Gain face, but lose happiness? It depends on how much money you have

Gain face, but lose happiness? It depends on how much moneyyou haveajsp_ 112..125

Xin-an Zhang,1 Peng Tian1 and Nicholas Grigoriou2

1School of Management, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China, and 2Monash College, Guangzhou, China

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of face consciousness on happiness and the moderatingrole of financial situation on this relationship. We first examined our hypotheses in study 1 in a particular settingof consumption, and replicated our findings in study 2 in a more generalized setting of interpersonal situations.The two studies produced essentially consistent results. We found individuals high on face consciousness tend tobe less happy, and the negative association between face consciousness and happiness is ameliorated by theirfinancial situation. These results revealed the importance of face consciousness as an individual difference inpredicting happiness. The implications of these findings for future research are discussed.

Key words: face consciousness, financial situation, happiness, subjective well-being.

Introduction

People in every society have the desire for a favourablesocial image. This social motive is defined by the conceptof ‘face’ in Confucian society, which plays a critical role ininterpersonal interaction. The Chinese writer Lin Yu-Tangdescribed the role of face in Chinese society as ‘the mostdelicate standard by which Chinese social intercourse isregulated’ (Hu, 1944, p. 867). An old Chinese saying simi-larly describes the importance of face by stating: ‘a manneeds his face, just like a tree needs its bark’. While indi-viduals who gain enough face are usually seen as success-ful, those who fail to maintain a minimal level of face mightexperience serious consequences, which could even lead tosuicide (Ho, 1976). The pursuit of face is often the core ofmany Chinese people’s life (Bond & Lee, 1981; Ho; Hu;Hwang, 1987).

Given the fact that face is one of the most important lifegoals for Chinese people, it naturally raises the question ofwhether the pursuit of face obstructs or facilitates theirpursuit of happiness, since prior research has consistentlydemonstrated that happiness, or subjective well-being(SWB), is related to what people pursue in their life(Emmons, 1986; Headey, 2008; Kasser & Ryan, 1996;Schmuck, Kasser, & Ryan, 2000; Sheldon, Ryan, Deci, &Kasser, 2004). It has been indicated that certain kinds of lifegoals, such as commitment to family and friends, and socialor political involvement, can promote happiness, while someother life goal, such as material gains, are detrimental tohappiness (Headey, 2008). In the present study, we

conceptualize face consciousness as an individual-difference variable that refers to the extent to which anindividual values face and takes it as an important life goal topursue, that is, individuals with strong face consciousnessare more likely to be motivated to enhance, to maintain, or toavoid losing face in relation to significant others in theirsocial life (Bao, Zhou, & Su, 2003; Chan, Wan, & Sin, 2007,2009). Based on this conceptualization, we examine theassociation between face consciousness and happiness. Wefurther propose that this association could depend on indi-viduals’ financial situations, such that possessing enoughmoney allows individuals with high level of face conscious-ness to become happier, since money is an all-purpose socialresource that can be used in exchange for face. Two separateinvestigations – one, in particular, in consumption setting,and the other, in general, in interpersonal situations – wereconducted to examine these hypotheses.

The study makes several important theoretical contribu-tions to the literature (Colquitt & Zapata-Phelan, 2007). Toour knowledge, this is the first study in the field of psychol-ogy to examine happiness from the perspective of face asone of the most popular concepts in Asian Confuciansociety. The results contribute not only to research thatlinks individual-difference variables and SWB (DeNeve &Cooper, 1998; Diener, Oishi, & Lucas, 2003), but also tothe emerging research field of indigenous psychology(Kim, Yang, & Hwang, 2006), since face is the key toexplaining much of the complexity of social interactions inAsian societies (Kim & Nam, 1998). By examining thejoint effects of face consciousness and financial situation onboth cognitive and emotional components of happiness, thestudy suggests that for individuals with high levels of aspi-rations to gain or maintain their face, money, or financialthings would be used as a more powerful resource inexchange for happiness.

Correspondence: Xin-an Zhang, School of Management, Shang-hai Jiao Tong University, 535 Fa Hua Zhen Road, Shanghai200052, China. Email: [email protected] 22 April 2009; accepted 30 April 2010.

Asian Journal of Social Psychology

© 2010 The AuthorsAsian Journal of Social Psychology © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Asia Pty Ltd with the Asian Association of Social Psychology andthe Japanese Group Dynamics Association

Asian Journal of Social Psychology (2011), 14, 112–125 DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-839X.2010.01336.x

Face and happiness

Face is an indigenous concept deeply rooted in theChinese Confucian culture and predominates in regulatinginterpersonal behaviour in the East Asia (Hwang, 1987,2000; Leung & Chan, 2003). Researchers have long rec-ognized the importance of face in understanding EastAsian social culture. Extant literature has observed facefrom a number of different perspectives, including faceand ‘guanxi’ (Park & Luo, 2001), face as a source of busi-ness advantage in China (Tsang, 1993), face as a negotia-tion tool (Brunner, Chen, Sun, & Zhou, 1990), and face asa means of conflict resolution (Tardif, 1998; Tjosvold,Hui, & Sun, 2004).

There are two distinct types of meanings for the word‘face’ in the Chinese language (Hu, 1944). The socialmeaning of face [‘mian’ ( )] refers to a function of one’ssocial standing for the prestige and honour that accrues fora person as the result of success and possibly ostentatiousbehaviour before others (Bond & Lee, 1981), whereas themoral meaning of face, ‘lian’ ( ) represents the confidenceof society in the integrity of the ego’s ‘moral character’(Hu, p. 45). Following a review of empirical studies onsocial incidents that induce a feeling of gaining or losingface, Hwang (2006) concluded that the moral aspect of faceis, in general, much more basic and necessary for mostpeople with Confucian values.

The universality of face was argued by Goffman (1956)as being based on the need to avoid, what he terms, ‘flus-tering’ in social interactions. To keep social interactionsrunning smoothly and effectively, people involved in inter-actions are required to convey minimally-acceptable publicimages of themselves, and likewise, assist other people inmaintaining their social identities as well. At the conceptuallevel, the Western counterpart of face, either described as‘an image of self delineated in terms of approved socialattributes’ (Goffman, 1955, p. 213), or as ‘a claimed senseof favourable social self-worth that a person wants others tohave of her or him’ (Ting-Toomey & Kurogi, 1998, p. 187),is more close to the social aspect of the Chinese concept offace.

Although there might be considerable variation amongthe conceptualization of what constitutes face and the rulesgoverning face behaviour, people’s concern for face isinvariant (Bond & Hwang, 1986; Goffman, 1959; Ho,1976). People in all societies might have experienced thefeeling of gaining or losing face because of positive ornegative social evaluations, and they have to show a regardto face if they do not want to declare their social bankruptcy(Ting-Toomey, 1988; Ting-Toomey & Kurogi, 1998). Thus,face consciousness reflects the desire that people want toenhance, maintain, or protect their face as to present them-selves in a favourable way in social encounters (Bao et al.,2003; Chan et al., 2007, 2009).

Face and happiness

We propose that the pursuit of face could result in loss ofhappiness because individuals high on face consciousnesshave an excessive concern with the impression they makeon others (Chan et al., 2009; Ho, 1976; Joy, 2001; Kim &Nam, 1998), which is typically accompanied by a low levelof psychological well-being (Christopher & Schlenker,2004; Emmons, 1991; Kasser & Kasser, 2001; Kasser &Ryan, 1996; Kim, Kasser, & Lee, 2003). The negative rela-tionship between concern with impressing others and hap-piness has been reliably demonstrated across variousoperationalizations of happiness (Leary, 1995; Schlenker &Leary, 1982). For instance, one might experience socialanxiety when one desires to make a particular impressionon others, but at the same time, doubt if he/she can suc-cessfully do so (Schlenker & Leary, 1982). In addition,when one believes that he/she has been perceived in unde-sirable ways by others, he/she might experience decreasedself-esteem and increased depression (Leary). The negativeassociation between an excessive concern over one’s imageand happiness has been particularly evidenced when theimage concern induces materialistic thoughts at the sametime, because this concern could distract people from othermeaningful activities of life and overly concentrate theirattention on gaining or protecting their face throughshowing off possessions or buying luxury goods (Christo-pher & Schlenker; Srivastava, Locke, & Bartol, 2001).

Another reason that individuals high on face conscious-ness might be at the risk of suffering a low level of happi-ness is because they often have a strong desire to avoidpotentially negative evaluations that could result in loss offace, thus they are more likely to place themselves underthe stress of living up to social expectations or requirements(Ho, 1976; Ting-Toomey, 1988; Ting-Toomey & Kurogi,1998). For example, Schlenker and Weigold (1990)reported that a fear of negative evaluation is negativelyassociated with self-esteem and is positively associatedwith social anxiety and shyness. Similarly, Mak and Chen(2006) found that face-protecting behaviour, as assessed byZane and Yeh’s (2002) Loss of Face Questionnaire, is asignificant predictor of psychological distress for ChineseAmericans. Taking together the earlier-mentioned discus-sions, the following hypothesis is proposed.Hypothesis 1: Face consciousness is negatively related to

SWB.

Interactive effect of face consciousnessand financial situation on happiness

To fully investigate the effect of face consciousness onhappiness, we further propose that an interaction of faceconsciousness and financial situation exists in predictinghappiness. In particular, we propose that financial situation,

Face, money, and happiness 113

© 2010 The AuthorsAsian Journal of Social Psychology © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Asia Pty Ltd with the Asian Association of Social Psychology and

the Japanese Group Dynamics Association

which refers to how much money an individual can use todeal with various life requirements, will mitigate the rela-tionship between face consciousness and happiness, suchthat, for individuals who are becoming financially better off,the negative effect of face consciousness on happiness mightbe reduced to a less extent or even in an inverse direction.

Financial situation is relevant to the effect of face con-sciousness on happiness because it is a critical resource thatcan be used in satisfying individuals’ face desire (Ho, 1976;Richins, 1994; Wong & Ahuvia, 1998; Zhou, Vohs, &Baumeister, 2009). The exchange of financial matters forface or similar things, like social status, can be seen fromconsumer-learning literature. For instance, Belk, Bahn, andMayer (1982) found individuals learn most consumptiondecoding skills during their time at grade school, and afterthat, they perceive the acquisition of some kinds of prod-ucts or brands of goods as instrument to successful socialrole enactment; that means that one might be judged byothers, and judge others, through consumption that dependsprimarily on their own financial situation. Further, researchon the effect of wealth on the impression formation processhas consistently revealed that individuals with better finan-cial situations are perceived more positively in certainsituations (Christopher & Jones, 2004; Christopher &Schlenker, 2000; Dittmar, 1992; Dittmar & Pepper, 1994).For example, affluent individuals are usually seen as havingmore personal ability, more sophisticated qualities, and amore desirable lifestyle than non-affluent ones (Christopher& Schlenker), no matter whether they acquire wealththrough external means (e.g. inheritance) or internal means(e.g. entrepreneurial success) (Christopher et al., 2005b).

It has also been suggested that financial situation repre-sents a primary resource through which individuals canclaim face before others, since face can be described inquantitative terms. To increase one’s face, an individual hasto demonstrate social performance beyond others’ expecta-tions about him/her. To avoid losing face, an individual alsohas to maintain his/her social performance above a levelconsidered acceptable (Ho, 1976). Given the exchangeabil-ity of financial situation to face in social activities, we caninfer that managing one’s face becomes a less difficult jobfor rich individuals, whereas a more difficult job for indi-viduals who are in financial hardship. For example, beingrich can prevent individuals from difficult life circum-stances, such as being not able to meet day-to-day basicneeds, and then help them avoid losing face (Adler &Snibbe, 2003). Further, one can also gain face by spendingmoney on luxury goods to present a wealthy appearancebefore others (Wong & Ahuvia, 1998).

If financial situation influences one’s capability tomanage his or her face, the desire for face should be easierto satisfy for rich individuals than for poor individuals.Thus, we can expect rich individuals will derive a higherlevel of happiness from the satisfaction of their face desire

than poor individuals will, since perceived desire satisfac-tion contributes to happiness (Crawford Solberg, Diener,Wirtz, Lucas, & Oishi, 2002; Plagnol & Easterlin, 2008). Inaddition to this intrapersonal process, a parallel interper-sonal process that makes rich individuals feel happier canbe expected. That is, in today’s materialistic world, beingrich is usually seen by other people as an important indi-cator of personal success (Richins, 1994; Richins &Dawson, 1992), and the social evaluation for rich individu-als is often more desirable than that for poor individuals(Christopher & Jones, 2004; Christopher & Schlenker,2000; Dittmar, 1992; Dittmar & Pepper, 1994). The dis-crepancy in feedback about rich and poor individuals’social performance might result in rich individuals feelingbetter about themselves, thus making rich individualshappier than their poor counterparts.

The theoretical argument for the interactive effect of faceand financial situation can also be based on the value-as-a-moderator theory regarding the interacting effects of valuepriorities with resources or activities in predicting happi-ness (Oishi, Diener, Suh, & Lucas, 1999). The value-as-a-moderator theory proposes that people gain a sense ofhappiness out of specific life outcomes or resources con-gruent with their values. For example, individuals with highpower-orientation values should gain more happiness out ofpower-related activities, such as making a lot of money orachieving high status than those with low power-orientationvalues. In support of value-as-a-moderator theory, Oishiet al. (1999) found higher correlations between value-congruent domain satisfaction and global life satisfactionthan those between value-incongruent domain satisfactionand global life satisfaction. Recently, Malka and Chatman(2003) also found a significant interaction of extrinsic workorientations and annual income in predicting happiness.

Face consciousness reflects the priority of face in anindividual’s value structure. In line with the value-as-a-moderator theory, resources or activities being able to helpindividuals gain face or prevent them from losing faceshould have more meaning and importance for individualshigh on face consciousness in determining their happiness.Stated alternatively, a person’s face consciousness mightinteract with some congruent resources and contribute anadditional amount of happiness beyond those brought bythese resources and face consciousness themselves. Giventhe particular relevance of financial situation in successfullymanaging one’s face, it is natural to infer that financialsituation matters more for people high on face consciousnessthan for those low on face consciousness. From this perspec-tive, it is suggested that individuals high on face conscious-ness will derive more happiness from their own financialresources than individuals low on face consciousness. Inother words, a positive interaction can be expected betweenindividuals’ financial situations and face consciousness,which will ameliorate the negative effect brought by face

114 Xin-an Zhang et al.


consciousness on happiness. Taking together the earlier-mentioned discussions, we therefore posit:Hypothesis 2: The negative correlation between face con-

sciousness and happiness is weaker amongindividuals who are relatively rich thanamong those who are relatively poor.

Methods

Empirical design

As our discussion mentioned earlier indicates, we suggestthat face consciousness is negatively associated with hap-piness, and this negative relationship is moderated by indi-viduals’ financial situations. To test these hypotheses, weconducted two empirical investigations. In study 1, weexamined the effect of financial situation on the relation-ship between face consciousness and happiness by usingBao et al.’s (2003) scale of face consciousness, which wasdesigned for use in the particular setting of consumption. Instudy 2, we replicated study 1 and extrapolated our findingsto a more generalized level by adopting Cheung et al.’s(1996) scale of measurement, which was designed for usein interpersonal situations.

We chose to examine our hypotheses first in the consump-tion setting, because face is particularly relevant to con-sumption. Individuals usually regard consumption more as achance to deliver a favourable social image than an activityin its own right, if they have strong desire to manage theirface (Tse, 1996; Yau, 1988). For example, Li and Su (2007)found that due to heavy influence of face, Chinese individu-als usually mimic consumption of his/her social groups andhave to buy name brands or high-price products. Bao et al.(2003) reported similar results by examining the influence offace consciousness on individuals’ decision-making styles.They found that face consciousness positively affectsindividuals’ ‘brand-conscious and price-equals-quality’ ori-entation and negatively affects ‘price-consciousness andvalue-for-money’ orientation, reflecting the fact that indi-viduals high on face consciousness tend to pay more forbrands that friends approve of. More recently, Liao andWang (2009) indicated that face consciousness is distinctfrom materialism and serves as a mediator in the relationshipbetween materialism and brand consciousness. Takentogether, these studies suggest that for individuals with highlevels of concern for their face, consumption and posses-sions is an often-used means through which they canimprove, maintain, or protect their face.

It must be noted that although consumption is of particu-lar relevance to face, our findings are not limited to theconsumption setting as indicated in study 1, since in theseearlier theoretical sections, we have argued our hypothesesin a more generalized sense; in study 2, we have lent further

support to these hypotheses using an alternative measure-ment with higher generalizability.

Study 1

Methods

Participants

The participants in the first study consisted of 319 under-graduate students from a major university in east China.The use of students as participants is very common in SWBresearch (Christopher & Schlenker, 2004; Diener & Oishi,2000; Kashdan & Breen, 2007; Robak, Chiffriller, &Zappone, 2007). The respondents majored in a range ofdisciplines, including management, economics, physics,mathematics, and engineering. One hundred and seventyfive (55%) were male; the other 145 students (45%) werefemale. Ages ranged from 18 to 29 years, with an averageof 20.9 years (SD = 1.5).

Measures

Happiness. We followed Diener’s (1994) framework inmeasuring happiness, or SWB, in which happiness is con-ceptualized as consisting of one cognitive component oflife satisfaction, as well as two emotional componentsregarding the presence of positive affects and the lack ofnegative affects. We measured the cognitive life satisfactionby the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS; Diener,Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985). The SWLS consists offive items (e.g. ‘In most ways, my life is close to my ideal’),which were rated on a seven-point Likert scale, rangingfrom 1 (‘strongly disagree’) to 7 (‘strongly agree’). The twoemotional components of SWB were assessed with thePositive Affect and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS;Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988). The PANAS consists of10 positive emotion adjectives and 10 negative emotionadjectives. Participants were asked to indicate how oftenthey had experienced each of the 20 emotions during thecurrent academic year using a five-point scale, rangingfrom 1 (‘very slightly or not’) to 5 (extremely). The con-sistency reliability for SWLS was 0.92, 0.91for the positiveaffect subscale, and 0.84 for the negative affect subscale.

Face consciousness. We measured face consciousnesswith four items developed by Bao et al. (2003) for con-sumption research. This scale was originally developed andexamined using university students, which was identical tothe setting of the present study. The scale items included: ‘Itis important that others like the products and brands I buy’,‘Sometimes I buy a product because my friends do so’,‘Name-brand purchase is a good way to distinguish peoplefrom others’, and ‘Name products and brands purchasescan bring me a sense of prestige’. All items were rated on a




seven-point Likert scale. The consistency reliability of thescale was 0.71. The results of the confirmatory factor analy-sis (CFA) confirmed the single-factor solution of the scalewith an acceptable fit level (c2 = 7.72, d.f. = 2, root meansquare error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.09, compara-tive fit index (CFI) = 0.98, non-normed fit index(NNFI) = 0.95).

Financial situation. We calculated the real amount of dis-posable money that each participant had as the measure offinancial situation. Participants were asked to report theirannual income according to four categories: money fromfamily, money from internship, money from the university(e.g. scholarship), and money from other sources. The sumof the four categories, minus the tuition for the currentacademic year, was calculated as the disposable income oractual money that the participants owned, which rangedfrom 800 to 40 000 RMB (~$100–$5000). The average was6581.50 RMB (~$820, SD = 3603.78). Considering someextreme high values would make the distribution of incomemoderately positively skewed, we further calculated the10-based log value of disposal money in the followinganalyses to prevent the potentially large impact that theymight have had on the results (Hodson, 1985; Malka &Chatman, 2003).

Control variables. Diener et al. (2003) suggested thatshared variance with some broad personality dimensionsshould be controlled when examining whether a narrowertrait uniquely predicts SWB. In the present study, two suchbroad personality traits, that is, extraversion and neuroti-cism, were controlled, since these two dimensions provideprimary links between personality and SWB (DeNeve &Cooper, 1998; Diener et al.). We measured these two per-sonality dimensions by using Goldberg’s (1999) Interna-tional Personality Items Pool (IPIP) scale, with 10 items foreach dimension. Items were responded to on a five-pointLikert scale. The consistency reliability for extraversionwas 0.90, and 0.92 for neuroticism.

Procedure. The scales used in the present study – the faceconsciousness scale, the SWLS, the PANAS scale, and thetwo controlled dimensions of the IPIP scale – were origi-nally developed in English. They were translated and back-translated following the procedure recommended by Brislin(1970). Specifically, the first author translated the items intoChinese, and the translated version was back-translated toEnglish by a bilingual colleague. Discrepancies in thetranslation were carefully inspected and corrected to ensuretranslation equivalence of all the items.

The survey was administrated to students during sched-uled class time at the end of the 2005–2006 academic year.Questionnaires were distributed by either the first author orby the instructors of the participating courses, and it typi-

cally took students approximately 10 min to complete thequestionnaires. No information about the study was pro-vided prior to the questionnaire session.

Results

We used Harman’s single-factor test to test for common-method variance. The factor analysis produced neither ageneral factor nor a single factor that accounted for themajority of variance, thus failed to identify common-methodvariance as a problem. Then, zero-order correlations werecomputed to determine whether face consciousness wasnegatively related to happiness. As shown in Table 1, theonly indicator of happiness that did not correlate signifi-cantly with face consciousness was positive affect(r = -0.06, not significant). Face consciousness was posi-tively related to negative affect (r = 0.21, p < 0.01), whereasnegatively related to life satisfaction (r = -0.16, p < 0.01).These results suggested that individuals high on face con-sciousness tend to be less happy in general.

We further examined whether the negative effects of faceconsciousness on various happiness indicators were due toits shared variance with the two broad personality traits ofextraversion and neuroticism. We used partial correlationanalysis in the present study, as it yields the same findingsas hierarchical multiple regression, where certain variablesare controlled when entering a new one to predict a crite-rion (Pedhazur, 1997). The results indicated that the corre-lations between face consciousness and various happinessindicators remain significant after controlling for the vari-ance attributable to extraversion and neuroticism. Thepartial correlation of face consciousness with life satisfac-tion was -0.12 (p < 0.05), with 0.16 negative affect(p < 0.01). These results suggested that face consciousnesshas unique effects on happiness that are not accounted forby other broad personality traits.

To test the moderator role of financial situation in therelationship between face consciousness and various indi-cators of happiness, we used hierarchical regression analy-ses, with all variables entered in three steps (Baron &Kenny, 1986; Cohen, Cohen, West, & Aiken, 2003). Step 1included four control variables consisting of sex, age, extra-version, and neuroticism. Step 2 included two main effectvariables of financial situation and face consciousness. Instep 3, we entered the interaction term of financial situationwith face consciousness. In accordance with Cohen et al.(2003), we centred the two main effect variables beforecomputation of the interaction term to facilitate plotting ofthe interactive effects (Echambadi & Hess, 2007). Wefurther tested for multicollinearity between main effectvariables and the interaction term by examining the vari-ance inflation factor (VIF) values, and found all of themwere below the cut-off criterion of 5 (Studenmund, 2000),thus the results were not affected by multicollinearity.



As seen in Table 2, the four control variables included instep 1 accounted for a significant portion of variance inpredicting all happiness indicators (DR2 = 0.14 for life sat-isfaction, 0.18 for positive affects, and 0.14 for negativeaffects; p < 0.01 for all), indicating that extraversion andneuroticism are two strong predictors of SWB, as shown inprevious research. After controlling for the effect of extra-version and neuroticism, adding face consciousness andfinancial situation in step 2 yielded a significant incrementin variance for all happiness indicators, except positiveaffect (DR2 = 0.03, p < 0.01 for life satisfaction; DR2 = 0.03,p < 0.01 for negative affect). Further, a significant portionof the incremental variance in step 2 was due to face con-sciousness (b = 0.14, p < 0.01 for negative affect). Theseresults were consistent with previous correlation analyses,strengthening our argument that the effects of face con-sciousness on happiness are unique and not due to otherbroad personality traits related to both of them.

Testing the moderator role of financial situation, weadded the interaction term of face consciousness withfinancial situation in step 3. Although adding this interac-tion term did not yield a significant increment in variance inpredicting positive affect, it was significant in predictinglife satisfaction (DR2 = 0.01, p < 0.10) and negative affect(DR2 = 0.01, p < 0.05). The DR2 produced by the interactionterms were within the typical range for moderator effects innon-experimental studies (Champoux & Peters, 1987), andas predicted, we observed a positive interaction for lifesatisfaction (b = 0.10, p < 0.10), although a negative inter-action for negative affect (b = -0.11, p < 0.05).

Following Cohen et al.’s (2003) procedures, we alsocomputed two standardized regression slopes and their sig-nificance for individuals with high (+1 SD) and low (-1 SD)levels of financial situations, and plotted these slopes foreach happiness indicator. Figure 1 illustrates a strong andnegative relationship between face consciousness and lifesatisfaction for people with bad financial situations(b = -0.39, p < 0.01). However, for people with good finan-cial situations, there was little relationship between them(b = -0.03, not significant). Conversely, Figure 2 illustratesa strong and positive relationship between face conscious-ness and negative affect for people with bad financialsituations (b = 0.24, p < 0.01), and a non-significant rela-tionship between them for people with good financial situ-ation (b = 0.05, not significant). These Figures furthersupport the moderator role of financial situation on thenegative association between face consciousness and hap-piness by illustrating the nature and form of the interactionof face consciousness and financial situation.

Discussion

We found strong evidence for our hypotheses in the con-sumption setting in the present study. Face consciousnessT

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was negatively related to life satisfaction, whereas posi-tively related to negative affect. Further, the effect of faceconsciousness on happiness should be unique, since wecontrolled for the potentially shared variance betweenface consciousness and two broad personality traits in the

analyses. Moreover, we observed a positive interaction offace consciousness with financial situation in predicting lifesatisfaction, whereas a negative interaction in predictingnegative affect, suggesting the negative effect of faceconsciousness on happiness might be mitigated by beingfinancially better off.

However, we found no support for the expected interac-tive effect of financial situation with face consciousness inpredicting positive affect. This suggested that no matterwhether an individual has enough disposal money, thenegative influence of face consciousness on positive affectremains the same.

A major limitation of the present study comes from theitems we used to measure face consciousness. The fouritems of Bao et al.’s (2003) scale are primarily focused onconsumption, thus might not be able to fully capture themeaning of this sophisticated construct. Another limitationof this study is the use of student sample. Although studentsamples have been widely used in happiness studies, thestudent sample used in the present study still represents athreat to the generalizability of our findings. To addressthese two limitations, we conducted a second study using amore generalized measurement of face consciousness,together with an adult sample, to provide a constructivereplication of these findings.

Study 2

Methods

Participants

Participants in the current study were 65 men and 59women (n = 124). Among them, 59.7% were married and

Table 2 Results of regression analyses testing the interacting effects of face consciousness with financial situation(study 1)

b

Life satisfaction Positive affect Negative affect

Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 1 Step 2 Step 3

Control variablesSex -0.03 -0.02 -0.01 0.18** 0.17** 0.17** -0.03 -0.04 -0.05Age 0.02 0.01 0.02 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.06 0.06 0.06Extraversion 0.17** 0.17** 0.17** 0.32** 0.33** 0.33** -0.10*** -0.10*** -0.10***Neuroticism -0.29** -0.26** -0.25** -0.17** -0.17** -0.17** 0.33** 0.30** 0.29**

Main variablesFace consciousness -0.08 -0.09 -0.02 -0.02 0.14** 0.15**Financial situation 0.13* 0.14** -0.04 -0.05 -0.07 -0.08

Interaction termX*Z 0.10*** -0.05 -0.11*DR2 0.14 0.03 0.01 0.18 0.00 0.00 0.14 0.03 0.01DF 13.15** 4.88** 3.41*** 17.56** 0.38 0.95 13.17** 5.02** 4.43*df1, df2 4313 2311 1310 4313 2311 1310 4313 2311 1310

N = 319. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.10.

3.70

3.90

4.10

4.30

4.50

4.70

Face consciousness

Lif

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hgiHwoL

Good financial situation

Bad financial situation

Figure 1 Life satisfaction as a function of face con-sciousness and financial situation (study 1).

1.99

2.06

2.13

2.20

2.27

2.34

2.41

2.48

Face consciousness

Neg

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Figure 2 Negative affect as a function of face con-sciousness and financial situation (study 1).



40.3% were single. In terms of age, 0.8% of the participantswere below the age of 20, 25.8% were 21–30, 46.8% were31–40, 25% were 41–50, and 1.6% were older than51 years. In terms of educational level, 48.4% of the par-ticipants had a university or higher degree, 46% graduatedfrom junior universities or technical secondary schools, and5.6% graduated from high school.

Measures

Happiness. We used the same instruments as used instudy 1 to measure happiness, including the five-itemSWLS scale (a = 0.88), and the 20-item PANAS scale(a = 0.92 for positive affect, and a = 0.91 for negativeaffect). Participants responded to the SWLS on a five-point Likert-type scale, with 1 representing ‘strongly dis-agree’ and 5 representing ‘strongly agree’, whereas whenanswering the PANAS items, respondents followed a five-point scale ranging from 1 (‘very slightly or not’) to 5(‘extremely’).

Face consciousness. We measured face consciousness bythe 11-item face scale adopted from the Chinese Personal-ity Assessment Inventory (CPAI). This scale was developedin a more generalized setting beyond consumption, andaimed to cover Chinese people’s concern for maintainingface and social behaviours that enhance face and avoidlosing face in their social life (Cheung et al., 1996). Asample item from this scale is: ‘I am usually very particularabout the way I dress because I do not want others to lookdown on me’. Participants were asked to rate on a true–falsescale, with the higher score indicated higher face con-sciousness. The consistency reliability of the scale was 0.67after deleting the two most irrelevant items. The CFAresults for a single-factor solution were marginally accept-able (c2 = 227.57, d.f. = 44, RMSEA = 0.11, CFI = 0.89,NNFI = 0.88).

Financial situation. Participants rated their current finan-cial situations subjectively via the following five dimen-sions: (i) the degree to which they felt they have less ormore money than they need [range = 1 (‘much less than’) to5 (‘much more than’)]; (ii) the scores they felt they couldget in terms of money they had, if the poorest person aroundthem got a score of 0, and the richest person got 100; (iii)the degree to which they felt their families were better offthan average [range = 1 (‘much worse than average’) to 5(‘much better than average’)]; (iv) the degree to which theyfelt pressure in terms of financial issues [range = 1 (‘veryheavy’) to 5 (‘little’)]; and (v) the degree to which they feltthey were better off financially than most others [range = 1(‘much worse than average’) to 5 (‘much better thanaverage’)]. The final score of perceived financial situationwas calculated by averaging all the z scores of the five

items. The consistency reliability of the scale was 0.83, andthe results of the CFA supported the single-factor structure(c2 = 11.50, d.f. = 5, RMSEA = 0.10, CFI = 0.98,NNFI = 0.97).

Control variables. In the present study, we controlled indi-viduals’ material values, since it might be related to bothface consciousness and happiness (Christopher, Morgan,Marek, Keller, & Drummond, 2005a; Richins & Dawson,1992). The six-item, short-version scale of materialism wasadopted (Richins, 2004), and its consistency reliabilitywas 0.82 in this study. Besides materialism, we also con-trolled for the influence of major demographic variables,including sex, age, educational level, and marital status inthe analyses.

Procedure

We asked 12 personal acquaintances to distribute question-naires to their family members, friends, colleagues, orneighbours. All respondents were indigenous Chinesepeople with a full-time job who participated in this surveywithout receiving any compensation. They were asked tocomplete the survey individually. Anonymity was assured,and the completed questionnaires were returned via mail tothe first author.

Results

A similar Harman’s single-factor test was performed toexamine whether common-method variance was present.Neither a single factor nor a general factor was identifiedthat accounted for the majority of variances. After that, weran the same analyses for study 2 as in study 1. The means,standard deviations, and correlations among all variablesexamined in this study are presented in Table 3.

The hierarchical regression results, as shown inTable 4, provided evidence for the negative associationbetween face consciousness and happiness. In step 2, faceconsciousness remained significant in predicting life sat-isfaction (b = -0.14, p < 0.10), and positive affect(b = -0.18, p < 0.10), after the influence of demographicvariety, materialism, and perceived financial situationwere partialled out. These results again supported ourhypothesis that face consciousness is negatively related tohappiness.

Consistent with study 1, the moderation effect of finan-cial situation on the relationship between face conscious-ness and happiness was demonstrated in step 3. Theaddition of the face consciousness ¥ financial situationinteraction term explained an additional 6% of the variancein the regression of life satisfaction score (p < 0.01), andalso 6% of the variance in the negative affect score(p < 0.01). As expected, we observed a positive interaction




for life satisfaction (b = 0.27, p < 0.01), whereas a negativeinteraction for negative affect (b = -0.26, p < 0.01). TheVIF values in the regression suggested that these resultswere not affected by multicollinearity.

We further computed the standardized regression slopesand their significance on high (+1 SD) and low (-1 SD)levels of financial situation. We plotted these slops andfound that they were quite similar to those in study 1. Thegraphical depiction of the interaction shown in Figure 3indicated that face consciousness had a strong and negativeeffect on the life satisfaction score (b = -0.15, p < 0.01) forindividuals who subjectively perceived themselves as poor,whereas it had a non-significant effect for individuals who

Table 3 Means, standard deviations, and zero-order correlations between all variables examined in study 2

M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

1. Life satisfaction 2.74 0.91 (0.88)2. Positive affect 3.06 0.86 0.40** (0.92)3. Negative affect 2.47 0.85 -0.24** -0.01 (0.91)4. Face consciousness 5.77 2.47 -0.13 -0.13 0.16 (0.67)5. Financial situation 2.50 0.76 0.55** 0.25** -0.07 -0.05 (0.83)6. Materialism 2.97 0.90 -0.18* -0.05 0.28** 0.37** -0.17 (0.82)7. Sex – – 0.03 -0.01 -0.18 -0.17 0.07 -0.05 –8. Age – – -0.08 -0.10 0.06 -0.05 0.10 0.01 -0.30** –9. Educational level – – 0.16 0.06 -0.06 0.09 -0.03 -0.16 -0.30** 0.15 –

10. Marital status – – 0.01 -0.05 0.05 -0.08 0.16 -0.09 -0.12 0.39** 0.05

N = 124. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01. Numbers in parentheses are alpha coefficients. Sex: female = 0, male = 0. Age: below 20 = 1, 21–30 = 2,31–40 = 3, 41–50 = 4, 51–60 = 5, above 60 = 6. Educational level: high school or lower = 1, junior university = 2, university = 3, graduatesor above = 4. Marital status: single = 0, married = 1.

Table 4 Results of regression analyses testing the interacting effects of face consciousness with financial situation(study 2)

b

Life satisfaction Positive affect Negative affect

Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 1 Step 2 Step 3

Control variablesSex 0.04 -0.03 0.01 -0.03 -0.08 -0.07 -0.18*** -0.17† -0.20*Age -0.10 -0.16*** -0.15*** -0.11 -0.15 -0.15 -0.02 -0.01 -0.02Marital status 0.04 -0.04 -0.01 -0.02 -0.05 -0.05 0.06 0.07 0.04Educational level 0.16*** 0.21* 0.16* 0.06 0.10 0.09 -0.07 -0.08 -0.04Materialism -0.15 0.00 -0.06 -0.05 0.07 0.05 0.27** 0.24* 0.30**

Main variablesFace consciousness -0.14*** -0.12 -0.18*** -0.17*** 0.05 0.03Financial situation 0.57** 0.62** 0.29** 0.30** -0.02 -0.07

Interaction termX*Z 0.27** 0.09 -0.26**DR2 0.06 0.32 0.06 0.02 0.10 0.00 0.11 0.00 0.06DF 1.52 29.40** 12.93** 0.42 6.42 0.81 2.98* 0.14 8.22**df1, df2 5118 2116 1115 5118 2116 1115 5118 2116 1115

N = 124. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.10.

1.5

1.9

2.3

2.7

3.1

3.5

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Figure 3 Life satisfaction as a function of face con-sciousness and financial situation (study 2).



perceived themselves as rich (b = 0.06, not significant).However, a converse pattern was observed in Figure 4,where face consciousness had a strong and positive effecton negative affect for self-perceived, poor individuals(b = 0.12, p < 0.01), whereas a non-significant effect wasfound for self-perceived rich individuals (b = 0.00, notsignificant).

Discussion

Consistent with the findings presented in study 1, theresults from study 2 indicate that face consciousness isnegatively related to the happiness indicators, and thisnegative relationship is moderated by financial situation ina more generalized setting. The effect of face consciousnesson happiness is not due to the shared variance between faceconsciousness and materialism, since it remained signifi-cant after we controlled for the influence of material values.Further, although we did not find the interactive effect offace consciousness with financial situation in predictingpositive affect, the results of the moderation analysessuggest that financial situation could mitigate the negativeeffect of face consciousness on life satisfaction, as well asthe positive effect on negative affect.

Discussion

One purpose of the present research was to examine theinfluence of face consciousness considered as anindividual-differences variable on happiness. We first pro-posed that face consciousness would be negatively associ-ated with happiness, and then proposed the negativeassociation of face consciousness with happiness would bemoderated by financial situation. To examine the hypoth-eses, we first conducted study 1 in a consumption settingusing a university student sample, and then replicated thisstudy in a more generalized setting using an adult sample instudy 2. These two studies produced essentially consistent

results, and taken together, supported our hypotheses thatfor poor individuals, whether measured by objective, dis-posable money or by subjective perceptions about theirfinancial situations, their happiness levels were negativelycontingent on face consciousness, whereas for richindividuals, face consciousness had little effect on theirhappiness.

Our findings are consistent with the view that an exces-sive concern with impression made on others is detrimentalto happiness (Christopher & Schlenker, 2004; Kasser &Kasser, 2001; Kasser & Ryan, 1996; Kim et al., 2003;Schlenker & Leary, 1982). In general, individuals high onface consciousness tend to be less happy, as they are lesssatisfied with life and experience less positive affect,whereas more negative affect. Furthermore, our results sup-ported the value-as-a-moderator theory by revealing thatface consciousness is an especially strong predictor of a lowlevel of happiness for individuals with bad financial situa-tions, but not for individuals with good financial situations.These results suggest that people with a high level of faceconsciousness might retain their happiness by becomingbetter off.

It is important to note that we used different measure-ments of face consciousness across two studies, butobtained similar results. These two measurements representtwo different research settings. The Bao et al. (2003) scale,which we used in study 1, reflects individuals’ concern overtheir face in the particular setting of consumption, whereasthe CPAI face scale, which we used in study 2, reflectsindividuals’ face concern at a more generalized level ofinterpersonal situations. We believe that this discrepancy inthe operationalization of face consciousness does notproduce theoretical inconsistency between the results ofstudy 1 and those of study 2, because both Bao et al.’s)scale and the CPAI face scale – although designed for use indifferent, specific settings – measure the same motives ofindividuals to value face and take it as an important life goalto pursue.

Our findings are of particular relevance to the researchknowledge regarding the relationship between materialismand happiness. In studies reported from Western individu-alistic societies, materialism has been seen as a steadypredictor of unhappiness. Our research suggests that faceconsciousness could be a deeper-level variable, underpin-ning the relationship between materialism and happiness,because some recent studies have indicated that it is notmaterialism itself, but deep motives behind individuals’materialistic values that lead to a lower level of happiness(Srivastava et al., 2001). In other words, some kinds ofmotives might work as the root cause that makes material-ists unhappy. This research demonstrated that face con-sciousness, whether measured by Bao et al.’s (2003) scalein study 1, or by the CPAI scale in study 2, might be amotive that enables individuals to put excessive importance

2.1

2.3

2.5

2.7

2.9

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Figure 4 Negative affect as a function of face con-sciousness and financial situation (study 2).




on money and possessions in order to improve or protecttheir face, but at the same time, reduces their happiness.

It is important to note that our two samples are alldrawn from a collectivistic society, which might havebiased our findings. This is because, in a collectivisticsociety like China, people are highly dependent on eachother and they interact more frequently than those in indi-vidualistic societies. As a result, Chinese people usuallyhave stronger desire to manage their face (Bao et al.,2003; Li & Su, 2007), which might increase the impor-tance of money to them, because having enough moneycan help them gain face through buying visible and luxu-rious products, or at least avoid losing face by keepingthem away from the embarrassment of being unable tomeet daily life requirements. Indeed, the correlation coef-ficient between face consciousness and materialism,which reflects the importance of money to an individual,is as strong as 0.37 (p < 0.01) in study 2, suggesting thatface consciousness induces people place higher impor-tance on money and possessions (Liao & Wang, 2009).Thus, it might be the case that the moderating effect offinancial situation on the relationship between face con-sciousness and happiness is partly due to the particularimportance placed on money by Chinese people in man-aging their face. Apparently, a replication in individualis-tic societies is needed to clarify this concern.

The present research contributes to the knowledge ofhappiness research, primarily because it demonstrates theimportance of face consciousness, developed from Easternsocieties as an individual-difference variable in predictingvarious indicators of happiness. Since the concept of facehas been argued by many researchers as the key concept inunderstanding the complexity of much of people’s behav-iour in Confucian societies (Bao et al., 2003; Ho, 1976; Hu,1944; Kim & Nam, 1998; Tse, 1996), our results suggestthat face consciousness could play a role in explaining thedifferences between the East and the West in happinessresearch.

Diener, Diener, and Diener’s (1995) seminal work dem-onstrated that individualism is a strong predictor of hap-piness across nations. They found people in collectivistsocieties reported lower level of SWB than those in indi-vidualist societies, even after potential covariates, such asthe income levels of nations, were controlled. Diener et al.(1995) suggested that the positive correlation betweenindividualism and SWB is because individualist societiesprovide more freedom, and people are more likely toattribute success to themselves. Our findings that face con-sciousness is negatively related to happiness could explainthis phenomenon. Given the fact that face concern is muchmore salient in collectivist societies than in individualistsocieties (Bao et al., 2003; Goffman, 1955; Ho, 1976;Hwang, Francesco, & Kessler, 2003), we believe that thestress of maintaining a minimal level of face at least partly

contributed to the lower level of happiness in collectivistsocieties. We suggest future research to extend our find-ings and provide additional evidence supporting thisexplanation.

Our findings that financial situation ameliorates the nega-tive effect of face consciousness on happiness suggest thatone way for individuals in a collectivistic society, likeChina, to improve their level of happiness is to becomefinancially better off. The 2004 report of the National Well-Being Index supports this notion by revealing that Chinesepeople in the wealthier Taiwan society are happier thanthose in the relatively-poor mainland China, althoughpeople from these two societies have the same cultural roots(Inglehart, 2004). However, the amelioration effect broughton by financial situation might disappear if individuals’levels of happiness go beyond a certain degree; our findingssuggest that the interactive effect of face consciousness andfinancial situation applies only to negative affect and lifesatisfaction, but not to positive affect. It is possible thatbecoming rich might work only to save people from suffer-ing some bad emotional experiences, but not necessarilybring good ones.

The present research is also of interest because it hasimplications for the value-as-a-moderator theory. Malkaand Chatman (2003) stated that previous studies examiningthe value-as-a-moderator theory have only focused on theinteracting effects of resources, with values on the cognitivelife satisfaction, but have not examined their effects on theemotional components of SWB. The present researchexamined how the joint effect of face consciousness andmoney influences various happiness indicators, includingboth the cognitive and emotional components of SWB. Ourresults supported the value-as-a-moderator theory for thecognitive component of happiness, but not for the emo-tional components of happiness. The interaction term offace consciousness with financial situation was not signifi-cant in predicting positive affects across both studies, sug-gesting that the value-as-a-moderator theory might bebetter applicable in predicting cognitive life satisfactionand negative affect than in predicting positive affect. Weargue that the results might be due to the fact that money isvalued more in hard situations, often characterized by nega-tive affect, than it is valued in easy situations, often char-acterized by positive affect (Lim, Teo, & Loo, 2003). Inother words, it is because money is a resource of moreimportance in taking away unhappiness from people than itis in bringing people happiness. Future research is encour-aged to investigate how and why this difference happens.

As stated earlier, given all our participants in the twostudies were drawn from the same Confucian society, careshould be taken in generalizing these results. Because indi-viduals’ levels of face consciousness are particularly salientin Confucian societies, the negative relationship betweenface consciousness and happiness might be weaker in



individualist societies. The potential effects of common-method variances should also be noted, given all our datawere collected from a single source. Although the results ofHarman’s single-method test did not identify it as aproblem, future research is encouraged to remedy common-method variances early from the research-design step(Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). Anotherlimitation of our research was related to the scales weadopted to measure the construct of face consciousness,that is, whether the four-item scale we used in study 1 orthe 11-item scale used in study 2 treated face consciousnessas a simple, unidimensional construct. However, manyresearcher have suggested that face consciousness shouldbe a multidimensional construct, consisting of distinctdimensions, such as a desire to gain face and a fear oflosing face (Ho, 1976; Hwang et al., 2003). Future researchmight benefit from examining the effects of differentdimensions of face consciousness on happiness, as thesedimensions reflect distinct motives for one to manage his/her face and can be associated with happiness in differentways.

Future research might also benefit from examiningpotential mediators of the face–happiness relationship. Forinstance, because individuals high on face consciousness

have a stronger desire to live up to social expectations orrequirements (Goffman, 1955; Ho, 1976; Ting-Toomey,1988), it might be the case that they are more susceptible tointerpersonal influence. Given the link between susceptibil-ity to interpersonal influence and self-esteem and life sat-isfaction (e.g. Bearden, Netemeyer, & Teel, 1989; Kropp,Lavack, & Silvera, 2005), susceptibility to interpersonalinfluence appears to be a potential mediator in the face–happiness relationship. Such investigations would shedfurther light on how individuals high on face consciousnesstend to have lower levels of happiness.

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by two research grants (no.70502027 and 70872075) from the National NaturalScience Foundation of China, a research grant from theChinese Ministry of Education (no. 07JC630033), and aresearch grant from the Shanghai Planning Office of Philo-sophical and Social Science (no. 2009BSH001). Theresearch was also sponsored by the Shanghai PujiangProgram. The authors would like to thank Dr James Hou-fuLiu for his insightful comments of this work.

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Gain face, but lose happiness? It depends on how much money you have