How do international students change
psychologically after going abroad?
Graduation Thesis
Presented to
the Department of
English Language and Literature
Notre Dame Seishin University
In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirement for the Degree
Bachelor of Arts
By
Sayuri Niina
2009
CONTENTS
Abstract
Chapter One: Introduction
1.1. Introduction 1
1.2. What is the definition of culture ? 1
1.3. Cultural contact 2
1.4. Permanent residents and sojourners 4
1.4.1 Classification of sojourners 6
1.4. 2 Who is the sojourner in this paper? 7
1.5. Theories 7
1.6. Psychological model of culture shock 8
1.7. Theory of sojourner adjustment 9
1.8. The process of cross-cultural adaptation 13
1.8.1 Adler’s theory: Double Swing 14
1.9. Focus of this thesis 19
1.10. Summary 20
Chapter Two: Case studies
2.1. Introduction 21
2.2. The questionnaire 21
2.2.1. Introduction to the questionnaire 21
2.3. Method 22
2.3.1. Subjects 22
2.3.2. The questionnaire 22
2.3.3. Procedure 23
2.4. The case studies 242.4.1. students going to English-speaking country 24
a) Case Ms. Miwako 24
b) Case Ms. Ji Hyong Son 26
c) Case Mr. Candy 28
2.4.2. Students going to Japanese-speaking country 30
a) Case Ms.Siti Norbaizura 30
b) Case Ms. Molly 31
c) Case Ms. Cansu Ezgi Sezin 34
2.5. Summary 35
Chapter Three: Results and Discussion
3.1. Introduction 37
3.2. Discussion of the results 37
4.3. Limitation of this thesis 40
4.4. Further research 41
4.5. Conclusion 42
References 43
Appendixes 45
Interview Questions
Abstract
As society has become globalized like Japan today, it has been easier to make contact with another culture. It is not rare to see foreigners on the streets in our country, and vice versa, many people go abroad every year. According to the survey by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the number of the students who went abroad to the English-speaking areas was 17,535 in 2006.
When people encounter a new culture, there are some possible issues as the term “culture shock” indicates.The purpose of this paper was to consider the psychological changes of 6 international students after their experience overseas. They were divided into two groups based on the countries they had been to America and Japan.
I found out that all the subjects had felt culture differences and had some symptoms to adjust the different cultures trough their experiences outside of their home countries. However, the symptoms were different individually because of their back grounds such as their home culture, characteristics, and the target language ability.All subjects had changed and grown in some ways by the adventures abroad. This paper will show you how they changed psychologically after going abroad.
1
Chapter One Introduction
1.1 Introduction
In Japan, society has become globalized thanks to the developments of technology. We can see what is going on in other countries though the Internet or TV or newspapers without going to the places. Also, it is not rare to see foreign people who live in Japan on the street now. In this situation, we hear the word cross-culture frequently. When we meet a new culture, it is important to understand and accept the culture to make the function better in the society. As the beginning in this chapter, we will examine what the culture is and cultural-contact. Added to this,we will see the process of cross-cultural adaptation.
1.2 What is the definition of culture?
When people say culture, it includes many things such as clothes, foods, life-style, music, art, history, politics, religions and so on. There are many definitions of culture from the aspects of various fields, such as anthropology, psychology, sociology. In this section, there is a point which needs to be clarified; what the definition of culture in this paper. Then, we can move on the next step.
Here are some of definitions.
1. That complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society (Tylor, E. B. 1871)
2. Culture consists of patterned ways of thinking, feeling and reacting, acquiredand transmitted mainly by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievements ofhuman groups, including their embodiments in artifacts; the essential core ofculture consists of traditional (i.e., historically derived and selected) ideas andespecially their attached values.(Kluckhohn, C. 1951)
According to these definitions that are defined the anthropologists, Taylor and Kluckhohn, culture is strongly related to the society that people belong to. Culture is inclusive system that we share in the society; therefore it is connected to our dairy life.
1.3 Cultural contact
As we looked above, culture is strongly connected to the society that people belong to. When we go to another countries, there is a chance to meet new culture; “cross-cultural contact” described by Bochoner, S. That means the contact with people who have different backgrounds. As the figure 1 describes, there are two types which cross-cultural contact happens. The the figure 1.1 shows, the first case happens when somebody who is from another the society comes to our community and we meet the different culture inside of our country without going abroad. For example, Japanese students contact with Chinese exchange students in Japan and get to know Chinese culture. As we can see from the pattern2 of figure 1.1, the next patternoccurs to us whenwe go to the society that somebody belongs to and contact with another culture outside of our country. For instance, Japanese go to Germany, and contact with German.
Figure1.1. Two types of cross-cultural contact
1.4.Permanent residents and sojourners
As the Figure1 shows, people meet another culture by going another society or someone’s coming into one’s community. In the case of going another community (it means going abroad here), we can classify two groups of people; permanent residents and sojourners. What are these differences?
What dose permanent residents mean? Permanents residents are people who go abroad on the assumption that they are going to resident in the hostcountryfrom their motherland for the rest of their life. For instance, the immigrants, (e.g. Japanese-American), the people who get married from another nationalities (e.g. the Japanese who get married with American is going to immigrant in America) are classified into this groups.
On the other hand, sojourners are people who go abroad for a certain period because of some reasons, but they go back to their country. Furnham and Bochner (1986) classified this group into four genus depend on their reasons.
1. Going abroad for study
2. The Foreign Service
a) without their free will
b) with their free will
3. Accompanies
4. Travelling abroad
1. Going abroad for study: the purpose of their stay is for their education with their free will such as exchange students, exchange probationers, researchers.
2. The Foreign Service: With the reasons of their jobs, they stay other countries.
In this category, we can classify two groups lie on they go abroad whether they have their free will or not.
a.) The case without their free will: exchange residences, diplomats, journalists, missionaries.
b.) The case with their free will: members of a assistants for another countries, teachers, researchers.
3. Accompanies: member of the family whose job or school is overseas.
4. Traveling abroad: travelers oversea with free will, and the period has many variety.
We can find out the patterns of this classification, measuring the motivation for going abroad (compulsory, unwilling or voluntary, satisfied) and the length of their staying.
1.4.1. Classification of sojourners
Figure 1.2 Classification of sojourners[1]
1.4. 2.Who is the sojourner in this paper?
In this paper, the sojourner I mentioned means the people who went to different country over six months continually to stay there, and had some motivation to go abroad. Therefore, sojourners in this paper mean the international students [2]who went to America and came to Japan to study.
1.5.Theories
The anthropologist Ogerg (1960) was first accredited with using the term“culture shock”. He explained the stages of culture shock by six aspects. In a brief and largely anecdotal article, he mentions at least six aspects of culture shock.
(1) strain, as a result of the effect required to make necessarypsychological adaption
(2) a sense of loss and feelings of deprivation in regard to friends, status , profession, and possessions
(3) rejection byand/ or rejection of members of the new culture
(4) confusion in role, role expectations, values, feelings, and self-identity
(5) surprise, anxiety, even disgust and indignation after becoming aware of culture differences
(6) feelings of importance, as a result of not being able to cope with the new environment
In fact, there are many researchers who analyzed the people, who went to other countries, and defined the culture shock. Almost all of them thought the phenomena as the negative ways. In fact, Guthrie (1975) used the term Culture fatigue for this effect.
1.6. Psychological model of culture shock
Figure 1.3 Psychological model of culture shock[3]
What are the factors of culture shock? When people live in the unfamiliar cultures, in the un-well known community, the culture shock happens on them. There are two factors; from the social and cultural aspects and individual aspects why the culture shock happens to people. The Clinical psychotherapist, Hiroshi Kondo, explained that the cultural shock occurs from the tension between the cultural/ social factors (ex. the lifestyle in the other culture) and individual factors (ex. the language, characteristics, one’s background) and they affect each other in 1980. When people think about the cause of the culture shock, it is impossible to consider separately cultural/ social side from individual view. Indeed, the steps of the psychological culture shock are following, 1. The social or culture aspects happens, 2. Then the individual phenomenonoccurs.
1.7. Theory of sojourner adjustment
Many researchers have tried to identify the sojourner adjustment and approached to this field. However, the theories have been full of varieties. Therefore, it is difficult to figure out the general theory.
Furnham and Bocher (1986) divided the stages of sojourner adjustment into eight periods as following.
1. Movement as Loss (Bereavement)
2. Fatalism (Locus of Control Beliefs)
3. Selective Migration (Natural Selection)
4. Appropriate Expectations
5. Negative Life Events
6. Social Support (Breakdown in Support Networks)
7. Clash of Values
8. Social Skills Deficit
1. Movement as Loss(Bereavement)
When people go abroad, they are separated by their family or friends temporarily. At the early stage when people go abroad, they suffer grief, because they cannot contact with their family or friends face to face. The relationships between them occupy the significant position on people, for people feel a great sense of inward security if the people around one know and understand him/her very fell. Going abroad means the distance geographic from one’s home, therefore they feel a great loss. This includes not only the human relations but also familiar food or routine of their life. However, viewers have to take the individuality account. As human are different, they have different backgrounds, cultures, personalities. The length of this stage or degree of this loss cannot be measured as the average model.
2. Fatalism (Locus of Control Beliefs)
When people face the difficulties or something that is hard to overcome, they are easily become a fatalism. They think that the events or phenomena happen because it is already decided to be happened. Due to this notion, they think that no one can control the destiny that is not happened yet. At this stage, people are apt to impotent to make their life better.
3. Selective Migration (Natural Selection)
When people get to know the host culture, and overcome difficulties, they can cope with things in that community. Therefore, they are positive to be sojourners in the second community.
4. Appropriate Expectations
The appropriate expectations are highly connected whether people adjust the unfamiliar culture or not. It implies that people can expect what they can do and cannot about sojourner and fulfillment.
5. Negative Life Events
In order to adapt the culture, stress and strain that are associated with psychological or physical illness, therefore they bring some changes in one’s life. It is not clear whether the symptom causes major or minor, positive or negative alteration.
6. Social Support (Breakdown in Support Networks)
It is very difficult to tell apart the relationship between the social support and psychological indications in a good way and low possibilities of physical or mental disease.
7. Clash of Values
When people join the host culture, the values about many aspects such as social, moral are apt to be influenced by the cultural effects. Therefore, the notions people had before is not always acceptable in other society. Then, one is misunderstood. distressed by others, and he/she is struggled as the sojourners between the cross-cultural situation.
8. Social Skills Deficit
The more people experience, the more they can get the social skills to adjust the society. This is depends on their background, so everyone has different levels of this skill. For instance, there are some factors such as their age, jobs, gender, surroundings, social position, structure of family, economic situations. Some can adjust the area easily, but others don’t to deal with. Therefore, this skill can not be measured without considering individual backgrounds.
1.8. The process of cross-cultural adaptation
We looked though one theory about cultural adaptation above. The person who went abroad can adapt to the other cultures though they might have struggled with some conflicts between the different of their home culture. It indicates that the culture shock or cultural adaptation is strongly connected to the home culture they had belonged to and the other culture they went to. The cultural adaptation is not only from the aspects of the new culture but also their home culture; cross-culture. Therefore we have to focus on the cross-culture in this case. Now, we are going to see the process of cross-cultural adaptation.
The process of cross-cultural adaptation is not a simple phenomenon. It involves the life history of a person, transcending the substitution of one culture for another. It involves the conscious as well as the unconscious changes in the individual. The adaptation process has often been described in terms of developmental stages.(Muneo, 1987: 140)
1.8.1. Adler’s theory: Double Swing
Alder showed us a model of cross-cultural adaptation process as five stages: contact, disintegration, reintegration, autonomy, and double-swing. He synthesized existing conceptualizations.
Figure 3. Alder’s theory: Double Swing[4]
The following five stages are examples of how the person adapts the first culture into the other culture. Alder showed us the ideal example, “Double Swing”, that one can easily accept the second culture with following stages.
1. Contact”
2. Disintegration
3. Reintegration
4. Autonomy
5. Double-Swing
1. The First Stage: “Contact”
When people go abroad, they meet the new culture. Everything is new and different for them, but in this stage, people tend to fail to recognize the new realities. People see the new culture with the view of their home culture, therefore the differences are interesting for them. In this stage, there is some emotional difference dependent on the person.
Some individuals may experience this contact period as a “honeymoon” stage in which everything is new and exciting. For others, the lack of familiarity may prove to be threatening. (Muneo, 1987)Especially, for the people who go abroad for the first time, everything looks great for them. They are overexcited to the new culture.
2. The Second Stage: “Disintegration”
In this phase, people come to understand the cultural differences between their home one and the new one, and become bewildered. They find out that there are incompatible with their own culture and second culture. For instance, people see some points as the same way like social moral, but the point of politics might be different. People face the “culture shock” because they are overwhelmed by cultural differences.
3. The third Stage: “Reintegration”
In this stage, people try to find out the solution to the difficult conditions by themselves, although they are apt to reject the cultural similarities and differences. For example, the idea of the things might be changed because of the cultural aspects.
During this stage some individuals switch back and forth between the first stage and the second stage. They are apt to experience an identity crisis, being caught between two cultures and in search of a sense of belongingness. They experience a sense of nothingness or alienation characterized by the “bohemian” (Thomas & Znaniecki, 1958), “neurotic” (Rank, 1945) or “anomie” (Riesman et al., 1961). In Lifton’s (1969) terms, such individuals appear to be in the “confrontation” stage where they question the condition of their existence. Adler (1975) calls this stage the “reintegration” stage. (Muneo, 1987 )
4. The Fourth Stage: “Autonomy”
At this stage, people become flexible towards the second culture. When they face the new situations, they can see that in a new way. They accept and appreciate the cultural differences and similarities. For example, the trend of cloth is same in another countries.
“In this “autonomous” state, some individuals begin to develop and identify themselves with the “third culture.”(Muneo 1987 )
5. The Fifth Stage* “Double-Swing”
Muneo (1987) explained following. “This stage is marked by “attitude, emotions, and behaviors that are independent but not independent of cultural influence”
Some can easily able to accept and grow from the influences of both cultural similarities and differences. Others are independent, however, at the same time, they are interdependent. There are varieties of point of view. Muneo (1987) also stated as following.