Intercultural adjustment and friendship dialectics in international students: A qualitative study

Despite the accelerating increase of international students on American campus, there is still a lack of in-depth understanding of how these individuals make sense of their adjustment journey or how they construct meaning concerning their friendship development experience. Existing adjustment research tended to focus primarily on the motivational goals of adjustment or the type of friendship network patterns (e.g., host national network, co-national network, or multi-national network) but did not probe deeper into the narratives of international students’ identity-change adjustment processes or the quality of their friendship networks. Using identity negotiation theory as a guide, this study utilized an interpretive methodology to examine the adjustment narratives and friendship stories of 20 international students. The findings revealed three themes: a variety of intercultural adjustment patterns and with a predominant upward trend or M-shaped adjustment trend, the role of cultural expectancy and personal time sense in intercultural friendship development, and identity shock issues and friendship dialectics. The findings have implications for the study of intercultural adjustment process and friendship development pattern especially concerning the intercultural friendship dialectics of feeling visible versus invisible, communication openness versus closedness, and feeling like a guest versus feeling like an alien.