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Self-support (ZiIi) is a personality trait rooted in the Chinese culture. Based on the results of open-ended interviews, 2 dimensions, field and function related to external behavior and internal psychology, respectively, were examined in relation to school children's selfsupporting behaviors. A survey was then constructed for assessing self-supporting behaviors of children aged between 6 and 12 years. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses showed that the factor structure of the survey was clear. The survey was found to be stable and internally consistent according to the reliability test.
Keywords: self-support, children aged from 6 to 12 years, Self-supporting Behaviors Survey.
Thanks to the academic movement known as psychological research indigenization, many psychologists in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China, in the last 20 to 30 years, have conducted a great deal of research on Chinese personality using the indigenous approach, that is, understanding the psychology of a people within their own cultural, social, and historical contexts (Yang, 1991, 1993, 2006). Such studies have been about Chinese personality structure, Wo (Chinese self-concept) and Guanxi (Chinese interpersonal relationships; Wang & Cui, 2003, 2004; Yang, 2006).
Self-support (ZiIi, in the Chinese language written as ???) is a personality trait rooted in the Chinese culture. The term ZiW was first found in the Confucian classic The Book of Rites-Ruxing. According to Confucius, scholars should be self-supporting, as represented by Zixiu (self-educated) and Lishen (to be a mature person). Zixiu means studying hard, being loyal, and faithful, and Lishen means waiting to be employed, to be consulted, to be promoted, and to be recommended, namely, acquiring social recognition and realizing personal values.
Since the Spring and Autumn period (770 BC-476 BC) and the Warring States period (475 BC-221 BC), the word self-support (ZiIi) has appeared in many contexts in Chinese literature. Through systemic analysis of the meanings of self-support, Xia and Huang (2006) point out that self-support, as a personality trait with a far-reaching origin in Chinese history and culture, has some similarities with Western concepts of autonomy, independence, self-determination, and self-reliance, but the concept of being self-supporting in ancient Chinese writings particularly emphasized moral factors and morality was considered central to the concept; so that the Chinese concept of self-support is different from those traits that are similar in...