2020 International Conference on the Development and Assessment of Intercultural Competence

Symposium

English

Theory and approaches

This symposium provides an analysis of two separate multinational studies on educational exchange participants’ intercultural development and language proficiency gains measured with an AICC (Assessment of Intercultural Communicative Competence) survey or an IDI with an OPI compared to the perspectives provided by members of the host communities.

Paper 1: The Development and Impact of Intercultural Communicative Competence in Educational Exchange, Alvino Fantini (SIT Graduate Institute)

Findings presented from two multinational research projects on the intercultural experiences of educational exchange participants from Brazil, Ecuador, England, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Switzerland, and the USA, based on quantitative and qualitative data from the responses of over 2,000 sojourners and 200 host families, obtained through AICC survey questionnaires and telephone interviews.

Paper 2: Intercultural Development among Early- and Late-stage L2 Immersion Learners, Dan E. Davidson (Director, American Councils Research Center)

Findings reported on the intercultural communicative development of 400 US year-long immersion students who returned to universities in China, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Morocco and Russia after an 8 week stay the previous summer.  The analysis includes participants’ pre-/post-program IDI and OPI scores and survey responses from participants and their hosts’ abroad.

Paper 3:  A Comparison of Research Findings with the AICC and IDI with an OPI, Paula Garrett-Rucks and Tim Jansa (Georgia State University)

This final session describes a comparative analysis of  the findings reported in the previous sessions  considering the use of different assessment tools—AICC and the IDI with an OPI—in addition to the perspectives provided by members of the host communities. Implications for educational exchange programs and research tools are discussed.