International exchange participants’ cross-cultural adaptations in an aiesec exchange program

• Main Author: Lê, Hương Giang
• Other Authors: Nguyễn, Thanh Hà
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: ĐHQGHN 2020
• Subjects: Tiếng Anh; Thích nghi đa văn hóa; Trao đổi sinh viên
• Online Access: http://repository.vnu.edu.vn/handle/VNU_123/95487
• Institution: Vietnam National University, Hanoi

The present study examines the cross-cultural adaptation of the international exchange participants who took part in an exchange program hosted by AIESEC in Hanoi organization. Specifically, it focuses on finding the factors influencing the adaptation process and the adaptive changes that took place. The study is qualitative in nature. Semi-constructed interviews were used to gather the data among three research participants and analyzed with inductive thematic analysis. The findings highlight several factors affecting the exchange participants’ adaptation during the six-week program. Environmental factors include host receptivity and organizational activities while the individual factors concern personality, communication competence, preparedness and cultural distance. Regarding the adaptive changes, there is evidence that the participants undergo various transformative changes in terms of attitude, behaviour and knowledge. These changes occur in the form of new cultural knowledge gain, transformed perspective and attitudes, and adoption of new coping strategies for tribulations of the host environment. Also, there is little evidence that the exchange participants abandon their old cultural habits in their time in the program.