Academic And Interaction Adjustment Of Korean International Students In Chinese Learning Environment

As a component of international exchanges and cooperation, international student education has been given great importance by Chinese government. International students have also attracted more attention from researchers with the increasing number of enrolment all around the world. The review of literature at home and abroad shows that there are studies on the intercultural adjustment of international students in western countries, most of which focus on the international students'adjustment in developed countries, especially in the United States such as Feng (1991), Zhong (1996), Yeh et al. (2003), Nicholson (2001), Young (1998), Lin (2002) and Moffett (2006). There is a lack of research on the adjustment issues of international students in developing countries like China. The growing number of international students enrolled in Chinese higher institutions each year has called attention to help international students adjust to the living and learning environment in China. The current research meets the need.The current study is then to investigate the difficulties in the process of adjustment of Korean international students to the Chinese learning environment, and to explore the predictors for their academic and interaction adjustment as well as the strategies they use in coping with Chinese inefficiency and interacting with Chinese teachers and students. Both qualitative and quantitative methods are used to solicit information from the participants in the study. The quantitative part of the study includes 41 questionnaires. The qualitative part includes 7 semi-structured in-depth interviews, informal interviews with the faculty and the class-observation. The subjects participating in the survey and the in-depth interviews are the Korean international students in a key university in China.The results of this study suggest that Korean international students have a moderate academic adjustment, while the variables covered in academic adjustment have no significant effects on their academic adjustment. Chinese language proficiency is not found to contribute significantly to the academic adjustment. They adjust well to Chinese education system. Korean international students are fairly satisfied with their interaction with Chinese. Cultural identification with the host, perceived personal similarities, positive expectations, quality of contact with the host, attitude of the host and host receptivity variables contribute greatly to international students'interaction adjustment in Chinese learning environment. A multiple regression test shows perceived similarities and attitude of the host toward international students have the strongest predictive power for their interaction adjustment. Demographic variables have some predictive power for international students'adjustment. Female Korean international students have more difficulty in academic adjustment and interaction adjustment, indicating female Koreans less adjusted to the Chinese learning environment. It is also found that the older the international students are, the less they adjust in learning and interacting with Chinese. Length of stay in China has significant impact on their academic adjustment and amount or kinds of difficulty they experience in Chinese learning environment. In coping with Chinese inefficiency, most preferred strategy is to look up in the dictionary followed by avoidance of the topic, co-national help and using English. In terms of interpersonal interaction, the majority of the Korean international students choose to stay with their co-nationals. The rest three strategies in order of frequencies are sharing, support and initiative. Recommendations for Chinese educators and administrators and suggestions for further research on this topic are also discussed. Future research should extend the range of nationalities of international students in Chinese higher institutions to generalize more common factors and predictors for their successful academic and interaction adjustment, to explore and classify the causes for their experienced difficulties in adjustment and longitudinal research is recommended for future research which allows observing the adjustment process over time.