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Asian Civic Values: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Three East Asian Societies

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Abstract

This study cross-culturally explored the way that East Asian lower-secondary school students perceive the peculiar matters of Asian civic values specific to Korea, Chinese Taipei, and Hong Kong using the Asian Regional Module data of the 2009 International Civic and Citizenship Education Study. Methodologically, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were employed to explore the factor model that successfully fits the three East Asian societies. Latent mean analysis was then conducted to measure between-nation mean differences. Overall, East Asian students tended to be negative against an undemocratic government and unfairness based on guanxi and moderately critical of the issues related to the independence of the judiciary. Asian identity and democratic values for a civil society were both accepted as valuable with moderate respect for the morality of politicians and the preservation of traditional culture. As perceiving collectivist and Confucian contexts positively, these societies have also developed some aspects assimilated from Western democratic contexts. However, the degree to which the students perceive was similar for some civic values but different for some others.

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Notes

  1. Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Korea, and Thailand.

  2. A Chinese social concept based on the exchange of favors in which personal relationships are considered more important than laws and written agreements.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Graduate School of Education, Kyung Hee University, 26 Kyunghee-daero, Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul, 130-701, South Korea

    Young Ha Cho

  2. Korean Educational Development Institute, Seoul, South Korea

    Tae Jun Kim

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  1. Young Ha Cho
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  2. Tae Jun Kim
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Correspondence to Young Ha Cho.

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Cho, Y.H., Kim, T.J. Asian Civic Values: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Three East Asian Societies. Asia-Pacific Edu Res 22, 21–31 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40299-012-0021-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40299-012-0021-5

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