Greek-American Couples Examining Acculturation, Egalitarianism and Intimacy A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Drexel University Fay Tsiartsionis Karapanagiotis in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2008 0 Copyright 2008 Fay T. Karapanagiotis. All Rights Reserved. Table of Contents ... List of Tables .............................................................................. 111 List of Figures ............................................................................. iv ABSTRACT ...................................................................... .:... v 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................ 1 2 . LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................ 4 2.1 Theories and Models ........................................................ 4 ... 2.2 Assimilation ................................................................... 8 2.3 Mobilization ................................................................... 9 2.4 Research on Acculturation.................................................. 9 2.4.1 Measurement of Acculturation.................................. 14 2.5 Sex Role Issues ............................................................. 15 2.6 Greek-American Acculturation.. ........................................ 18 2.6.1 Greek Language................................................... 18 2.6.2 The Role of the Church ........................................... 18 2.6.3 Gender Roles ....................................................... 20 2.7 Marital Intimacy ............................................................ 23 2.7.1 Definitions and Models .......................; ................... 19 2.7.2 Couples Research ................................................ -25 2.7.3 Inter-ethnic Relationships........................................ 28 2.7.4 Greek-American Couples ........................................31 3 . RESEARCH QUESTION ....................................................36 3.1 Conceptual Definitions..................................................... 37 4 . METHODOLOGY .............................................................39 . 4.1 Participants ..................................................................39 4.2 Procedure ....................................................................40 4.3 Measurements ............................................................... 43 5 . RESULTS ........................................................................ 49 . 5.1 Univariate Statistics ........................................................ 50 ... 5.2 Scale Reliabilities .......................................................... 53 5.3 Inferential Statistics ........................................................... 55 5.3.1 ANOVAs ........................................................... 55 5.3.2 Correlations ......................................................... 62 5.3.3 Regressions ......................................................... 65 6 . DISCUSSION .................................................................. 70 .6.1 Research Questions ........................................................ 70 6.2 Factor Analysis and Reliabilities........................................ 77 6.3 Limitations ........................................................................... 78 6.4 Unanticipated Changes ............................................................ 80 6.5 Implications for Research .........................................................81 6.6 Implications for Clinical Work .................................................83 6.7 Conclusion ..........................................................................84 LIST OF REFERENCES .............................................................. 86 APPENDIX A: Overlap of Variables ............................................. 96 APPENDIX B: Church Announcement ............................................. 97 APPENDIX C: Permission Letter.................................................... 98 APPENDIX D: Consent Form ....................................................... 99 APPENDIX E: Personal Demographic Data ..................................... 102 APPENDIX F: Greek-American Acculturation Scale.......................... 103 APPENDIX G: Vancouver Index of Acculturation ............................. 107 APPENDIX H: Personal Assessment of Intimacy on Relationships.......... 108 APPENDIX I: Egalitarian Questionnaire ........................................ 110 APPENDIX J: Researcher's Instructions ........................................ 112 APPENDIX K: Debriefing .................................................................. 113 APPENDIX L: Permission to Use the VIA ......................................... 114 APPENDIX M: Vancouver Index of Acculturation .............................. 115 APPENDIX N: Scoring the PAIR ................................................... 116 APPENDIX 0: Permission to Use the PAIR ...................................... 118 APPENDIX P: Greek-American Acculturation Scale Revised .................. 119 APPENDIX Q: GAAS Scale and Subscales' Reliabilities ........................ 122 APPENDIX R: GAASR Factor Analysis .........................................124 APPENDIX S: VIAM Scale Reliabilities ..........................................125 APPENDIX T: VIAM Factor Analysis ..............................................126 APPENDIX U: PAIR and Subscales' Reliabilities ..................................127 APPENDIX V: PAIR Factor Analysis .............................................129 APPENDIX W: EQR Factor Analysis .............................................. 131 APPENDIX X: EQ, EQR and Subscales' Reliabilities............................. 132 VITA .......................................................................................134 List of Tables 1. Age of Subjects by Groups ..........................................50 2 . Gender Subjects by Groups ......................................... -50 3 . Generation of Subjects by Groups ...................................51 4 . Children of Subjects by Groups ...................................... 51 5 . Years Married of Subjects by Groups ............................... 51 6 . Household Income of Subjects by Groups .......................... 52 7 . Level of Education of Subjects by Groups .......................... 52 8. Table 3.1 .................................................................55 9 . Table 3.2 .................................................................57 10. Table 3.3 .................................................................. 57 11 . GAASR and Subscales................................................ 59 12. VIAM .................................................................. 60 13. PAIR and Subscales.................................................. -60 14. EQR and Subscales................................................... 61 15. Table 4.1 .............................................................. -62 16. Table 4.2 ................................................................ 63 17. Table 4.3 ............................................................... 63 18. Table 5.1 ............................................................... 64 19. Table 5.2. .............................................................. 65 20 . Table 5.3. .............................................................. 66 21 . Table 5.4 ............................................................... 67 List of Figures 1. Acculturation and Assimilation.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .7 2. Variables for this study.. .. .. .. .. .37 vii Abstract Greek-American Couples Examining Acculturation, Egalitarianism and Intimacy Fay T. Karapanagiotis This research study investigated several questions about Greek-American couples: 1) Is there a relationship between an individual's profile of acculturation and perceived intimacy and egalitarianism in hisker marital relationship? 2) Are there differences in perceived levels of intimacy and egalitarianism between members of mono- and inter- ethnic couples? 3) Do gender and generation affect a partner's profile of acculturation? 4) Do gender and generation affect a partner's perception of intimacy and egalitarianism in hislher marital relationship? Participants were sixty married couples from a Greek Orthodox Church in Southern New Jersey, with at least one member of each couple self identified as Greek- American. Each spouse filled out four assessment inskuments: 1) Greek acculturation was assessed by the Greek-American Acculturation Scale Revised (GAASR), 2) American acculturation was assessed by a modified version of the Vancouver Index of Acculturation (VIAM), 3) perception of intimacy was assessed by the Personal Assessment of Intimacy in Relationships (PAIR), and 4) the perception of egalitarianism was assessed by the Egalitarian Questionnaire (EQ) (a scale developed for this study). The results yielded a high correlation between intimacy and egalitarianism, indicating good concurrent validity for the EQ. Additionally, Greek participants who ... Vlll were married to Greek partners yielded statistically significant differences on scores of the GAASR indicating that participants in mono-ethnic marriages are more acculturated to Greek culture, whereas Greek subjects appeared to be more Americanized if they selected a partner outside of their ethnic group. This study found a statistical significant negative correlation between the GAASR and the