Examining U.S. and Japanese College Students’ Differences in Psychological Distress: the Mediating Roles of Valued Action and Experiential Avoidance

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a counseling modality that features values clarification interventions. However, a well-established ACT-consistent measure of values for practitioners and researchers is lacking. The present study, therefore, examined an exploratory measure called the Valued Time and Difficulty Questionnaire (VTDQ; Wilson et al. 2010 ) and investigated the possible explanatory role of multiple ACT constructs on psychological distress. Obtained cross-national differences with a sample of 188 U.S. and 223 Japanese students were consistent with previous research. Moreover, a multiple mediator model revealed significant indirect effects of VTDQ subscale scores for time and difficulty on the association between culture and symptoms.