An Exploratory Study of Chinese University Undergraduates’ Global Competence: Effects of Internationalisation at Home and Motivation

Abstract

Global competence is categorised into three dimensions: knowledge, skills/experience and attitudes. This study aims to investigate the global competence discrepancies of Chinese undergraduates in universities and regions of different development levels, as well as the effects of internationalisation efforts at home and students’ motivation on global competence. To this end, 2,695 students within nine universities (three 985 project universities, three 211 project universities and three provincial universities) in three Chinese cities (Beijing, Nanjing and Changchun) participated in this survey. The findings revealed that Chinese undergraduates have positive global attitudes, but they seem to lack sufficient global knowledge. Students from 985 project universities reported gaining higher global competence than students from 211 project and provincial universities, and students from Beijing reported higher global competence than students from Nanjing and Changchun. Competence discrepancies concerning fields of study were also found. The results of hierarchical regression analysis suggest that gender, 985 and 211 project universities, Beijing city, social sciences and humanities, experience of contact with foreigners on campus activities, enrolment in courses related to internationalisation and students’ motivation were predictive of Chinese students’ global competence.

A Classification Analysis of the High and Low Levels of Global Competence of Secondary Students: Insights from 25 Countries/Regions

“…Mass media [8] Mass migration [8] Time zone differences [8] Contact with foreigners [9] Family influences…”

“…First, students' global competence is enhanced by their international learning environment and experiences [8]. Studying abroad is considered a primary way for students to enhance their global competence by recognizing diversity and engaging more in intercultural communication [9]. Through surveys of college students in a U.S. university and a Korean university, researchers found that cross-and inter-cultural projects also had a significant positive impact on the communication skills and knowledge of the participants [8].…”

“…Previous studies focused on the relevant factors of global competence mainly at the student and school levels, including student experiences, language proficiency, socioeconomic backgrounds of families and parenting [8][9][10] at the student level, and teacher proficiency and school rankings [11][12][13] at the school level. However, few studies target students' global competence disparities.…”

Internacionalização no Ensino Superior e o Brasil como Case Study

“…Diversas são as formas pelas quais as instituições de ensino superior podem se internacionalizar (GUO; GUO, 2017;MENG, ZHU, CAO, 2017;BEDENLIER;KONDAKCI;ZAWACKI-RICHTER, 2018;WIHLBORG;ROBSON, 2018), e de acordo com Alsharari (2019), as oportunidades em acelerar a internacionalização nas instituições de ensino superior incluem a melhoria geral na qualidade da educação, difusão de tecnologia e criação de uma força de trabalho competente globalmente.…”

How to support mobility students to gain soft-competences: Knowledge, Skills and Attitudes

“…This study analyses the support services that students receive for the development and acknowledgement of mobility related knowledge, skills and attitudes. Boyatzis (1982) defines "competence" as the underlying characteristics of the individual causally related to an effective or superior performance in a professional activity; where the individual characteristics are commonly classified in the following three dimensions (Meng et al, 2017): (i) knowledge or the "cognitive" dimension of competence. It refers to all the topics and issues individuals know or need to know to perform a specific task; (ii) skills, the "practical" or applied dimension of competence, which refers to what individuals are able to do or what they need to be able to do to perform a specific task, and (iii) the attitudes (and values) that individuals must espouse in order to perform a specific task effectively.…”