RESPONSES OF JAPANESE STUDENTS AND COMPARABLY EDUCATED MIDDLE-AGED ADULTS TO A BENIGN AND A STRESSFUL MOTION-PICTURE FILM WERE COMPARED WITH DATA FROM AMERICAN EXPERIMENTS. SELF-REPORT MEASURES (NOWLIS ADJECTIVE CHECK LIST OF MOOD AND DISTRESS RATINGS) WERE OBTAINED BEFORE, DURING, AND AFTER THE FILMS, AND SKIN CONDUCTANCE WAS MONITORED THROUGHOUT. SS WERE DIVIDED AMONG "SILENT," "INTELLECTUALIZATION," "DENIAL," AND "TRAUMA" ORIENTATION TREATMENT GROUPS. IN MOST RESPECTS THE JAPANESE RESPONSE TO STRESS WAS LIKE THE RESPONSE OF AMERICANS. THE PATTERN OF MOOD AND THE DEGREE AND TIMING OF REPORTED DISTRESS WAS SIMILAR, AND THE DEFENSIVE ORIENTATIONS REDUCED STRESS REACTION FOR BOTH SUBJECTIVE AND PHYSIOLOGICAL MEASURES. HOWEVER, THE HYPOTHESIZED INTERACTION BETWEEN MMPI-SCALED PERSONALITY DISPOSITION AND DEFENSIVE ORIENTATIONS WAS NOT OBSERVED. UNLIKE AMERICANS, JAPANESE SS' SKIN CONDUCTANCE WAS ALMOST AS HIGH DURING THE BENIGN FILM AS DURING THE STRESSFUL FILM, AND THEIR CONDUCTANCE DURING THE STRESSFUL FILM WAS POORLY CORRELATED TO THE SPECIFIC STRESSFUL SCENES. IN THIS RESPECT THE JAPANESE RESEMBLE "HIGH ANXIOUS" INDIVIDUALS IN AMERICAN STUDIES. POSSIBLE EXPLANATIONS IN TERMS OF AN INTERACTION BETWEEN JAPANESE CULTURE AND THE SITUATION OF BEING EXPERIMENTED ON ARE DISCUSSED. (26 REF.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved)