Intercultural Communication Concerns

This dissertation is an empirical study focusing on the intercultural and interpersonal aspects of the communication between Chinese graduate students and their American advisors in the U.S institutions of higher education. The purposes of this study are: (1) to identify the intercultural communication concerns of Chinese graduate students and their American advisors in the educational contexts regarding communication of Chinese graduate students, (2) to compare differences in the communication concerns of Chinese graduate students and their American advisors in educational contexts, and (3) to explore way(s) of developing the intercultural communication sensitivity of both Chinese graduate students and American advisors so as to help Chinese students studying in the U.S. to adapt to the new environment and make greater academic achievement with minimum hardship.Student-teacher communication has been recognized as an important variable influencing the effectiveness of instructional process. As international education develops, the communication between international students and their foreign advisors has become an important variable affecting the process of effective learning and teaching. This intercultural communication as an important variable in securing and developing effective learning and teaching is even more emphasized today due to the rapid change of international landscape. The dramatic changes in economy, technology, and demography across nations and ethnic groups present cultural diversities, among many others, in this post-millennium world and this phenomenon of cultural diversity, which is ever increasing, has brought numerous contacts and encounters of students from different cultures into the United States, the target country for most international students. The mixing of cultures in international education naturally and necessarily heightens the emphasis on intercultural communication. As a result, there is a stronger need than ever before to understand the important role intercultural communication plays in the process of learning and teaching in international education.To secure and make learning and teaching effective in intercultural contexts, scholarship in general identifies four major variables affecting international students'communication: language barriers, cultural disparity, new relationships with faculty and individual characteristics. However, according to Fuller (1970), one way of securing and motivating students'effective learning and teachers'effective teaching in the universities is"to provide learning that matches concerns (problems the student experiences) and program (problems the student is given help with)"(Fuller, 1970).In this dissertation, the concept of communication concerns introduced by American scholars is extended to the concept of intercultural communication concerns. The concept of intercultural communication concerns generally refers to the problems that an individual may experience in his/her interaction with people from different cultures. In this dissertation, it is particularly used to refer to the problems that Chinese graduate students experience during interactions with their American advisors, which is obviously intercultural in nature.The current study follows Staton-Spicer and Bassett's (1979) Communication Concerns Model, which originated and was modified from Fuller's (1969) model in its examination of the teachers'concerns. The Communication Concerns Model embodies three categories: concerns about self as a communicator, concerns about task of communicating, and concerns about the impact of one's communication on others. On the basis of previous research findings, a questionnaire was developed combining the Communication Concerns Statement (Staton-Spicer & Bassett, 1979) and the Teacher Communication Concerns Scale (Staton-Spicer, 1983; Bauer, 1992). The qualitative data provided by the open-ended questions allowed for content analysis, whereas the quantitative data were analyzed by t-tests and analyses of variance. Besides, a series of semi-structured interviews was designed as a follow-up to the questionnaire survey for the purpose of uncovering more in-depth information. Collection of data was conducted at the University of Louisville (USA). Altogether, one hundred and seven Chinese graduate students and forty-nine American advisors at the University of Louisville (USA) participated in the questionnaire survey. Of them, ten students and six professors were interviewed in the American context.The results showed that both Chinese graduate students and their American advisors expressed a higher level of concern about students'language proficiency and communication in classroom settings. In terms of the communication concerns model, most of the expressed concerns fell into the task category. Culture-related behaviors appeared to be less a barrier than English language to Chinese graduate students'academic communication because they were not as culturally sensitive as they were supposed to be, whereas their American advisors displayed some cultural sensitivity to their Chinese students'cultural background.A comparison of the communication concerns reported by Chinese graduate students and American advisors suggested that Chinese students had significantly greater concern about their communication than did American advisors. In addition, the two respondent groups tended to express a different focus on Chinese students'intercultural communication.The findings of this study called for communication-focused language training and the increase of host culture exposure for international students, as well as development of intercultural sensitivity of both students and faculty.For further and future studies, employing a larger sample and a better selection process, investigating actual behaviors to supplement the self-reported data, and focusing on the intercultural validity of the communication concerns model were suggested.