentally healthy, just like plants need air, water, and sunshine to grow? Psychologists have intensively discussed and investigated the number and type of needs critical for human well-being (e.g., Baumeister & Leary, 1995;Maslow, 1954;McClelland, 1965;. During the last decade, the concept of psychological needs has received increasing attention, mainly due to accumulating empirical evidence for Basic Psychological Needs Theory (BPNT), one of the five mini-theories of Self-Determination Theory (SDT; Vansteenkiste, Niemiec, & Soenens, 2010). BPNT specifies three fundamental psychological needs -relatedness, competence, and autonomy -that, when satisfied, would promote wellbeing and psychological growth. Dozens of studies in a variety of life domains, cultural contexts and among diverse age groups and populations have provided evidence for this claim, suggesting that the satisfaction of these three needs is indeed essential for human growth .Nevertheless, there could be other needs that matter on top of the psychological needs articulated in SDT. For instance, some scholars have posited a need for self-esteem (e.g., Pyszczynski, Greenberg, & Solomon, 2004), a need for popularity-influence (Derber, 1979), or a need for safety or security (e.g., Kasser, 2002;Maslow, 1943). The present study focused on the interplay between SDT's psychological needs and the need for safety, which can be broadly defined as the need to feel safe from environmental threats and to perceive oneself as having sufficie...

There is ongoing debate about the universal or culture-specific role of controlling parenting in children’s and adolescents’ development. This study addressed the possibility of cultural variability in how controlling parenting practices are perceived and dealt with. Specifically, we examined Belgian (N = 341) and Chinese (N = 316) adolescents’ perceptions of and reactions towards a vignette depicting parental guilt-induction, relative to generally controlling and autonomy supportive vignettes. Whereas Belgian adolescents perceived guilt-induction to be as controlling as generally controlling parental behavior, Chinese adolescents’ perception of guilt-induction as controlling was more moderate. Belgian and Chinese adolescents also showed some similarities and differences in their responses to the feelings of need frustration following from the controlling practices, with compulsive compliance for instance being more common in Chinese adolescents. Discussion focuses on cross-cultural similarities and differences in dynamics of controlling parenting.

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In contemporary research on autonomy development, autonomy has been defined as independence (vs. dependence) or as self-endorsed (vs. controlled) functioning. Analogously, perceived parental autonomy support involves either perceived parental promotion of independence (PI) or perceived parental promotion of volitional functioning (PVF). The primary aim of the present study among Belgian and Greek adolescents (N = 658; 58% girls; M age = 16.3 years) was to examine associations between the two types of parental autonomy support, on one hand, and the two types of adolescent autonomy, on the other hand. The secondary aim was to investigate the moderating role of various background variables (i.e., gender, country of residence, and age) in these associations. As hypothesized, perceived parental PVF was related to adolescents’ self-endorsed (vs. controlled) motives. The relation between perceived parental PI and adolescent independence was qualified by an interaction with perceived parental PVF. Finally, although mean-level differences in the study constructs were found across gender, country, and adolescent age, the structural associations among constructs were invariant across these demographic groupings. These findings provide further insights in the complex dynamics involved in adolescent autonomy development in multiple national contexts.

The present study focused on the function of autonomy for individuals from a collectivistic culture, thereby differentiating between two prevailing conceptualizations of autonomy—namely, autonomy as independence and autonomy as self-endorsed functioning. Participants were 573 Chinese adolescents from both urban and rural regions. Autonomy as independence (versus dependence) was operationalized as the degree of independent decision making within the family, whereas autonomy as self-endorsed (versus controlled) functioning was operationalized in terms of the degree of self-endorsement reflected in motives underlying both independent and dependent decision making. Basic psychological need satisfaction was examined as an explanatory mechanism (i.e., mediator) of the association between autonomy and well-being. Results showed that relatively more self-endorsed motives for both independent and dependent decision making yielded a unique positive relation with psychological well-being, with psychological need satisfaction playing an intervening role in these associations. In contrast, the degree of independent decision making as such did not yield any significant relations with well-being or need satisfaction. Moreover, individual differences in collectivistic cultural orientation did not moderate any of the above associations. Discussion focuses on the distinction between the two viewpoints of autonomy and their meaning for Chinese adolescents.

Research increasingly demonstrates that associations between autonomy-relevant parenting and adolescent adjustment generalize across cultures. Yet, there is still an ongoing debate about the role of culture in these effects of autonomy-relevant parenting. The current study aimed to contribute to a more nuanced perspective on this debate by addressing cultural variability in micro-processes involved in autonomy-relevant parenting and, more specifically, in adolescents’ appraisals of and responses to parental behavior. In this vignette-based experimental study, involving 137 South-Korean adolescents (54% female, mean age = 16 years), we examined whether individual differences in vertical collectivism affect the association between descriptions of potentially autonomy-supportive and controlling parenting practices and (a) appraisals of these practices (in terms of perceived autonomy support and control and experiences of autonomy need satisfaction and frustration), and (b) anticipated responses to these practices (i.e., negotiation, submissive compliance, and oppositional defiance). Participants in the autonomy-supportive condition reported more perceived autonomy support and autonomy satisfaction and lower perceived control and autonomy need frustration than participants in the controlling condition. Collectivism moderated between-vignette effects on perceived control and autonomy need frustration such that the differences between the autonomy-supportive and controlling vignettes were less pronounced (yet still significant) among adolescents scoring higher on collectivism. Collectivism did not moderate effects of the vignettes on the responses to parenting, but yielded a main effect, with collectivism relating to more submissive compliance and less oppositional defiance. Overall, the results suggest that both universal and culture-specific processes are involved in autonomy-relevant socialization.

Chinese parents have been found to use more psychological control toward their children than Western parents. The present study examined whether Chinese, relative to Belgian, parents' experiences of social pressure to be an achievement-promoting parent and their own unfulfilled dreams could account for this country-level difference in psychologically controlling parenting. In turn, the association of social pressure and unfulfilled dreams with parental psychological control was expected to be accounted for (i.e., mediated) by child-invested contingent selfesteem. In a cross-cultural sample consisting of 412 Chinese (209 mothers and 203 fathers) and 418 Belgian (209 mothers and 209 fathers) parents of 14-year-old adolescents, we found that social pressure and unfulfilled dreams were related positively to child-invested contingent self-esteem which, in turn, was related to psychologically controlling parenting. Moreover, the hypothesized between-country differences in psychologically controlling parenting and childinvested contingent self-esteem were largely explained by between-country differences in parents' experiences of social pressure and unfulfilled dreams. Findings are discussed in light of the influence of the broader society on parents' self-worth and parenting practices.