This study investigates Chinese international students' acculturation strategies and pragmatic intentions to address identity conflicts in Hong Kong study experiences through a developmental lens. We treat conflicts and stressors as indicators of active commitments and the process of engagement as strategic, goal-oriented, intentional investments…

International students in U.S. higher education who pursue work must balance personal and professional pressures while seeking employment. While much attention has been given to their experiences of acculturation, stress, and psychological well being, further work is needed to document their personal growth, navigation of economic pressures, and…

As complex phenomena, spirituality and religion defy any single definition and are delineated differently yet often conflated. Despite the confluence of the terms, religion and spirituality are not interchangeable or equivalent. Spirituality aids the process of developing the whole student and affects learning while shaping perspectives and…

This study uses qualitative and quantitative methods to explore the intercultural sensitivity (IS) of international students at an American university--specifically, whether international students' IS improved over the course of a semester on campus. The findings indicate that the participants did not, on average, achieve progress in their levels…

This study examined the results of a post-internship survey and a follow-up survey and interviews with 11 undergraduate students from the University of California in Davis, who worked as volunteers in a ten-week unpaid internship in Japan to examine their perceptions of the challenges and gains of working abroad. The results of the post-internship…

As globalization increases and the international community moves toward greater interdependence, international learning experiences have become a core educational value for many American universities. Although there are various approaches to study abroad programming, the Semester at Sea (SAS) voyage is an understudied global education program.…

The purpose of this longitudinal study was to investigate students' developmental readiness to navigate dissonance and experience transformation as they engaged in an international service-learning program. Using case-study methodology, researchers collected data from a diverse group of 7 graduate students and 5 undergraduate students who…

Globalization continuously shapes our world and influences post-secondary education. This study explored the cultural adaptation process of participants during a short-term study abroad program. Participants experienced stages which included initial feelings, cultural uncertainty, cultural barriers, cultural negativity, academic and career growth,…

Research on the impact of outdoor education mostly consists of assessments of self-esteem and social skills in adventure programs outside of academia. The present exploratory study assessed personal and academic development in undergraduate participants of an interdisciplinary, semester-long, study away learning community in higher education. We…

In this paper, we examine the case of Veronica, an American undergraduate studying abroad in Paris, whose struggles to negotiate linguistic and cultural differences highlight a deeply personal and emotional attempt to reconcile the symbolic values she assigns to her national, ethnic and "imagined" identities. While at first glance this…

Despite the considerable growth of the international student population, positive aspects of their experience have received little attention. The current study combines a Critical Incident Technique methodology and a positive psychology lens to explore the cross-cultural transition of seven international students, focusing on facilitative factors,…

This research project uses the constructive-developmental tradition, in the self-authorship framework of intercultural maturity (King & Baxter Magolda, 2005), to examine the extent to which 12 specific educational experiences may be associated with international undergraduates' learning, development, and perception of campus climate. The study…

The author shares the results of her research with focus groups of Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and atheist students who discussed their religious and spiritual beliefs with her and with each other. She offers these students' words in order to encourage other educators to consider hosting similarly structured conversations and to think about the…

This paper discusses the background and key findings of a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded mixed-method research project (2006-2008) which was designed, within the context of university internationalisation, to provide an investigation of the experiences of first-year international students during their undergraduate…

Growth in US education abroad has been consistently strong for the past decade, surpassing 9 percent annually. Within the field of education abroad, this growth is both exciting and alarming. Education abroad helps students change learning structures, learn new paradigms and become more complex individuals. If a student's structures are not ready…