The relationship between multicultural personality, foreign language mastery and time spent abroad for (international) students.

Keywords

Loading...
Thumbnail Image

Issue Date

2022-08-16

Language

en

Document type

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

Title

ISSN

Volume

Issue

Startpage

Endpage

DOI

Abstract

This research examines whether there is a relationship between multicultural personality, foreign language mastery, time spent abroad and student group (Dutch-taught Dutch students, English-taught Dutch students, international students). In a survey, differences between student groups were studied to determine whether multicultural personality, measured with the Multicultural Personality Questionnaire (MPQ), foreign language mastery and time spent abroad could discriminate between the groups. International students were found to be more open-minded and reported to be more proficient in English than Dutch-taught Dutch students. Moreover, international students spent more months abroad than both Dutch groups. International students were less emotionally stable than Dutch-taught Dutch students and less flexible than English-taught Dutch students. Moreover, number of foreign languages correlated with Open-mindedness, total months abroad and number of visited countries. Selfassessed proficiency correlated with Cultural Empathy, Emotional Stability, total months abroad and number of visited countries. Furthermore, self-assessed proficiency of English predicted Open-mindedness and Emotional Stability, total months abroad predicted number of foreign languages, and number of visited countries predicted self-assessed proficiency of English. Open-mindedness, Flexibility, Social Initiative and total months abroad were to some extent predictive of differences between the student groups. This study contributes to the ongoing research into multicultural personality and will help multinational companies in selecting and training multicultural competent employees.

Description

Citation

Faculty

Faculteit der Letteren