Challenges Students Face in Multicultural Group Work: Group Management, Feedback, and Contribution

• In Event: Internationally Distributed Collaboration With School-Aged Learners and Teachers

Abstract

A well-documented body of literature relevant to IDC demonstrates the positive relationship between collaborative learning and student achievement, skill acquisition, persistence, and motivation (see Chen et al., 2018; Johnson & Johnson, 2009; Kyndt et al., 2013; Slavin, 2017 for reviews). At the same time, student groups are becoming more intercultural as student populations of universities around the world are becoming more international (De Wit, 2016). These international students bring their own culture-based learning and working style into the classrooms.
Benefits of collaborating in multicultural groups that reported include, among others, increased self-awareness, new interaction skills, new ideas and learning practices, development of perspective-taking abilities, reduction of prejudices, and opportunities to make new friends (Frambach et al., 2014; Spencer-Oatey & Dauber 2016). The question is whether this learning outcome is always accomplished. Challenges students face in multicultural group work might affect the outcome and hamper the learning (Mittelmeier et al., 2018; Spencer-Oatey & Dauber, 2017).
This study aims to contribute to this body of knowledge by providing new insights into the first research strand, i.e. how group members’ cultural backgrounds affect their understanding of a collaborative situation and their demonstrated behaviors in a collaborative situation. While some research has been carried out on students’ experiences of multicultural group work, it remains unclear how students’ interpretations of these challenges relate to cultural differences.
A selection of 281 reflective journals written by students from 2009 to 2016 as part of the Intercultural Communication Skills course at a Netherlands university was analyzed. These journals were written by 210 Dutch students, 38 European (non-Dutch) students, and 33 Asian students. The quantitative analysis showed that the main challenges were related to group management, contribution to group work, and feedback. Asian students reported challenges related to feedback significantly more often compared to Dutch and other European students. The qualitative analysis showed that the concerns of Dutch, European, and Asian students differed in terms of interaction and communication styles stemming from various learning cultures.
The outcome of this study is relevant for IDC researchers, instructional designers, and for students who struggle with questions, such as “What are appropriate and effective group work assignments in the international classrooms?” and “How can we facilitate learning among students who have been trained in culturally very different educational environments?” Part of the answer lies in the design of collaborative learning environments where cultural differences are, at the very least, accommodated, and perhaps even leveraged effectively, to promote learning. If this is not done, the educational effectiveness of multicultural group work may not be achieved.

Author

• Vitaliy Popov, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor