We focus in the current study on associations between personality, multicultural attitudes, and perceived ethnic outgroup distance in the Netherlands. Data were collected among four different ethnic groups (from low to high in terms of ethnic hierarchy): Turkish/Moroccan-Dutch, Antillean/Surinamese-Dutch, Mixed Western immigrants, and Dutch majority group members. We found support for a mediation model in which in all groups multicultural attitudes mediate the relation between personality traits, education level, and age as antecedents, and outgroup distance as outcome; age was the only antecedent that also had a direct effect on outcome. Education was positively related to multiculturalism in the groups high in the hierarchy and unrelated in the groups low in the hierarchy. The association between multicultural attitudes and outgroup distance was negative and stronger for the groups higher in the ethnic hierarchy; hierarchy was unrelated to outgroup distance. Groups higher in the hierarchy scored lower on multicultural attitudes. It was concluded that multicultural attitudes and outgroup distance are important for understanding intergroup dynamics in ethnically diverse societies.
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The development of intercultural competences has become a prominent goal for many study programs in higher education. A widely used frame to measure intercultural competence is Cultural Intelligence (CQ). While empirical research has focused extensively on the development of CQ by means of (student) mobility and long-term training, the effects of short-format trainings – a more cost-effective intervention that can be provided to a large number of participants – remain understudied. Existing findings are inconclusive, and it remains unclear under which conditions, and for whom, short-format interventions are effective in improving participants’ CQ. We propose that CQ development is contingent upon individual differences in multicultural personality traits (operationalized through the Multicultural Personality Questionnaire, MPQ). More specifically, in this study we investigate (1) whether a short-format (6-hour) training improves CQ among higher education students (n = 108), and (2) whether the development of CQ is moderated by students’ social-perceptual and stress-related MPQ trait scores prior to the training. Using a pre and post-test design we found that across the whole sample, all four facets of the CQ increased after the training. We also found that some social-perceptual traits of the MPQ moderated the development of CQ: Social initiative on Metacognitive CQ, Openmindedness on Cognitive CQ, and Social initiative and Openmindedness on Motivational CQ. Additionally, we did not find a moderator effect of stress-related MPQ traits on the development of Behavioral CQ. Based on our findings, we conclude that multicultural personality influences individuals’ susceptibility to intercultural education, underscoring the importance of individualized approaches in intercultural education.
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In this study we measured the effect of COIL on intercultural competence development using a quasi-experimental design. Our sample consisted of 108 undergraduate students from two universities, one located in the Netherlands (NL) and one in the United States (US). Students’ self-reported intercultural competence was measured using a pre-post survey which included the Cultural Intelligence Scale (CQS) and Multicultural Personality Questionnaire (MPQ). Qualitative data were collected to complement our quantitative findings and to give a deeper insight into the student experience. The data showed a significantly bigger increase in intercultural competence for the US experimental group compared to the US control group, supporting our hypothesis that COIL develops intercultural competence. This difference was not observed for the NL students, possibly due to the NL control group being exposed to other international input during the course.
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