51. Factors Associated with the Development of Cross-Cultural Social Interaction.
- Author
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Goldsen, Rose K., Suchman, Edward A., and Williams Jr., Robin M.
- Subjects
SOCIAL interaction ,FOREIGN students ,CULTURE diffusion ,COLLEGE student attitudes ,SOCIAL change - Abstract
The article focuses on the factors associated with the development of cross-cultural social interaction. Contact between cultures leads, on the societal level, to cultural diffusion and change; on the individual level, to a process of learning and adjustment. The social scientist, seeking to arrive at generalizations about the nature of what is diffused and changed, and by what process this takes place, is constrained to analyze the events in each situation of culture contact in terms of trans-cultural variables. In seeking to understand the character and the process of social change resulting from the contact of cultures, the social scientist views all situations of culture contact as, so to speak, potential case studies in the search for such trans-cultural variables, and as further opportunities to test their manifestation and interrelationship in one more contact situation. It is from this point of view that the present study of the effect of contacts between American and foreign students at Cornell University are reported here. The total study is designed to investigate this reciprocal effect. The present paper, however, reports oh only one aspect of the research.
- Published
- 1956
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