Exploring Aspects of Culture Shock as Experienced by International Students from Thailand

Abstract

Culture shock aspect is such a common issue that experienced among students who study abroad. The causes of culture shock aspect usually are anxiety and the lack of intercultural communication competence. Most of studies in the previous study tend to discuss the importance of intercultural communication competence and only describe the kinds of culture shock. Thus, to fill this empirical void, the aims of this study are to investigate Thai students’ perceptions of intercultural communication competence and how Thai students handle their culture shock during study in Indonesia. In order to understand more about culture shock aspects, the researcher used culture shock and axiety theory by Oberg (1960) and Dörnyei (2005). The study is employed qualitative method. Participants in this research were two Thai students who have lived for more or less 4 years in one of Islamic university in Yogyakarta, they are from different batch and major. The data were obtained by in-depth interview. The researcher analyzed the data by using thematic analysis method by Braun & Clarke (2006). The finding showed that all respondents were experiencing the culture shock symptoms stages, such as tension of adaptation, sense of loss and rejection from environment, rejected by new culture, unpredictable anxiety, and feeling of helplessness at the first time they studied in Indonesia. There was also an interesting finding that both of them had the lack of intercultural communication competence, and also the anxiety leads them to survive in Indonesia