The role of cultural pressures and group favouritism in shaping Syrian refugees’ identity in the Jordanian work environment

This study seeks to understand the cultural inclusion/exclusion practices that Syrian refugees encounter in the Jordanian work environment, explore whether an ingroup (Jordanian) over outgroup (Syrian refugees) favouritism exists and how such favouritism reshapes Syrian refugees’ social identity in this new environment. Drawing on qualitative-semi structured interviews with 12 Syrian refugees in Jordan, the study highlights different multi-layered cultural exclusion/inclusion practices that Syrian refugees in Jordan face. Through a combined underpinning of social identity theory (SIT) (Tajfel & Turner, 1979) and the acculturation framework (Arends-Tóth & van de Vijver, 2006), the study reports how these practices re-shape Syrian refugees’ identity around vocational skills. We go beyond the basic types of discrimination against refugees (e.g., gender, race, religion) to highlight economic and legal restrictions as important promoters of cultural exclusion despite the strong cultural cohesion factors. This highlights the significant role of community and societal practices that can go beyond cultural differences between groups, and extend our understanding of SIT.     

Consensual and individual stereotypic beliefs about international students among American host nationals

The present study examined the consensual stereotype of an extraordinarily heterogeneous social group, international students who are sojourning in the United States, among American host nationals. The content and valence of the cultural stereotype was assessed using a multicomponent, free-response methodology with N=100 American college students. On the whole, consensual and individual stereotypic representations of international students were somewhat favorable, although a number of negative attributes were consistently ascribed to the group. The percentages of agreement among participants concerning the attributes of foreign students were substantial, indicating that international students are regarded as a fairly homogenous outgroup by domestic students, notwithstanding the extreme heterogeneity of the foreign student population. Individual stereotypic beliefs about international students were significantly correlated with overall attitudes and behaviors (social contact) toward the group. The negative evaluative content of participants’ individual stereotypic beliefs was strongly related to prejudicial attitudes and social avoidance of the group.     

Effects of Japanese national identification on attitudes toward learning English and self-assessed English proficiency

This research examined effects of Japanese national identification and attitude toward the United States on attitude toward learning English and self-assessed English proficiency among a sample of Japanese university students (N = 377). We assessed various components of Japanese national identification drawn from previous work by Kosterman and Feshbach [Kosterman, R., & Feshbach, S. (1989). Towards a measure of patriotic and nationalistic attitudes. Political Psychology, 10, 257–274] and Karasawa [Karasawa, M. (2002). Patriotism, nationalism, and internationalism among Japanese citizens: An etic-emic approach. Political Psychology, 23(4), 645–666], specifically: patriotism (positive identification with and affective attachment to country), nationalism (perceptions of national superiority and support for national dominance), internationalism (support for international goodwill and cooperation), and commitment to national heritage (devotion to national symbols and cultural heritage). Patriotism predicted less positive attitudes toward learning English, whereas nationalism, internationalism, and pro-U.S. attitudes predicted more positive attitudes toward learning English. Nationalism also predicted higher self-assessed English proficiency. These relationships remained after controlling for the instrumental value of English and demographic factors in multiple regression equations. Our findings highlight the need for closer examination of specific aspects of Japanese national identification, and their relationships with Japanese attitudes toward the English language.     

Mixed Methods Research – Nonverbal Observations of Cultural Convergence in Online and Offline Contexts: Testing Hall’s Low- Vs. High-Context Framework

ABSTRACT

Extending the existing low- and high-context culture theoretical framework, the current research examined the extent to which globalization has shaped low- and high-context cultures in relation to nonverbal communication. The current study employed an exploratory sequential design mixed research method. The first phase of the study observed cultural convergence evident in people’s nonverbal communication in real life and reported the observations qualitatively. In the second phase of the study, a quantitative content analysis was carried out. The content analysis, namely sentiment analysis, examined the occurrences of people of diverse nationalities expressing their emotions when they provide reviews of airlines on a travel website and empirically test the relevance of low- and high-context theoretical framework in the era of globalization. A total of 85,228 reviews of 592 airlines available on a travel website were downloaded using a web crawler. The qualified records used for analysis included records from the following regions: Africa, Asia, Australia, Latin America, Northwestern Europe, Southern Europe, and United States. An analysis of variance on the number of words people used in writing travel reviews online yielded significant variations among the seven regions. This data also sheds light on cultural convergence.