It’s easier to stick together: International students in US colleges and their lack of adaptation to the American culture.
INTRODUCTION
The number of international students enrolling in Americans colleges is greatly increasing every year. According to the IIE (Institute of International Education), 819,644 students were enrolled in the USA in 2012/2013 and their number increases by about seven percent every year. Chinese, Indians and South Koreans constitute the majority of them but nonetheless over 100 different countries are represented within the international student population. This study will follow a phenomenon that can be seen at Minnesota State University Mankato within this population. The phenomenon involves international students interacting little or even not at all with American students and creating a barrier between the two populations. International students lack of awareness towards activities that Americans tend to practice and do not wish to get involved with them and vice versa. I then will be observing International students in public spaces to try to understand where this phenomenon comes from and why it is so drastic. As a participant observer, I will use my own bias to explain how it feels to be in the skin of an International student and try to convey why they separate themselves so much.
In my study I wish to introduce a concept that wasn’t visited a lot in communication studies, the concept of international students that tend to “stick together” instead of including themselves deeper in the American culture. My study will be qualitative as it is an ethnography. I do not wish to make an educated prediction about international students since it is a topic that was not covered thoughtfully as well as since I wish to do my study in one university only. My study would be then qualitative, to gather my data, I wish to observe students in social places on campus as well as interview a few of them through the international student office (5 to 20 students).
TOPIC OF CURIOSITY
Little studies have been done about international students. Their population keeps on growing and creating a new type of cultural sense to the American society. It is hard to understand them as a population with its own culture and customs since each one of them come from over a hundred different countries with already a deeply anchored culture on its own. However international students do have something in common: culture shock and adaptation. As a unity, they are all going through the same struggles as well as have the same need for acceptance and blending in.
A few types of international students can be seen as MNSU. First, the exchange students (under a J-1 visa) are studying in their home country but are taking part to a program that allows them to come to MNSU for a semester to a year. They have a tendency to be less attached to America and their patriotism is stronger since they don’t have as much of a need for acceptation within the US culture. Secondly we have IELI (Intensive English language institute) students (under a F1 visa) who had a score on their TOEFL from 60 to 45 (ITS) and are then not eligible to study at MSU unless they go through this program. This program is made to improve their English either during the summer, before the semester starts, or during the semester with all American students. They are eligible to earn credits but only if when they are done with their program. They usually seek a degree in America, thus stay for four years or more. Lastly International students and transfer students (under a F-1 visa) stay until they earn their degree. They are called degree seeking students and had a score on the TOEFL ITS of 61 or above. I will focus on the later as they are fulfilling the most my criteria. I think as an international student myself that it is categorical for our population to be more involved in the American society and vice versa. This is why I think that it is important to study international students as an entity.
RQ1 Why do International students tend to stay among their peers?
RQ2 Why are International students so hesitant to immerge themselves into American culture?

LITERATURE REVIEW
“International education promotes the relationship building and knowledge exchange between people and communities in the United States and around the world that are necessary to solve global challenges,” said Evan M. Ryan, Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs. It is indeed important to mix cultures in order to see the big picture. By hearing different standpoint you tend to have a more broad and large understanding of the world that surrounds you. In the world that we live and more specifically in the era that we live in, it is crucial to have an understanding of different cultures and society. Our world develops itself and communication oversea is primordial in most businesses nowadays. It is then important to understand and develop our culture by sharing our differences. International students bring that in the USA.
According to the IIE, over eight hundred thousand international students study in the USA, Mankato University has one of the largest diversity in the country of international students. Last semester (fall 2014) 1,228 international students were enrolled at MSU from 90 different countries (Kearney International Students Center).
UNESCO defines culture as the set of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features of society or a social group, that encompasses, not only art and literature, but lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs (UNESCO, 2001).
Coming from a culture entirely different from the one you are in is not without consequences. Culture shock is an experience that every international student has to go through. The Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs describes culture shock as the degree of "shock" which depends on such factors as length of study abroad, flexibility, tolerance for ambiguity, degree of difference between home and host culture, prior experience abroad and his or her expectations (United States Department of States, Exchange Programs). This phase comes with symptoms such as homesickness; depression; feeling lost and out of place; frustration; irritability; and fatigue (United States Department of States, Exchange Programs).
As a way to overcome these symptoms, international students tends to stick with each other as a way to counter balance and ease their passage in this new society. However, most of them tend to not reach for friendships with American students after that stage of culture shock. The importance of interacting with American students both in satisfaction with communication and in adjustment to American culture underscores the central role uncertainty reduction plays in adapting to a new culture (Gudykunst, 1988; Lee and Boster 1991) While it is useful to teach international students behavioral skills, providing opportunity for them to talk with American students seems to be of greater use in assisting their adaptation (Stephanie Zimmermann 1995). These study prove the importance of immerging yourself in the culture in order to fully understand the latter.
While some international students consciously choose to separate themselves from their U.S. American peers and spend time with their co-nationals (Al-Hattami & Al-Ahdal 2014), others wish to establish friendships with US Americans although they feel that the cultural distance and linguistic barriers make it challenging (Trice, 2004). These students tend to come from European countries as the differences between their culture and American culture are not as important and their English skills greater. White students from Europe, particularly those proficient in the English language, are likely to more effortlessly ‘‘fit in’’ with the majority, especially as the cultural norms and values of the dominant society are not as distant from their own (Yeh & Inose, 2003).
Previous studies show the importance for emerging entirely oneself in a new culture as it helps later on to understand better that new environment. They also show how important interaction between American and International students is.
STUDY DESIGN AND METHOD
For this study I would be a Participant as observer through my reflexive ethnography. Reflexive ethnographies provide researchers an opportunity to critically view the experiences of a particular cultural community (Davis, C. S., Powell, H., & Lachlan, K. A., 2013).
My study would be set at Minnesota State University Mankato. The primary places that I would go to in order to observe international students would be the CSU (Centennial Student Union) as well as the library or the Kearney International Student Office. By staying on campus I ensure that I would be in a public place observing people which would not require any IRB approval.
In these places I would take notes of the occurrence of key words that I hear in conversations between international students and American students. An example of keywords would be “Does that make sense?”; “I don’t understand”; “What does that mean?”
Later on I would come back to these places and take notes of how international students interact with each other and try to find patterns in their speech that would convey the fact that they feel understood among them.
Later on I would do an interview with key informant in order to get more information on how international students feel towards American students and the same vice versa in order to get an answer of why it is hard for them to interact with the others. During these ethnography interviews, I would use funnel questions such as “How do you feel about international students?” to “why do you think American students don’t try to engage conversation more with international students?”(To an American student) or “How do you feel about American students” to “Do you feel like it is easier for you to hang out with only international students?” (to an International student).
I would recruit these people through the Kearney international student office. I would send a chain of emails and say what my study is about with hopefully get an answer from them in order to interview them. I would ask Donna Casula for the email address of the international students in school by explaining to her my project and ask for RIB approval from MNSU and pass it on for review a second time. RIB approval is necessary for this part of my study since I will talk to students and wish to use their words within my study.
I would be using the SPEAKING framework (Hymes 1962) according to Hymes, the elements of the speaking frame work are used to describe: “what a foreigner must learn about a group’s verbal behavior in order to participate appropriately and effectively in its activities.” (Hymes, 1962, p.16) I would be looking for these elements in the speech patterns that I sampled during my period of observation.
Finally I would run through my data gathered and look for a pattern in it.
In order to maintain reliability in my study, I would run through my data twice to make sure that I would not miss any patterns (intra coder reliability). I would also make sure that my data are reliable with a synchronic measurement which is the similarity of observation within the same time period rather than using a diachronic method which checks the stability of observations over time. This method is less reliable since data is not fixed throughout the time, as time changes things, which why I chose to check my data synchronically. I also chose to divide the number of agreements by total number of agreements + disagreements in order to make sure to get that 90% desirable range of reliability through my data. I although wish to state that my study is qualitative as it is an ethnography and the reliability of my data might be impaired by the fact that my study set place in a specific place with a specific population from a specific time.
In order to check my validity, I wish to make my study to be from an emic point of view (studying behaviors from inside the system since I would be a participant observer and I am an International student). I would also use triangulation with observation, and interviews with several of international students (from 5 to 20 of them for the interviews). Using funnel types of question throughout my interviews, I wish to let the interviewee lead the interview with making it open to argument in order to see more patterns that would help me answer my research question. I want to make sure that my data set helps answer my question and I also want to make sure that my way to collect data is accurate and helps my purpose.
ANTICIPATED RESULTS AND FINDINGS
First, I would transcribe my data that I gathered on campus as an observer as well as the dialogues from my interviews (unstructured text and recordings). As I would use an interim analysis that is circular (non-linear) I would have to analyze my data as I gather them and then code them. Using intra coder analysis, I would have to run all of my data on my own recognizing my bias as I go through with my study.
Then I would start to generate an initial code by making an initial list of items that are recurrent in my transcribed data such as a word, a speech pattern or expressions. Through inductive analysis I would code my data to make a pattern emerge out of them and find the recurrent themes to then be able to seek an answer to my research question. An inductive approach would help me to look for relationships within my data by using emergent framework to group the data (Organize the data, identify framework, sort data into framework, use the framework for descriptive analysis, and then make a second analysis of it).
My results could not be generalized. I would like to use only qualitative methods in my ethnography which would restrain the generalizability of my results. On top of that, my sample would be really limited to one college and one specific population in one specific period of time. Also I do not wish to generalize my results as the topic I am researching has had little research done about it and on a personal stand point I think that it is dangerous to generalize something that wasn’t researched more. I think that for future research studies it would be interesting to use my findings but it has to be taken into account that my study is purely qualitative and does not aim for generalizability. If future research is done on this topic and the researchers wish to make generalize their findings, they must take a broader sample that focuses on international students all across the USA as well as a different method.
CONCLUSION
This study would be meant to help people understand that international students have a culture on their own. As an international student I found that there is an important difference between Americans and international students. International students tend to hangout with each other because they have a lot in common (more than they do with Americans) even though they come from countries with opposite cultures. The fact of going to a country that you are not used to with a different culture gives you a different understanding of the world and brings you and your peers together. At first I had a hard time understanding why it is that way but little by little I understood that everybody needs a family and being so far from your “real” family gives you the need to create a new one. All of us have that need so because of that, we find a family in each other. I would like to create awareness on the fact that American students and International students should have more interactions. Here at MNSU, a lot of festivals and nights are dedicated to International students, “international student festival”, “African night”, “Eurasian night”, “South Asian night”… etc. However a lot of Americans are unware of them and thus don’t go and never have a chance to immerge themselves in “our” culture. Writing this report I started understanding the complexity of giving awareness to people. It also made me open my eyes on the fact that maybe international students is a really sensible subject to study as a “population” since hundreds of cultures are embedded within it. Very few studies have been done on this topic, I was shocked at first knowing the amount of international students that are in the USA, but then I understood that it is a tricky subject to approach. This report truly helped me as well to be more prepared for 485 Senior Seminar and understand how to do a study on my own. In French we say “to put a foot in the caliper”.
I also wish to point out the fact that international students within the world qualify themselves as homeless. As such, looking for a new home is mandatory in order to survive socially. Moreover, the latter lost a sense of home towards their home country. Home is no longer where the family is at but more where your bed is at. It is important to remember that without a home,
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