Comparative Study On Acculturation Of Chinese Overseas Students In High And Low Contexts

With the development of economy and culture,China and the international community have become closer in education.According to the data,China is the largest source of international students in popular countries such as the United States,Japan and the United Kingdom.However,some western countries have set various barriers for Chinese students to enter and graduate,which adds bumps to the road of Chinese students’ study.The differences in cultural backgrounds in overseas online and offline cross-cultural socialization also bring difficulties in cross-cultural communication for this group,and the Chinese international student group faces great and extreme academic and psychological pressure,and social media has become an important tool for the Chinese international student group to understand local culture and establish social networks.This study uses Edward Hall’s cultural context theory as the research threshold,and adopts a qualitative research method to compare the social media acculturation practices of Chinese students in Japan,a typical high-context culture,and Chinese students in the United States,a typical low-context culture,and the factors influencing their cross-cultural adaptation.Through in-depth interviews with the two groups of Chinese students,it was found that the social media acculturation practices of Chinese students in the U.S.in typical low-context cultures were mainly characterized by active expansion of friendships online and offline,active self-presentation across social circles,and casual interaction beyond real relationships.For Chinese students in Japan,a typical high-context culture,their acculturation practices through social media are characterized by the establishment of social networks based on real relationships,the sharing of daily life around small circles,and discreet interactions that focus on identity and generation.This study adopts the research method of rooted theory and further sets out the research idea to summarize the factors influencing the acculturation behaviors of Chinese students in different contexts through open coding,spindle coding and selective coding into built-in factors that have a constructive effect on acculturation and external factors that have a moderating effect on acculturation.The social,cultural and behavioral factors in the low context culture and the institutional,interaction,communication and cultural factors in the high context culture constitute the influence of contextual factors on acculturation,and the causal relationship between them and acculturation is clarified,so as to summarize the "model of factors influencing acculturation of Chinese international students in the high and low context culture difference".This study further compares the cultural adaptation differences in different contexts,which are characterized as open and tolerant differences and closed and introverted proximity in culture,cognitive differences and detailed differences in behavior,and event-based and relationship-based in communication.The paper offers suggestions for Chinese students and other groups who need to make cross-cultural adaptation.They should abandon cultural stereotypes and change passive adaptation to active adaptation;understand cultural taboos and avoid transgressions;and break out of the circle of cultural self-containment and break the comfort zone of cultural adaptation.In order to reflect on the communication barriers brought about by intercultural communication itself,we provide insights on how to better understand and adapt to foreign cultures.