Do Demographics Matter? The Relationship between Student Characteristics and Intercultural Competence

ABSTRACT

There is ample evidence that intercultural and global learning programmes can create meaningful experiences for students. Despite the consensus on the importance of intercultural competence, the processes of how students gain these skills remain ambiguous. There is a lack of concluding research on the extent to which personal characteristics can affect intercultural competence, making it difficult to capture the true impact of these programmes on students. Using Bennett’s Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity, this study seeks to understand if student characteristics can influence intercultural competence. The data was collected from a convenience sample of 117 undergraduate students participating in four types of international and intercultural experiences. The Intercultural Development Inventory pre-test was used as an assessment tool to measure students’ intercultural competence. Applied descriptive statistics results summarised the dataset, followed by inferential statistics (simple regression, multiple regression, and chi-square test). The results indicate that 7.69% of students have an ethnorelative worldview, while 55.5% are in the transition stage from a monocultural to an ethnorelative mindset. Findings complement previous studies that race/ethnicity and gender are significant variables impacting intercultural competence. Our results provide a framework to higher education professionals for effective curriculum design and more accurate assessments of programme effectiveness.

KEYWORDS:

• Intercultural development inventory
• study abroad
• intercultural competence
• development model of intercultural sensitivity
• global learning

Disclosure statement

We have no known conflict of interest to disclose.

Notes

1. The common demographic factors recognized in this 2020 study included gender, age, education level, linguistic capability, birth country, and religion.

2. Previous experiences with diversity comprised of three sub-questions that are explained in the method section under independent variables.

3. Intercultural sensitivity was defined as, “the ability to discriminate and experience relevant cultural differences” (Hammer et al., 2003, p. 422).

4. It must be noted here that these studies used a pre-and post-test to determine the impact of a specific intervention on students’ intercultural competence development while our study only utilized a pre-test with no post-test to evaluate a convenience sample of undergraduate students participating in intercultural/international experiences and determine their intercultural competence levels based on their specific characteristics ((academic standing, major, gender, race/ethnicity, first-generation status, linguistic ability, household income and previous experiences with diversity and experiences living abroad).

5. Spitzberg and Changnon (2009) grouped theories of intercultural competence into adaptational, causal, compositional, co-orientational, and developmental models. A short description of each and a modified version of their classification with additional theories can be found in the Appendix.

6. Participants were recruited from two domestic programmes, the Global Citizenship Certificate and the Collaborative Online International Learning virtual exchange, and two study abroad programmes, Global Exchanges and First Year Abroad. Each programme is discussed in the Method section.

7. FSU-IRB approval was received to conduct the study. The institutional assurance number is IRB00000254.

8. Phase Two of the research was in progress during the writing of this paper. It also included the administration of an IDI post-test to the same participants.

9. Strength of the relationship was based on the beta coefficient for each independent variable.

10. One participant overestimated their competence by 53.81 points.

11. The orientation gap (O.G.) score measured the difference between the perceived orientation (P.O.) score and the developmental orientation (D.O.) score where scores above seven points indicate overestimation of intercultural competence.

12. Since this study focuses on pre-tests only, we merely recommend higher education professionals keep intersectional identities in mind when creating experiences.

13. Results from Phase Two of this study must be included to see how participants progress along DMIS in the different programmes to yield to more robust results.

14. Academic standing was used in place of age, capturing the role of academics and college life in building students’ cognitive maturity. It allowed for ease of statistical analysis by avoiding traditional age ranges (5- or 10-year intervals) for a sample of undergraduate students who are typically 18–21 years old. The category of super seniors was included to mirror data ranges collected by the researchers’ institution.

15. Using college of enrolment allowed for ease of statistical analysis, as opposed to accounting for the 106 baccalaureate programmes offered at the university (Academics, n.d.)

16. Gender, race/ethnicity and household income mirrored the demographic categories collected by FSU.

17. This was a binary nominal variable used to identify students whose parents do not have a bachelor’s degree, usually making them the first to attend college in their family. FSU has had a strong first-generation programme for students from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds (Center for Academic Retention and Enhancement, n.d.). This variable provided a better understanding of the reach of intercultural competence interventions to non-traditional students. Including these students was crucial because of their increasing numbers in higher education institutions and their lack of participation in global learning opportunities on campus and in study abroad (Whitehead, 2015).

18. This was a binary variable where the participant indicated their ability to speak more than one language. Monolingualism meant they were proficient in English only, while proficiency in more than one language was indicated as being bi- or multi-lingual. Participants were neither asked how many and which language they spoke, nor how they acquired that language. Although the information on the number of languages spoken and the mode of language acquisition was found to be important to study how students process interactions with other cultures in other intercultural competence development literature, these specifics were not seen as instrumental in this study.

19. This measured the duration a participant previously lived outside the U.S. for travelling, living, or studying abroad. Since the overwhelming proportion of the sample was comprised of U.S. residents, they had to report the time spent out of the U.S. participants were not asked about their countries of birth or citizenship or if they were international students. It was assumed some students might have counted their years growing up in a different country as years spent living outside of the U.S.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any grant funding from agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes on contributors

Elçin Haskollar

Elçin Haskollar, Ph.D. is the Programme Director for Global Citizenship Certificate at the Center for Global Engagement, Florida State University.

Tanu Kohli Bagwe

Tanu Kohli Bagwe, Ph.D. is a Teaching Faculty for Global Citizenship Certificate at the Center for Global Engagement, Florida State University.