Influence Of Culture Shock In Education Services Exports

For more than two centuries,concepts like competitive advantage,exchange rate,wages,relative prices,tariffs and so on have been some of the key points on which academics have focused their efforts to understand the factors that determine how countries trade goods and services in the world.However,some other concepts that could also have a strong influence in certain markets haven?t received enough attention.This is the case for the role of culture in international trade.The main objective of this study is to provide evidence on the relevance of culture shock in international trade in a country like China,where cultural differences remain very strong with most of its trade partners.In order to do so,an analysis was made on the sector of education services exports,a field in which cultural differences matter a great deal.The analysis was undertaken in three ways.First,the statistics of the education sector were gathered to provide an overview of the capacity and the trends of this sector.Second,a survey was conducted among foreign students in China to determine their level of culture shock.Finally,the analysis of the outcome of the survey contrasted with characteristics of students who participated and the Chinese market for education services allowed to identify possible patterns and relations between Chinese exports on education services and the culture shock that foreign students experience whilst in China.This study provides with new academic evidence on the relation between culture and international trade in a field that has not been studied deeper enough.It also exposes the potential of a relatively new market for China and provides a path for further research.