The Relationships Among Sensation Seeking,Intercultural Contact And Cultural Intelligence Of College Students

In the context of globalization,intercultural communication is becoming increasingly frequent.Intercultural competence has become a new indicator of high-quality talents.In China,foreign language education remains as the main channel to cultivate talents with intercultural competence.Domestic universities attach great importance to the cultivation of talents with intercultural competence that is regarded as one of the important goals of foreign language education.The existing research has confirmed that intercultural contact was closely connected with cultural intelligence.Sensation seekers had the tendency to seek novelty by creating diverse social ways,which presupposed that sensation seeking was related to intercultural communication.However,few research has been conducted to explore the relationships among the three constructs.Therefore,this research aims at exploring the status quo of domestic college students’ sensation seeking,intercultural contact and cultural intelligence,and investigating the relationships among the three constructs.The present research is expected to provide implications and suggestions for the cultivation of college students’ cultural intelligence.Based on the above research objectives,the following research hypotheses were proposed:(1)Sensation seeking has a predictive effect on intercultural contact;(2)Sensation seeking has a predictive effect on cultural intelligence;(3)Sensation seeking could influence cultural intelligence through intercultural contact.With the method of questionnaire survey,this research was participated by 1576 students in an agricultural university.With 1070 valid samples,SPSS software and PROCESS program were employed to carry out data statistics and analysis on the responses of participants.The research findings are as follows:(1)College students’ sensation seeking was at the median-high level;(2)The overall level of college students’ intercultural contact was relatively low.Up to now,with a lack of direct contact,indirect contact(contact with cultural products of different cultures)still remained as the main way of intercultural contact;(3)College students had a high evaluation of their own cultural intelligence,but among the four dimensions of cultural intelligence,cognitive cultural intelligence was at a relatively lower level;(4)Sensation seeking had a positive predictive effect on intercultural contact and cultural intelligence;(5)Sensation seeking could influence cultural intelligence through intercultural contact.Based on the above findings,the implications of this study are as follows:(1)Sensation seeking plays a crucial role in intercultural research,and researchers should conduct intercultural research based on a holistic and connective view;(2)Universities should regard the cultivation of cultural intelligence as a goal of talents cultivation.They should not only update the curriculum constantly,but also optimize the structure of student enrollment,so as to provide more platforms and resources for the improvement of students’ cultural intelligence;(3)Educators should improve their teaching skills,update their teaching content,and hold more interesting intercultural communication activities in order to offer more opportunities to cultivate students’ intercultural awareness and improve their cultural intelligence;(4)Students should make full use of the platforms and opportunities provided by the universities,and actively participate in the intercultural communication activities.They should be braver to participate in intercultural practice as well.In addition,students should take full advantage of online platforms and be more active to acquire intercultural knowledge in order to promote their own cultural intelligence and intercultural competence.