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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
Chapter 8
Understanding Intercultural Transitions
Learning Objectives
After studying the material in this chapter, students should be able to accomplish the following
objectives:
1. Describe a dialectical approach to cultural transitions.
2. Identify four types of migrant groups.
3. Define cultural adaptation.
4. Identify three approaches to understanding cultural adaptation.
5. Identify individual characteristics that may influence how people adapt.
6. List outcomes of the adaptation process.
7. Define and describe the occurrence of culture shock.
8. Describe the reentry process and how it differs from adaptation to a host culture.
9. Describe a phenomenological approach to understanding cultural adaptation.
10. Describe how the adaptation process is influenced by contextual elements.
11. Explain how different approaches to adaptation are related to cultural identity.
12. Discuss the effect on the identity of living on the border and making multiple returns.
Key Terms
• Assimilation
• Cultural adaptation
• Culture shock
• Explanatory uncertainty
• Fight approach
• Flight approach
• Functional fitness
• Immigrants
• Integration
• Intercultural identity
• Liminality
• Long-term refugees
• Migrant
• Multicultural identity
• Phenomenological approach
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
• Predictive uncertainty
• Psychological health
• Segregation
• Separation
• Short-term refugees
• Social support
• Sojourners
• Transnationalism
• U-curve theory
• Uncertainty reduction
• W-curve theory
Detailed Chapter Outline
I. Thinking Dialectically about Intercultural Transitions
• The privilege–disadvantage dialectic structures some kinds of intercultural transitions.
identities.
II. Types of Migrant Groups
• Migration may be long term or short term and voluntary or involuntary.
o A migrant is an individual who leaves the primary cultural contexts in which he or
she was raised and moves to a new cultural context for an extended period.
o Another type of voluntary traveler is the immigrant. Families who voluntarily
leave one country to settle in another exemplify this type of migrant.
• There is often a fluid and interdependent relationship between the countries that send
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
and those that receive immigrants.
• Countries like the United States welcome some working immigrants, even issuing
skilled migrants are drawn from the overseas student cohort, with similar trends in
Canada, the United States, and Europe.
o A core principle of the 27 countries who belong to the European Union (EU) is
“freedom of movement,” meaning that an EU national may travel to another EU
member state and live, study, or work on an equal basis with native-born
residents.
B. Involuntary Migrants
• Two types of migrants move involuntarily: long-term refugees and short-term
refugees.
o Long-term refugees include people who are forced to relocate permanently because
of war, famine, and oppression.
their host cultures.
III. Migrant–Host Relationships
• The relationships between immigrants and their hosts are very complex, and understanding
these relationships requires a dialectical approach.
• International migration is usually a carefully considered individual or family decision.
• The major reasons to migrate can involve economic and/or noneconomic reasons and
complex push–pull (dialectical) factors.
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
country.
o Migrants crossing borders for noneconomic reasons may be moving to escape
persecution—a push factor. One of the most important noneconomic motivations for
crossing national borders is family unification—a pull factor for family migration
(Martin & Zürcher, 2008).
• The immigrants may be simultaneously accepted and rejected, privileged and
disadvantaged, and relationships may be both static and dynamic.
A. Assimilation
• In an assimilation mode, the individual does not want to maintain an isolated cultural
identity but wants to maintain relationships with other groups in the new culture.
o The migrant is more or less welcomed by the new cultural hosts.
o When this course is freely chosen by everyone, it creates the archetypal “melting
pot.”
o However, when the dominant group forces assimilation, especially on immigrants
whose customs are different from those of the host society, it creates a “pressure
cooker.”
o Heavy doses of discrimination can discourage retention of immigrants’ original
cultural practices (Ruggiero, Taylor, & Lambert, 1996).
B. Separation
• There are two forms of separation.
o The first is when migrants choose to retain their original culture and avoid
interaction with other groups.
▪ This is the mode followed by groups like the Amish, who came to the
United States from Europe in the 18th century.
racial segregation was the established legal norm.
C. Integration
• Integration occurs when migrants have an interest both in maintaining their original
culture and language and in having daily interactions with other groups.
o Integration differs from assimilation; in that it involves a greater interest in
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
maintaining one’s own cultural identity.
D. Cultural Hybridity
• Migrants and their family often combine these different modes of relating to the host
society—at times assimilating, other times integrating, and still other times separating,
forming a cultural hybridity relationship with the host culture.
o They may desire economic assimilation, linguistic integration, and social
separation, producing not the “melting pot” society where everyone was supposed
to try to become the same, but rather a “salad” society, where each group retains a
distinctive flavor but blends together to make up one great society.
o Many people in today’s world who consider themselves the product of many
IV. Cultural Adaptation
• Cultural adaptation is the long-term process of adjusting to and finally feeling
comfortable in a new environment (Kim, 2001, 2005).
o How one adapts depends to some extent on the host environment—whether it is
welcoming or hostile.
A. Social Science Approach
• Many individual characteristics—including age, gender, preparation level, and
expectations—can influence how well migrants adapt (Ward, 1996).
o There is contradictory evidence concerning the effects of age and adaptation.
o On the one hand, younger people may have an easier time adapting because they
are less fixed in their ideas, beliefs, and identities.
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
o Because they adapt more completely, though, they may have more trouble when
they return home.
o On the other hand, older people may have more trouble adapting because they are
less flexible.
o The goal of effective intercultural communication can be reached by reducing
anxiety and seeking information, a process known as uncertainty reduction.
o There are several kinds of uncertainty.
▪ Predictive uncertainty is the inability to predict what someone will say or
do.
▪ Explanatory uncertainty is the inability to explain why people behave as
o Migrants also may need to reduce the anxiety that is present in intercultural
contexts.
o Some level of anxiety is optimal during an interaction.
o Too little anxiety may convey that one doesn’t care about the person, and too
much causes one to focus only on the anxiety and not on the interaction.
empathy) and behaviors, and (3) are complex and flexible in their categorization
of others (e.g., able to identify similarities and differences and avoid stereotypes).
o The situation in which communication occurs is important in this model.
o The most conducive environments are informal, with support from and equal
representation of different groups.
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
as a subcategory of transition shock.
o All transition experiences involve change, including some loss and some gain, for
individuals.
2005).
• Kim suggests that adaptation is a process of stress, adjustment, and growth.
o This model fits very well with our dialectical approach in its emphasis on the
interconnectedness of individual and context in the adaptation process.
stress, clarify uncertainty, and increase a sense of identity and self-esteem (Adelman,
1988).
• Dan Kealey and his colleagues discovered that the most important characteristics in
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
applies best to voluntary transitions.
o There are at least three aspects, or dimensions, of adaptation: (1) psychological
health, (2) functional fitness, and (3) intercultural identity (Kim, 2001).
• Part of adapting involves feeling comfortable in new cultural contexts.
outcome, functional fitness, which involves being able to function in daily life in many
different contexts (Ward, 1996).
o Some psychologists see adaptation mainly as the process of learning new ways of
living and behaving (Ward, Bochner, & Furnham, 2001).
o That is, they view the acquisition of skills as more important than psychological
o Newcomers will become functionally fit more quickly if host members are willing
to communicate and interact with them.
• A potential outcome of adaptation is the development of an intercultural identity.
B. Interpretive Approach
• The interpretive approach focuses on in-depth descriptions of the adaptation process,
common theory is the U-curve theory of adaptation.
o This theory is based on research conducted by a Norwegian sociologist, Sverre
Lysgaard (1955), who interviewed Norwegian students studying in the United
States.
o The main idea is that migrants go through fairly predictable phases in adapting to
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
o The second phase which is culture shock is a relatively short-term feeling of
disorientation, of discomfort due to the unfamiliarity of surroundings, and the lack
of familiar cues in the environment.
term sojourners, it may be too simplistic for other types of migrants (Berry,
1992).
o W-curve theory is a theory of cultural adaptation that suggests that soujourners
experience another U curve upon returning home.
▪ Scholars refer to this process as the W-curve theory of adaptation because
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
▪ Depending on how long the person was away, political figures, popular
culture, family, technology, and even language may have changed.
▪ Sojourners who leave their countries during times of political upheaval and
return when peace is reestablished may have to contend with the
patterns, and coming to understand new information.
❖ In the first phase, migrants realize that their assumptions are wrong
and need to be altered.
❖ In the second phase, migrants slowly begin to make sense of new
patterns, through communication experiences.
during their summer break.
❖ Using a phenomenological approach, she interviewed the students
several times before they left, during their sojourn in France, and after
they returned to the States.
❖ Her findings reflect the embodied, visceral experience of their cultural
cultural values and readily accessible as sources of socialization for
newcomers.
❖ The mass media may play an especially important role in the
beginning stages of adaptation.
C. Critical Approach: Contextual Influences
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
o She maintains that in a country like Japan, which emphasizes homogeneity,
people may be less welcoming toward outsiders than in less homogeneous
settings, as in many contexts in the United States.
• Local institutions, like schools, religious institutions, and social service agencies, can
• The relative status and power of sojourners and host groups also influence adaptation.
• Sometimes the discrimination and class issues result in conflict between recent migrants
and emigrants from the same country who have been in the host country for a long time.
• Individual migrants develop multicultural identities depending on three issues.
o One is the extent to which migrants want to maintain their own identity, language,
ownership of political power.
• As international migration increases and more and more people travel back and forth
among different cultures, the lines between adaptation and reentry become less clear
(Onwumechilia, Nwosu, Jackson, & James-Huges, 2003).
• The experience of living on the border was described by anthropologist Victor Turner
languages, and coherent cultural communities.
• People who move back and forth between cultural worlds often develop a multicultural
identity.
• Communication scholar Radha Hegde (1998) uses the metaphor of swinging on a
trapeze to describe the immigrant’s experience of vacillating between the cultural
patterns of the homeland and the new country.
• Movement between cultures is never as simple as getting on a plane (Clifford, 1992).
Discussion Questions
1. Why does culture shock occur to people who make cultural transitions?
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
2. Why are adaptations to cultures challenging for some people and easier for others?
3. What function does communication play in the cultural adaptation process?
4. How do relations of dominance and power influence adaptation?
5. What factors influence migration patterns?
6. What dialectical tensions can you identify in the process of adjusting to intercultural
transitions?
7. Why is being in a liminal state like living on the threshold?
8. What contextual variables influence communicative interactions during intercultural
transitions?
9. What are some of the different types of relationships that migrants may develop with the
new culture?
10. How does the anxiety and uncertainty management model describe the challenge of
cultural adaptation?
11. How can local institutions and agencies play a part in immigrants’ adaptation?
12. What are some of the outcomes of cultural adaptation?
13. What are some of the challenges that may make reentry adaptation a more difficult
experience than culture shock?
14. What value do you see in using a phenomenological approach?
15. What are the identity challenges that may face people who live on the border?
Classroom Exercises and Chapter Activities
1. Guest Lecture Exercise: Invite two individuals from a college/university or a community
who are immigrants to the United States or who are from the United States but have lived
2. Simulation Exercise: One of the most effective ways to help students identify with the
challenges faced by sojourners is to involve them in a simulation that puts them in the
Box 700, Yarmouth, ME 04096; Tel: (800) 370-2665; fax: (207) 846-5181
2900; fax: (619) 792-9743
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
3. “I Heard the Owl Call My Name” Assignment: This project is designed to familiarize
students with the stages of intercultural adjustment and how people feel about and respond
to the experience by reading the account of someone’s cultural adjustment. In the book I
Heard the Owl Call My Name, Margaret Craven tells the story of a young priest, Mark,
report similar to the one described above.
• Lederer, W. J. & Burdick, E. (1958). The Ugly American. New York: Norton.
4. Intercultural Interview Assignment: The purpose of this assignment is to provide the
opportunity for students to gain an understanding of the challenges faced by people from
other cultures who come to live in the United States. This assignment also gives students
the opportunity to have one-on-one interactions with people from other cultures. Assign
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
Preparing for the Interview
• Plan the interview several weeks before the due date.
• Decide whom you want to interview.
• Think of a suitable place to conduct the interview where both you and the
notes or recorded the interview.
• Prepare your questions so that you are comfortable with how they are worded and are
sure that they are clear and easy to understand. Short questions work better than
detailed questions. Avoid using clichés or slang in the questions.
• Prepare any note-taking equipment.
minutes to share information about each other, your class, or other issues that will
create a relaxed atmosphere.
• Explaining the objective at the start of the interview and confirm that the person is
comfortable with the arrangement you have chosen for recording the interview.
• As you begin to ask the questions you have prepared, listen carefully to the answers,
considerate of the interviewee’s schedule.
• When the interview is finished, thank the interviewee for her or his time. It is always
appropriate to send a thank-you note, and it may be appropriate to send a small gift to
show your appreciation.
Ideas for Interview Questions
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
here?
• What were the most surprising things you found when you arrived in the United
States?
• Did you come by yourself or with family or friends?
• What were your toughest challenges in adjusting to life in the United States?
• Who helped you the most in your adjustment?
• What things made it easier to adjust to living in the United States?
• What do you like best about living in the United States?
• Was it easy to make friends here? Why, or why not?
• What can people in the United States do to make it easier for people from other
countries to adjust to living here?
5. Marginalization Exercise: This exercise will give students the opportunity to learn (at least
in part) what it feels like to be included and excluded in certain interactions. Begin this
exercise by discussing how it feels to be part of an “ingroup” (included) and how it feels to
be excluded or part of an “outgroup.” Then, ask students to do the exercise given below by
6. Variation on the Marginalization Exercise: Show the students a video that highlights the
concept of ingroup and outgroup and then use examples from the video to answer the
questions in the above exercise. Suggested videos are as follows:
7. Cultural Adaptation Assignment: This two- to three-page assignment helps students apply
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Chapter 8: Understanding Intercultural Transitions
their own experience of adaptation to one of the models of cultural adaptation offered in
the textbook. Ask students to write about a major transition they have experienced such as
moving away to college, being an international student, moving to a different community,
getting married, and so on. Have the students describe the transition they experienced, and
then ask them to compare their experience to one or more of the models presented in the
textbook (Anxiety and Uncertainty Management Model, the U-curve Model, the Transition
Model, or the Communication System Model). Ask them to explain how their experience
“fits” the model(s) they have chosen by being as specific as possible and using examples
from their experiences to illustrate the concepts presented in the textbook.
Suggested Videos
1. Overture: Linh from Vietnam (Distributed by LCA, 1981, 26 minutes)
2. The Way of the Willow (Produced by Norwood, MA: Beacon Films; Distributed by New
York, NY: Modern Educational Video Network, 1992, 29 minutes)
3. Bridging the Cultural Gap (Distributed by San Francisco, CA: Griggs Productions, 1983,
28 minutes)
4. Beyond Culture Shock (Distributed by Chicago, IL: Encyclopedia Britannica Educational
5. Welcome Home, Stranger (Distributed by Chicago, IL: Encyclopedia Britannica
Educational Corporation, 1983, 14 minutes)
