SIETAR Europa Congress 2007

Can cross-cultural training make matters worse?

Lessons to be learnt from an empirical study of expatriate EFL teachers in Taiwan
Wei Ju Liao Robert Johnson University of Bedfordshire

Outline
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Background Cross-cultural adjustment Classroom management issues Research findings Possible explanations

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Culture shock training Commonly used approaches and tools Problems and pitfalls Essentialism and the small culture paradigm Recommendations

Background

Expatriate English teachers in Taiwan Methodology Hypothesis:

Expatriate English teachers previous cross-cultural training is positively related to their adjustment: i. in the general environment ii. in social interaction with host country nationals iii. in the workplace

Cross-cultural adjustment

What is cross-cultural adjustment? Is there an effective model for researching cross-cultural adjustment?

The framework of international adjustment

Black, Mendenhall & Oddou (1991)

Reported conflicts between East and West in the classroom

In the East (CONFUCIAN) Teaching methods Teacher-centred Focus on grammar and vocabulary Grammar Translation Method In the West (SOCRATIC) Student-centred Focus on using the language Communicative, interactive teaching styles

Purpose of To pass examinations and get To be able to use the learning good marks language for personal interests Roles Teacher serves as role model, Teacher leads students to transmits wisdom of the take responsibility and find ancients their own truth
Based on Cortazzi & Jin, 1996; Li, 1998, 1999; Maley, 1986; Miklitz, 1996.

Research findings

Expected correlation groups

Teachers experiencing culture shock Cross-cultural training matched with homesick, talking about myself with others and Taiwanese students lack of independence
Language ability Levels of culture-shock Influence of students parents

Unexpected correlation groups

Possible explanations

Misleading responses, either due to particular situation or faults in the research design. Taiwan makes foreign expatriates go crazy. The training they received may have been badly designed, clumsily delivered or pitched at the wrong level. The tone of the training may have been too negative leading trainees to expect to have difficulties a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Culture shock training

What is it? Time and resources

Participation
Delivery and quality control Content

Commonly used approaches and tools

Facts about the place Facts about the people Dos and donts Exploring stereotypes The iceberg The U-curve and the stages of adaptation Jolt activities, simulations and role play Cultural dimensions

Conventional

Innovative

Problems and pitfalls

Do some of these activities help to create an impression of polar opposites in the mind of the trainee? Is there too much of an emphasis on the negative, stressful aspects of crossing cultures? If this is the case, can it become a self-fulfilling prophecy? Are we providing trainees with a useful toolkit, a set of strategies or something else?

Essentialism and dualism

Essentialist view of culture The world is divided into mutually exclusive national cultures. People in one culture are essentially different from people in another. Non-essentialist view of culture Cultures can flow, change, intermingle, cut across and through one another, regardless of national frontiers, and have blurred boundaries.

Peoples behaviour is defined and People are influenced by or make use constrained by the culture in of a multiplicity of cultural forms. which they live. To communicate with someone who is foreign or different we must first understand the details or stereotype of their culture. To communicate with anyone who belongs to a group with whom we are unfamiliar, we have to understand the complexity of who s/he is.
(Holliday, Hyde and Kullman, 2004)

The small culture paradigm

Small culture vs large culture The slippery slope of Culturism: reductionism, otherisation, cultural fundamentalism Small culture is:

Any social grouping from a neighbourhood to a work group. A dynamic, ongoing group process which operates in changing circumstances to enable group members to make sense of and operate meaningfully within those circumstances.
(Holliday, 1999)

Recommendations

Institutional: training is not the icing on the cake Personal: trainers must engage in pedagogical reflection and professional development Professional: international standards for cross-cultural training? Design: more effort needed in planning stage; more consideration of pedagogical principles Content: dynamic process not fixed product Evaluation: a measure of effectiveness or a marketing tool?

Questions to consider

What do you think of these research findings? In your experience, does cross-cultural training overemphasize the stressful aspects of crossing cultures? What can trainers do to avoid this kind of negative effect?

Thank you very much

Wei Ju Liao E-mail: weiju.liao@beds.co.uk Robert Johnson E-mail: rpk_johnson@yahoo.co.uk