Research On The Use Of Online Media By Chinese Overseas Students In America And BII

The global development of the world accelerates the personnel mobility across borders and people living in alien places are inevitably confronted with conflicts or integration,mutual exclusion or coexistence of two or even more cultures.How can we improve the bicultural identity integration level and relieve the cultural pressure so as to lead a better life in a different cultural environment? In this paper,the focus is the role of network media as “human extension” in the process of cultural adaptation.In this study,based on the theory of Bicultural Identity Integration(BII),with Chinese students who study further in America as study objects,whether the use of network media influences the BII and its specific influencing mechanism are explored through questionnaire and in-depth interviews.As found by this study,the use of network media by overseas students is relatively frequent,showing relatively high overall level of BII.It can be found from the layered regression analysis on questionnaire data that the use of Chinese network media by overseas students positively influences the level of BII and this effect acts through two approaches.The first one is the direct approach,that is,the direct positive influence exerted by the use of Chinese network media on the level of BII.The second one is the approach with the original social connection and cultural pressure as dual mediators,that is,the use of Chinese network media that reduces the different cultural pressure level through maintaining the social connection among Chinese culture group members and further positively influences BII.The third one is the approach with new social connection and cross-cultural skills as dual mediators,that is,the use of American network media that promotes the new social connection,improves the cross-cultural contact skills and further exerts positive effects on BII.The fourth one is the approach with cultural pressure as the single mediator,that is,the use of American network media that positively influences BII through influencing the different cultural pressure.It is also found from the study combined with in-depth interviews that Chinese network media can be deemed as the extension of student individuals.The overseas students get contact with the original society and are immersed in the original culture through extended vision and hearing so as to relieve the anxiety and pressure arising out of strange cultural environments.Meanwhile,American network media is playing a more functional role.The new society presented by the media helps to expand the vision of multi-cultural values and improve the skills of cross-cultural contact so as to improve the subjective will to understand and appreciate cultural differences.BII not only facilitates the cultural adaption of individuals at the micro level,but is also conducive to cultural communication and talent recruitment at the social level.This study finds that both the use of Chinese and American network medias and the BII exert positive effects on the willing to spread Chinese culture while the use of Chinese network media exerts positive effects on the willing to return to China.In this study,from the perspective of media use,the action mechanism model of use of network media on BII is established to add new dimensions to the former variables of the theory of bicultural identity integration,enrich the study perspectives and provide enlightenment for construction of mutual understanding between Chinese and American cultural group members from the perspective of communication.