Defining Acculturative Dissonance and Developing a Model of Expatriate Acculturative Stress

CHAPTER 24 Defining Acculturative Dissonance and Developing a Model of Expatriate Acculturative Stress Waheeda Lillevik Introduction Outsourcing, globalization, and technology have all contributed to the increased mobility of individuals and workers all across the world. This movement has resulted in individuals becoming bi- and multi- cultural through the increased contact and interaction of individuals with differing backgrounds, customs, languages, and expectations. The employment of expatriates to develop subsidiary posts and engage in employment assignments in foreign locations has also seen continued activity. Such movement entails a considerable amount of learning on the part of the expatriate with respect to the host culture into which he or she enters. This learning provides the basis for the acculturation efforts that he or she must undertake in order to increase the likeli- hood of success for international assignments. In most cases, however, regardless of the steps taken to acculturate to the unfamiliar culture, expatriates experience some degree of emotional disturbance during this transition (Mumford, 1998). Such intercultural contact can happen domestically or abroad. Even moving within a nation can result in individuals having to learn new customs, terminology, and general methods of doing things integral for basic functioning. Having said this, much of the research done in this area in the business arena has been carried out in training efforts A. A. Camillo (ed.), Global Enterprise Management © Angelo A. Camillo 2015 192 M Waheeda Lillevik to prepare expatriates for foreign corporate assignments, with the goal of minimizing what is popularly known as “culture shock” (Oberg, 1960) and maximizing the potential for a successful overseas mission. A considerable amount of this overseas preparation involves language instruction (where appropriate) and learning the customs, values, and so forth of the host country. A common element of orientation for an expatriate is engaging in a predeparture visit to the host country (Solomon, 1994). Of course, it is not possible to fully and completely acculturate to another culture or nation through all of these efforts. While these actions represent honest and meaningful attempts at understanding a new culture, there is little substitute for immersion into a culture and sustained interaction with members and artifacts from that culture. Studies have shown that the use of the above preparatory predeparture training activities has helped in increasing the success rates of acculturation of foreign expatriates (see Waxin & Panaccio, 2005); however, a gap in the level of cultural expectations of the expatriate prior to arrival and the reality of the cultural impact that an individual experiences is highly likely to exist. This phenomenon is introduced and defined in this chapter as acculturative dissonance. Acculturative dissonance is an important element to consider when assessing employees for foreign work assignments, as expectations can play a huge role in the success of an overseas assignment. The nega- tive consequences of a failed assignment can include tangible costs such as poor performance, reduced efficiency, and damaged relationships, while individual, less visible costs include diminished self-esteem and confidence on the part of the expatriate (Mendenhall & Oddou, 1985). This chapter will first discuss the definition of acculturation and the term “culture shock,” along with development of the concept of “acculturative dissonance.” Acculturative dissonance will be further discussed as a possible antecedent of acculturative stress, and a model for this will be outlined. The chapter will conclude with future directions for research in the area of acculturative dissonance, acculturative stress, and cross-cultural training. Acculturation and Culture Shock Acculturation Individuals must make adjustments and changes to their feelings, behaviors, attitudes, and other characteristics, consciously or subconsciously, Defining Acculturative Dissonance M 193 when they experience a new cultural environment. The concept of acculturation first appeared in the late nineteenth century (Al-Omari & Pallikkathayil, 2008; Berry, 1980). Acculturation has been defined as a process in which individuals experience cultural change and adaptation from interacting with others from different cultures (Gibson, 2001; Redfield et al., 1936). Some researchers examine this process from the perspective of the migrating group only, describing their adaptation to the “host” culture (Amer & Hovey, 2007); however, acculturation can occur in both minority and majority groups when these groups interact. As immigration has increased in the United States over the past century, concerns over intercultural contact and subsequent acculturation have also grown. Expatriates often experience difficulty in attempting to fully acculturate to their new environment. Doing so requires that they learn and adapt to a variety of different social arenas. Black (1988) classifies these into three main domains: work adjustment, relational adjustment, and general adjustment. This is especially difficult to achieve in a discrete period of time, as learning and internalizing the new values and behaviors often requires some level of transformation of one’s self-identity (Ryder et al., 2000). Culture is important to shaping an individual, and his or her self-identity is a reflection of the larger culture to which the individual belongs (Al-Omari & Pallikkathayil, 2008). As a cognitively and emotionally acceptable compromise, frequently these workers selec- tively adopt the values and behaviors that they consider appropriate and congruent to their own culture (Zakaria, 2000). Such “safe” adoptions typically do not rattle one’s self-identity dramatically at the outset of the overseas assignment. Bandura’s (1977) social learning theory is one of the main pillars upon which the notion that cross-cultural training can help the acculturation process for expatriates is based. Since training can assist and accelerate the process of learning a new culture for expatriates through observation and experience (both directly and indirectly), facing the consequences of various behaviors and ideally, the subsequent modeling of desirable behaviors (Bhagat & Prien, 1996; Black & Mendenhall, 1990) should minimize the level of culture shock experienced. The Concept of Culture Shock While the idea of “culture shock” is popularized and well known, this is not an area that is well investigated in the literature, and as a result, has some different connotations. It is often used descriptively and 194 M Waheeda Lillevik anecdotally (Sims & Schraeder, 2004), with the assumption that the meaning is known and accepted. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary (2009) defines culture shock as “a sense of confusion and uncertainty some- times with feelings of anxiety that may affect people exposed to an alien culture or environment without adequate preparation.” One of the first definitions of culture shock was offered by Oberg (1960). He identifies it as strain and anxiety that result from intercultural contact. This can include feelings of loss and confusion resulting from loss of familiar cultural cues and social rules (Oberg, 1960). Taft (1977) further outlined six different and distinct aspects of culture shock, which include strain from the effort of psychological adaptation, a sense of loss due to lost relationships, rejection by and of others, and confusion and ambiguity over role expectations and identity, and this outline of culture shock has been reinforced by Furnham and Bochner (1986). According to Smith (2008), culture shock is an anxiety that one experiences that is context specific. He defines in his paper the concept as often accompanying “intercultural communication encounters” (Smith, 2008). It manifests as frustration that one experiences when one is overwhelmed by too many uninterpretable cues in one’s new environment (Adler, 1997). Dodd (1997) views culture shock as a process that occurs in four stages: i) eager expectation, ii) everything is beautiful, iii) everything is awful, and iv) everything is okay (Dodd, 1997). Taft (1977) reviewed various definitions of culture shock, summarizing the term as a feeling of impo- tence arising from dealing with one’s new environment, due to lack of familiarity and cognitive aspects. The problem with this and other definitions of culture shock is that they are defined in many different ways—it is essentially a wide category of behaviors and experiences. Dodd (1997) views culture shock as a set of stages, rather than a singular feeling, that a sojourner can experience. Oberg (1960) defines culture shock as strain and anxiety, which is more of an outcome, akin to a more recently studied concept, acculturative stress. Taft (1977) identifies a number of factors, including feelings of role confusion, rejection by new colleagues, surprise and anxiety about the aspects of the new culture, identity issues, and loss of status, friends and power. In this definition, symptoms of the experience of engaging in a new culture are defined. Acculturation has been defined as both a process and a state of being (Ward, 1988). However, none of the definitions approach the fundamental reason(s) for the stress, role confusion, anxiety, and so forth that individuals experience in their new settings. Most definitions appear to describe the manifestations of this cultural anxiety, without necessarily addressing possible

Load more