Cross-cultural flexibility: Validation of the traditional Mandarin, simplified Mandarin, and Japanese translations of the Multidimensional Psychological Flexibility Inventory

Drawing from Eastern ideologies including Buddhism and Taoism and grounded in Relational Frame Theory, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) promotes wellbeing by helping individuals alter the function of internal experiences, encouraging them to engage in a psychologically flexible set of skills in response to unwanted thoughts, feelings, and experiences (representing the Hexaflex model: awareness of the present moment, acceptance, self-as-context, defusion, contact with values, committed action) rather than engaging in rigid and inflexible responses (inattentive unawareness, experiential avoidance, self-as-content, fusion, lack of contact with values, inaction). Recent work developed the Multidimensional Psychological Flexibility Inventory (MPFI), offering a method of assessing and tracking all 12 dimensions of the Hexaflex model separately. Given ACT's conceptual ties to Eastern ideologies, the current study sought to develop translations of the MPFI in three Asian languages (traditional Mandarin, simplified Mandarin, and Japanese): (1) to allow for the scale's clinical use in those languages and (2) to allow clinical researchers to examine ACT mechanisms in non-English speaking populations. Toward that end, 2091 respondents (69% female, M = 32.4 years old, SD = 10.2 years) from 5 cultural groups across 4 countries and 4 languages completed a 30-35 min online survey. Confirmatory Factor Analyses supported the measurement invariance and factor structure of the MPFI across all cultural groups and languages, the MPFI subscales demonstrated excellent internal consistencies across all languages, and the subscales continued to show convergent patterns of correlation with indices of wellbeing and psychological distress across all languages. Implications will be discussed.