Forgiveness among Javanese Ethnic Students: A Mountainous, Highland, Lowland, and Coastal Culture Background Comparison 45 FORGIVENESS AMONG JAVANESE ETHNIC STUDENTS: A MOUNTAINOUS, HIGHLAND, LOWLAND, AND COASTAL CULTURE BACKGROUND COMPARISON Andar

It has been repeatedly documented in the scientific literature that culture plays an important role in forgiveness. However, research of mountainous, highland, lowland and coastal culture related to forgiveness was rare. The goal of this study was to describe the comparison of forgiveness among Javanese ethnic students who had been raised in mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background. Forgiveness Scale developed to obtain the data was adapted from TRIM and has been tested for its reliability and validity using the Rasch model. Descriptive statistics, Kruskal-Wallis (H) test, and MannWhitney (U) posthoc test were used to analyze the data. The result showed an insignificant difference in forgiveness but showed a significant difference in lessen-avoidance motivation. This finding had practical implications in multicultural counselling, especially in promoting forgiveness to various counselees. For a more comprehensive understanding, further research in forgiveness motives is required.


INTRODUCTION
Forgiveness is a unique gift. Theoretical review shows that forgiveness is classified as one of the character strengths in the dimension of temperance that protects a person from anger, resentment, and hurt (Peterson & Seligman, 2004). From the motivational aspect, forgiveness is inferred from low revenge and avoidance motivation combined with high benevolence motivation. Forgiveness is a composite of motivation change indicated by reducing revenge motivation, reducing avoidance motivation, and increasing benevolence motivation to the transgressors (McCullough, Worthington, & Rachal, 1997;McCullough, 2008). There is no coercion in forgiveness. When a person experiences negative treatment from transgressor, they can choose to remain hurt and betrayed or choose to free their selves from these negative feelings through forgiveness.
History shows that forgiveness was been becoming one of the Indonesian people personalities. Forgiveness in Indonesian culture was shown through the character of the maja labo dahu in Bima (Tasrif & Komariah, 2018), work value in the Wedhatama (Istiqomah, Muslihati, & Atmoko, 2017), Banyumas dablongan t-shirt design (Dadan, 2016), the nature of samodra as leadership value of Hasta Brata (Hamim, 2014), and social identity in Indonesian children's novels (Suyatno, 2014). Javanese ethnic in Indonesian had been having noble values and ways of life that is close to forgiveness. Compliance with etiquette (unggah-ungguh) and ability to hide feelings had been being the characteristic of Javanese culture (Handayani & Novianto, 2004). This Javanese culture value is ideal for the development of forgiveness.
Forgiveness of Javanese ethnic students who are transitioning from late adolescents to early adulthood is characterized by the search for self-identity, the improvement of more mature social protection patterns, and the transition of egocentric views into empathy. This transition is a time of the problem, a time of emotional tension, and a time of value changing (Hurlock, 1990). However, empirical studies of forgiveness showed that the forgiveness level of students in Java was moderate-high (Habibi & Hidayati, 2017;Kusprayogi & Nashori, 2016). The research found that forgiveness of male student of UMM was majority high, whereas female students forgiveness were moderate (Utami, 2015). In contrast, another research found male students had a higher level of forgiveness than the forgiveness level of the female (Khasan, 2019), whereas the other found no differences in forgiveness between a male and female student (Nashori, Iskandar, Setiono, & Siswadi, 2013). Further, his findings revealed that there were significant differences in forgiveness in vary level of education, but no differences of forgiveness in adolescents, early adulthood, middle adulthood, or late adulthood.
This research aims to develop existing literature through the exploration of demographic variables on Javanese ethnic, especially on students who had been raised in mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background in Salatiga and its surroundings. Salatiga is an ideal place for the research because it is well known as -Indonesia Mini‖ which won the contest of the most tolerant city in 2015 and 2017 (Kompas Regional, 24 th February 2018). Another reason is the representative topography of Salatiga which is located in the foothill of Mount Merbabu and surrounded by small mountains of Telomoyo, Ungaran, Payung, and Rong. Students came from mountainous and highland on the west, south, and east sides of Salatiga (Wonosobo, Temanggung, Magelang, Boyolali), the students came from the lowland and coast on north and northeast side of this town (Semarang, Jepara, Demak, Kudus) (salatiga.go.id). Although came from different topographical regions, the students had the same orientation of collectivistic cultural values. Therefore, the forgiveness of the students from the four backgrounds can be compared. This comparative quantitative study aims to compare the forgiveness of Javanese ethnic students who had been raised in the mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture in Salatiga and its surroundings. The hypothesis of this study is: at least one group of Javanese ethnic students who had been raised in the mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background had significant forgiveness differences.

Respondents
This study used purposive random sampling by distributing instruments to 554 respondents. The requirements required were (1) Javanese, (2) 18-24 years old, and (3) had been raised in mountainous, highland, lowland, or coastal culture in Salatiga and its surroundings. Some 482 respondents fulfilled the requirements, 89 men (18%) and 393 females (82%) aged 19.22±1.35. Respondents who had been raised in the mountainous were 91 respondents (M= 17, F= 74), in the highland were 115 respondents (M= 24, F= 91), in the lowland were 242 respondents (M = 39, F = 203), and in the coast 34 respondents (M= 9, F= 25). Determination of ethnicity, sex, age, and background of respondents was based on their answer in the self-identity form.
Item reliability, person reliability, and person-item reliability were analyzed using the Rasch model with the Winsteps®. From reliability categorization, namely "weak" (α <0.67), "sufficient" (0.67 <α <0.80), "good" (0.81 <α <0.90), "very good" (0.91 <α <0.94), and "excellent" (α> 0.94) (Sumintono & Widhiarso, 2015), the person-item reliability of Forgiveness Scale measured with the alpha Cronbach (KR-20) was -very good‖ (α= 0.92). This result indicates that the instrument was suitable for the respondents. Analysis of the person reliability showed three respondents had an extreme maximum score. The person reliability which measures the consistency of respondents' answers was classified as "good" (α= 0.89), either "extreme respondents" were included or not, whereas the item reliability was -excellent" (α= 0.99). The output of the summary statistic and item dimensionality was presented in Table 1. The separation index (G) of Forgiveness Scale item was 8.91 and it was able to separate strata (H) into 12 groups (H= 12.21). Forgiveness Scale's items were classified as "excellent" because of was able to make 12 levels of separation based on the difficulty level (Sumintono & Widhiarso, 2015). Separation of person strata was classified as "very good", which was able to divide the respondents' forgiveness into four levels (H= 4.17).
The item dimensionality test showed raw variance data explained by measure was very good (46.7%), that was to say construct validation was empirically almost the same as the value predicted by the Rasch model (47.2%). The variance which could not be explained by the instrument was 9.7%. Thus, the Forgiveness Scale fulfils the requirements of unidimensionality, that was (1) the variance which could be explained by the instrument at least 20% and (2) the variance which could not be explained by the instrument did not exceed 15% (Sumintono & Widhiarso, 2015).

Procedure
The Forgiveness Scale was distributed to respondents by being informed that it was voluntary participation, respondents' identities would be kept confidential, and the answers did not affect any assessment. After completion, the questionnaires were collected to the researcher. Questionnaires that fulfil the research requirements were used for analysis.

Hypothesis test results
Hypothesis testing was preceded by data normality testing using Kolmogorov-Smirnov with Lilliefors significance correction for a more accurate result. Table 4 showed Asymp.sig value (p) <0.05 therefore H 0 was rejected. This means that the forgiveness data of Javanese students from the mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background was not normally distributed. Nonparametric statistics were needed for further hypothesis testing. The Kruskal-Wallis (H) hypothesis test results presented in Table 5 showed Asyimp.sig (p) of Lessen avoidance motivation was 0.009, therefore H 0 was rejected. Its mean at least one /more of Javanese ethnic student from mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background was significantly different. The higher the H value, the greater the group differences. Lessen revenge motivation, benevolence motivation, and total forgiveness showed no differences among the group. The post-hoc Mann-Whitney (U) test results in Table 5 showed that groups in Lessen avoidance motivation that had significant differences were the mountainous and coast (p= 0.006), highland and coasts (p= 0.006), and lowland and coasts ( p= 0.001). Because of Asymp.sig (p) <0.05, H 0 was rejected. It means that there were significant differences in Lessen avoidance motivation among mountainous-coast, highland-coast, and lowland-coast culture. Significant differences were also found between the mountainouslowland culture in Lessen revenge motivation (p= 0.026) and between the lowland and coastal culture in generally forgiveness (p= 0.027).
The results of the data analysis showed that (1) majority of the forgiveness level of Javanese ethnic students from mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background in Salatiga and its surroundings was high, lessen revenge motivation was high, lessen avoidance motivation was moderate, and benevolence motivation was high; and (2) there was a significant difference in Lessen avoidance motivation between mountainouscoast, highland-coast, and lowland-coast students, but were not differ significantly in Lessen revenge motivation, benevolence motivation, and in generally forgiveness. Comparison of the forgiveness was presented in Table  6.

Discussion
The discussion focused on (1) high category of the forgiveness of Javanese ethnic students and (2) significant differences in Lessen avoidance motivation among students from mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background. Research findings were discussed through collective culture and social harmony, withdrawal and avoidance coping strategies, and the topographical conditions.

Collective culture and social harmony
The findings of this study indicated that the forgiveness of Javanese ethnic students from the mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture background in Salatiga and its surroundings were classified as high, benevolence motivation was classified as high, lessen revenge motivation was classified as high, and lessen avoidance motivation was classified as moderate. These findings were in line with previous research. Utami found that forgiveness of male students in UMM was high and that of female students was moderate (Utami, 2015). The self-forgiveness of Undip Semarang students was moderate, whereas interpersonal forgiveness and situation forgiveness were high (Habibi & Hidayati, 2017). Kusprayogi & Nashori also found that majority of the UII Yogyakarta student forgiveness was moderate (Kusprayogi & Nashori, 2016). There was no extreme difference between these studies. Apart from the research subjects, differences occurred could be caused by differences in categorization procedure that classifies forgiveness into five levels and three levels.
The high level of forgiveness among Javanese ethnic students became empirical evidence of research which suggested that people from interdependent relation/collective cultures tend to be more forgiving than people from relatively individualistic cultures (Kadiangandu, Mullet, & Vinsonneau, 2001). Collectivism was characterized by (1) a close relationship between individuals based on social norms and (2) prioritizing collective goals rather than personal goals, therefore, encourage decisions to forgive (Hook, Worthington, & Utsey, 2009). The culture of the community formed the motives of forgiveness. Self-oriented in individualistic culture formed forgiveness related to personal motives such as mental health, well-being, and personal peace; whereas interdependent relations oriented not collective culture formed forgiveness related to efforts to maintain a social relationship (Bedford & Hwang, 2003;Hook et al., 2009;Scobie, Scobie, & Kakavoulis, 2002).
Collectivism promoted forgiveness as a way to maintain social harmony and as conflict management (Fu, Watkins, & Hui, 2004;Leung, Brew, Zhang, & Zhang, 2011;Sandage & Williamson, 2005). As a collective culture, the culture of peace in Java was relatively high (Eliasa, 2017). Javanese ethnic communities had a "rukun" value that promotes peaceful interaction with one another and avoids potential conflicts (Karina, 2014;Rufaedah, 2012;Suseno, 2001). This "rukun" value was manifested by prioritizing community interests rather than personal interests. Collective values encourage a person to be willing to control his personal feelings to comply with the norms of social harmony (Karremans et al., 2011). Negative thoughts, feelings, or actions that arose as a result of mistakes made by the offender deliberately set aside or changed into positive thoughts, feelings, or actions. Collective culture in Javanese ethnic encourages students to forgive for maintaining social harmony. Vice versa, social harmony encourages the emergence of forgiveness.

Withdrawal and avoidance coping strategies
The level of Lessen avoidance motivation among Javanese ethnic students was "moderate", which was the lowest compared to lessen revenge motivation, benevolence motivation, and general/total forgiveness. It could be interpreted that students had motives to avoid transgressor or negative experience. It was undeniable that Javanese did tend to avoid conflicts and prefer to live together in harmony (Suratno & Astiyanto, 2009). Stereotypes were inherent to Javanese ethnic as a closed and reserved ethnic group (Puspitaningrum, 2018). Javanese tend to try to solve their problems themself and were reluctant to ask for help from others. But if they were unable to overcome the problem, they tend to avoid the problem, or withdrawn from the problem, or cover up the problem because of -isin‖/ashamed. The findings of this study support Chang and Jung's research that avoidance and withdrawal coping strategies were more widely used by Asian-American than that by the European-American (Phinney & Haas, 2003).

Topographical conditions
Significant differences in Lessen avoidance motivation between students from the mountainous and coastal cultures, highland and coastal cultures, and lowland and coastal cultures indicate that the students from coastal culture value became the dominant differentiator in lessen avoidance motivation. Their lessen avoidance motivation was the highest. It means that their tendency to avoid the perpetrators, places, or situations related to negative events was lower than that in the other three groups. Topographical conditions became one of the factors causing these attitudes. Topographical conditions affect human activities, human personalities, and culture of the people live nearby (Hu et al., 2019). Culture influences the way persons interact with each other (Riswanto, Mappiare-AT, & Irtadji, 2017). So far, coastal communities were faced with harsh and hot topographical conditions. The sea provides fish as a livelihood, but its availability cannot be controlled by humans, in contrast to agriculture and plantations which are relatively more controllable. Following their environment, the characteristics of coastal communities generally assertive, straight forward, spontaneous, openness, and had a high tolerance attitude (Fajrie, 2017;Satria, 2015). This combination of characteristics minimizes the motive for avoidance.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
The collective culture that promotes social harmony encourages the high level of forgiveness among Javanese ethnic students who had been raised in the mountainous, highland, lowland, and coastal culture in Salatiga and its surroundings. In a certain extent, topographical conditions shape the culture, ways of interaction, and forgiveness tendencies of students who had been raised in their environment. This complex set of results has practical implications in counselling. Significant differences in one aspect indicate that in some extent the findings of this study are useful in multicultural counselling especially to promote forgiveness to the various characteristic of counselees. In the other hand, insignificant differences and the numbers of outlier indicate that individual forgiveness is unique. Therefore, to get a more comprehensive understanding, an overview of forgiveness motives needs to be examined through further research.