International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87
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International Journal of Intercultural Relations
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Alien at home: Adjustment strategies of students returningfrom a six-months over-sea’s educational programme�
Ulrich Dettweilera,∗, Ali Ünlüa, Gabriele Lauterbacha, Andrea Leglb,Perikles Simonc, Claudia Kugelmanna
a TUM School of Education, Technische Universität München, Germanyb Dr. von Haunersches Kinderspital, Klinikum der Ludwig Maximilians Universität München, Germanyc Faculty of Social Science, Media and Sport, Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz, Germany
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:Received 12 September 2013Received in revised form 14 October 2014Accepted 21 October 2014
This paper assesses German students’ adjustment strategies after a six months expedi-tionary learning programme on high seas with intercultural encounters in Cuba and CostaRica. A postal survey (N = 128, global response quote rg = .44) has been conducted with stu-dents having returned from four separate learning expeditions from 2008 to 2012. Thestudents reports were coded in five categories, i.e. (1) reintegration narratives (RN), (2)perception of schooling (PoS), (3) self-perception (SP), (4) perceived programme effects(PPE), and (5) social context (SC), which were also quantified on a 5-point Likert-scale.By means of principal components analyses (PCA) and polynominal interpolation (PI), wesearched into underlying distribution patterns in the categories. No significant differenceswere found with respect to gender in the four groups in a one-way ANOVA. However, signif-icant differences with respect to (4) self-perception (SP) and perceived programme effects(PPE) can be referred to group 3. This accords well with the findings of the PCA and PI,which corroborate a U-curve with its apex after eight months at home. It can be shown thatall four cohorts show symptoms of expedition reverse culture shock, which indicates thatpedagogical intervention also after the cruise may be undertaken.
1.1. KUS in the context of international student expeditions and exchange programming in Germany
In recent years, there had been a vivid discourse on international student exchange programming with special intereston intercultural learning in a globalized world. For example, a New Zealand based research group names “exposure to adifferent culture or language” and “the chance to see if you would like to live and work overseas” as the two predominant
motives of students to apply for an international student exchange (Doyle et al., 2010, p. 479).
In the UK, international educational expeditions to promote science among students started in 1932 when the PublicSchools Exploring Society (known today as British Schools Exploring Society (BSES)-Expeditions) ran its first expedition
� Author sequence according to the “sequence-determines-credit” approach (SDC). The sequence of authors reflects the declining importance of theircontribution, as suggested by previous authors (Hunt, 1991; Tscharntke, Hochberg, Rand, Resh, & Krauss, 2007).
∗ Corresponding author at: TUM School of Education, Technische Universität München, Arcisstraße 21, 80333 München, Germany.E-mail address: [email protected] (U. Dettweiler).
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o Finland (Allison, Stott, Felter, & Beames, 2011). “In the UK, there are now more organisations providing educationalxpeditions for young people as school vacation or gap year experiences than ever before” (Stott, Allison, & Von Wald, 2013,. 149).
In Germany, international adventurous expeditions have been run as early as 1925, when two teachers from Kurt Hahn’soarding school “Salem”, Marina Ewald and Otto Baumann, took twenty pupils on a four week school expedition to FinlandVeevers & Allison, 2011). This expedition had no other goal than to master “a long and hazardous expedition” (Hahn, 1930,ited by Veevers & Allison, 2011, p. 11).
However, such international youth expeditions are not very popular in Germany any longer. The vast majority of inter-ational youth programming is organized as (1) student exchange with accommodation in guest families, (2) mutualouth-groups visiting programmes, (3) project-oriented cultural youth-exchange, and (4) multinational work-campsThomas, 2010, p. 20).
In a substantive survey searching into biographical long-term effects of such international student programmes Thomas,hang, and Abt (2007) included N = 589 questionnaires into their data processing. 51% of those students reported that the
nternational experience was a “fitting piece in their biography”, described by the authors as a biographical “mosaic-effect”.or 31% of those 589 students, the experiences abroad gave even impulses for many more positive events and activities“domino-effect”). 12% described no further effects, but found the experience valuable (“nice-to-have-effect”). Only 7%ortrayed the experience as a turning-point, an escape from the known and familiar (turning-point-effect). Interestingly,one of those latter 41 respondents connotes negative consequences to their biographical break-over (Thomas et al., 2007,. 132) and all claim a strong increase in self-competences (Thomas, 2010, p. 22).
In the following, we will present data from an international youth project, the “KUS-Projekt” (Dettweiler & Kugelmann,010; Dettweiler, Kugelmann, & Streifinger, 2011), an expeditionary learning programme on high seas, which was accrediteds pilot project for an alternative “year abroad” by German school authorities in 2007.
.2. Organizational aspects and the programme’s goals
Every year, the traditional sailing vessel Thor Heyerdahl sets sail as an educational institution for 32 boys and girls aged4–16. The “KUSis”1 are all German, most of them even come from the same area of the country, they all attend the sameype of school (Gymnasium = high school), have nearly the same age and come from very similar family backgrounds, whichs academic upper middle class. They have to cover the costs themselves, but there are possibilities to get stipends. WithUS, the youths follow the lead of great explorers like Alexander von Humboldt and Christopher Columbus. They sail fromermany via the Canary Islands into the New World. There, the youngsters explore countries of the Caribbean and themericas during several weeks of layover, where they live with local host-families and attend local schools, but they never
eave their “home-base”, the Thor Heyerdahl, longer than two weeks. The voyage home leads them back to Germany via theermudas and Azores where the focus lies on on-board schooling and personal development (Merk, 2006).
During their six months on board, the students responsibly participate in ship operations, explore foreign countries andultures, and attend school on shore as well as at sea. On board, they follow a rigid regimen of watch duty and schooling. Dueo the particular challenges on board and on shore, they develop personal and social skills (Dettweiler et al., 2011; Kugelmann
Lauterbach, 2011), since the voyage requires mastering new life situations that demand autonomous decision-making.he exceptional framework conditions of the project provide first-hand experience and adventure. The objectives of KUS areffective gender mainstreaming, to strengthen young individuals’ autonomy, initiative taking, and sense of responsibility, asell as to prepare the girls and boys equally for the demands of a complex and globalized world (cf. Dettweiler & Kugelmann,
010; Kugelmann & Lauterbach, 2011).According to the analysis of the students’ diaries and the board-logs, the four cruises, undertaken from 2008 to 2012,
re very constant in their core objective parameters, such as pedagogical setting, crew number, general weather conditions,election process of the students, travel route, etcetera (Kugelmann & Lauterbach, 2011). However, cruise 1 was conductedn another vessel, the Maria Maris, due to a delay in the wharf, and cruise 3 was accompanied by a camera team thatroduced a documentary television series, which was broadcasted nation-wide.
However, the programme ends with the return and there was no formal pedagogical concept offered following up on thee-entry phase has been offered to those students participating in our survey. Our findings challenge this tacit understandingf solely positive effects and support instead Kevin Gaw’s concept of “reverse culture shock” (Gaw, 2000, see below).
. The concept of (expedition) reverse culture shock
.1. U-curve vs. UU (W)-curve models or culture vs. reverse culture shock
The concepts of culture shock, respectively reverse culture shock, have been discussed as resembling U-respectively UUW)-runs of a curve. Hereby, culture shock describes the outgoing phase including the return home (the “first U”), and reverseulture shock the adjustment phase at home (the “second U”, mostly referred to as UU-curve or W-curve).
1 This is the term the students have given themselves.
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The “first U” resembles initial “culture shock”, a concept which has been coined by the cultural anthropologist Cora DuBoisat the first Midwest regional meeting of the Institute of International Education, Chicago, in 1951 (DuBois, 1951, as cited inOberg, 1954), and systematically described by Kalvero Oberg. According to Oberg, culture shock is “an occupational diseaseof people who have been suddenly transplanted abroad” (Oberg, 1954, p. 1). “Culture shock” has definable stages and arelatively predictable progression, known as honeymoon, aggression, humour, and adjustment/acceptance phases. Obergreported that initially, the new environment appeals to individuals (honeymoon) until the alien social cues and failure tofunction in the new society becomes irritating. At this point, the individual may show aggressive behaviour towards the hostcountry, behaving negatively towards the country and its people (aggression). At this stage, the symptoms of culture shockappear to be worst and include, among others:
• psychological strain, sometimes resulting in excessive washing of hands,• sense of loss and feeling of deprivation and helplessness,• feelings of rejection by the new culture,• confusion in role expectation, values and feelings,• surprise and anxiety at realization of cultural differences,• feelings of impotence and inability to cope with, or integrate into the new environment (Oberg, 2006 [1960], p. 142).
After acquiring some knowledge on the culture and language, however, the individual may develop a sense of humourabout the situation and an attitude of putting one’s own experience into perspective to others, who might be in even worsesituations. Finally, the individual starts to adjust to the new social cues and accepts the new behaviours as the way peopleusually live in this new environment.
Even if Oberg has not referred to his theory as a U-curve, only one year after Oberg’s presentation, S. Lysgaard (1955)described the adjustment patterns of international students in a host culture – Norwegian Fulbright grantees visiting theUnited States – explicitly as a U-curve, in which the adjustment process moves “from a higher and more adequate levelthrough a lower and less adequate level toward a return to the higher and more adequate level of coping in the new cultureor cultures” (Pedersen, 1995, p. 3). Judith N. Martin (1984) portrays the U-curve model as the prevalent pattern in cultureshock theory in seven stages: (1) incubation stage, (2) crisis, (3) understanding of host culture, (4) distance to host culture,(5) re-entry, (6) reverse culture shock, and (7) readjustment to the home country, resembling more or less a U-curve for theoutgoing phase. She states that
most researchers include at least a ‘honeymoon phase’ where the sojourner is excited by the experience, followedby a period characterized by confusion or disintegration in confronting new beliefs, values and behaviors. . . . A finalstage is ‘recovery’, or adjustment, characterized by increased sensitivity, understanding and appreciation for the hostculture. . . . [Those] phases have been described in terms of the U-curve of adjustment. (Martin, 1984, p. 117)
Ward, Okura, Kennedy, and Kojima (1998) put the U-curve model on trial and claim that in their study on 35 Japaneseexchange students’ adjustment strategies in New Zealand, they found no empirical support in favour of the U-curve model.This corresponds well with Pedersen’s evaluation of recent literature, who concedes, that “in spite of lack of clear empiricalevidence, there is much support for the U-curve as a convenient model for describing culture-shock. [But b]ecause cultureshock is subjectively complex, it is difficult to measure accurately” (Pedersen, 1995, p. 4).
Gullahorn and Gullahorn (1963) focussed specifically on the re-entry phase and extended the U-curve model to a UU-model (“double u” or “w”-model), claiming that the adjustment symptoms in the re-entry phase resemble the original processabroad. N. Adler (1981) gives empirical evidence based on two hundred government and corporate employees returninghome to Canada that the re-entry phase was even a more difficult transition than the move to the foreign culture. Morerecently, Gaw (2000) reports of students suffering from reverse culture shock after returning from overseas and speaks ofa “process of readjusting, reacculturating, and reassimilating into one’s own home culture after living in a different culturefor a significant period of time” (pp. 83–84).
2.2. Expedition reverse culture shock (ERCS)
A different sort of re-entry shock has been recently reported by Allison, Davis-Berman, and Berman (2011). They foundsymptoms of reverse culture shock in students returning from an expedition to Greenland and labelled it “expedition reverseculture shock”. The adverbial phrase “expedition” seems to be essential, since the outdoor or expeditionary context createspecific outgoing and re-entry phases. The latter has also been attested to adult Australian wilderness adventure programmeinstructors and been referred to as “post-course psychological adjustment” by Lawrence-Wood and Raymond (2011):
Sixty-five percent of staff experienced ‘a sense of loss’ or ‘missing the participants and/or adult staff.’ Seventy-four
percent of staff also indicated that they had ‘difficulty in adjusting back to normal life’ and ‘felt different, just not mynormal self,’ after program completion. (Lawrence-Wood & Raymond, 2011, p. 331)
The main difference between expedition reverse culture shock and reverse culture shock is twofold: Firstly, the outgoingstudents do not primarily encounter an alien host culture in an isolated way, but they rather stay in a peer group which
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erves as a stable “home” base. Thus, the group persists as a stabilizing factor throughout the outgoing phase as well ashrough the re-entry phase. Secondly, the stressing symptoms in the re-adjustment phase back home is more a “self-shock”nd challenges “the sojourners to renegotiate viable identities” (Zaharna, 1989, p. 501) in their old home with their newlycquired self during the expedition/outgoing phase (Dettweiler, 2012). In the following, we want to anchor our findingsetween Allison, Davis-Berman, et al. (2011) concept of ERCS and the U-Curve model of reverse culture shock theory.
. Changes in latitude, changes in attitude: The reference study on ERCS
The focus of Allison, Davis-Berman, et al. (2011) was to gain an initial understanding of young people’s experiences ofeturning home after an expedition. Allison and his colleagues were looking at a group of youth explorers (aged 17–18 years)hat went on a six-week expedition with the British Schools Exploring Society based at the Royal Geographical Society toouth-west Greenland to do science work and conduct journeys on the ice cap. Data was taken six months after the returnome by asking the young explorers to send back a letter in which they should write about any ways in which they thoughthe expedition had impacted them as an individual and as a member of a group. Using a qualitative approach means focusingn individuals’ experiences and thus gaining some insights into the phenomenon of RCS.
They received 19 responses from the 72 letters they had sent (response rate r = .26) and came up with mainly three themesf RCS: (1) Sense of Isolation, (2) Extending the Lessons of the Group, and (3) Using the Group as a Compass for the Future.
. The KUS RCS-research protocol. Methodological and epistemological considerations
Our main research question was to systematically examine the KUS-students’ readjustment strategies after they hadeturned home from the sailing trip. We wanted to seek for patterns in the data that might support or discard the “second” of the UU (W)-curve model, respectively the expedition reverse culture shock (ERCS) model, notwithstanding of anyotential previous experience of culture shock in the outgoing phase (the “first U”). This might have also been an interestingesearch question, which would, however, have had overstressed our financial and personal resources in that survey. Thus,e defined the following two aspects as our guideline for the research design.
Firstly, we wanted to include all of the previous returners into our survey, from whom we had informally learned abouteadjustment problems. This asked for a post hoc examination in a cross-sectional design.
Secondly, we chose a constructivist epistemology, along the lines of “understanding”. The latter methods of data collectionre usually subsumed under “qualitative research methodology”. At the core, our survey applies such “qualitative researchethodology”, and tries to “understand” the phenomenon rather than give proof to a set of hypotheses. However, within
hat constructivist epistemology, we apply “quantitative” statistical methods, both, in the semantic analysis of the texts andhe exploration of data distribution patterns in the core categories.
.1. Data collection
In order to achieve a critical grade of comparability to Allison, Davis-Berman, et al. (2011) findings, we chose a similarethodological approach in the data collection. We sent out letters to all participants of all four KUS-cruises and asked them
o write us back telling us about their experiences after they had returned home. Each subject received a personal noteN = 128) explaining the research goal, a line-numbered, pre-coded (gender and cruise number) template to write on, and aeady-stamped return envelope. Anonymity and independence of the study from the “KUS-Projekt” were ensured. The handritten letters had been transcribed into a word-processing software and additionally been digitalized with pdf-scans.
We received back 56 letters (n1 = 6; n2 = 9; n3 = 20; n4 = 21) which is a global response rate of rg = .44 (cf. Fig. 1). The globalesponse rate can be assumed very high, given a standard value of rs = .05 (Porst, 2001) and Allison’s r = .26, but cruises (1)nd (2) are underrepresented (r1 = .19; r2 = .28) with reference to the other two cruises (r3 = .63; r4 = .66) which leads to a biasn the stochastic interpretation and needs some attention in the statistical model. We explain the increase of motivation toarticipate in the survey and returning their report mainly by the time factor. From the letters we received, the general lifeircumstances and backgrounds across the four groups are rather constant and we do not have any passages in the texts thatint at other reasons than increasing indifference to the research question with growing remoteness from the experience.he relative jump in the response rate after turn 3, i.e. 8–20 months after re-entry, indicates that a certain distance seemso make quite a difference (cf. Fig. 1).
.2. Data interpretation
.2.1. Independent coding of the text with NVivo® live-coding and qualitative content analysis to find core categoriesIn order to achieve sufficient inter-coder reliability of the qualitative interpretation of the data, two coders have applied
ndependent coding strategies. Coder1 accessed the digitalized text with NVivo® live-coding (cf. Bazeley, 2007; Bringer,ohnston, & Brackenridge, 2006; Gibbs, 2002; Lewis, 2004), whereas coder2 performed “classical” content analysis on theand-written material (cf. Flick, Kardorff, & Steinke, 2004). The coders did not specifically look for culture-shock symp-oms, however, since we had asked the students to tell us about their time at home, and how they perceived the re-entry,
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Fig. 1. Displayed is the response rate across the four cruises. Turn 4 indicates returners who have been at home for about 4 weeks, turn 3 for about 8months, turn 2 for about 20 months, and turn 4 for about 32 months. Thus, the indices 1, 2, 3, and 4 refer to the four cruises in historical order: 1 being thefirst cruise, 2 the second and so forth. In order to analyse the effects of re-entry adjustment over time in a cross-sectional design, one needs to flip the order,
because returners from cruise 4 are at home at t1, returners form cruise 3 at t2, and so forth. One can see a sudden drop after cruise 3, i.e. eight monthsafter return, which mirrors a sudden decrease in interest in our research and assumedly the readiness to reflect on their re-entry phase.
re-adjustment was a predominant topic. All authors compared the two coded sets, and five core categories had been extractedas a consensus.
Coder1 produced an NVivo® output on the basis of the core categories, and coder2 re-coded the hand written materialaccordingly. Data are originally in German, and all interpretational operations were conducted in German on the Germantext. Only after the analysis, we have translated those text-chunks that are directly quoted in this paper into English for thesake of international dissemination.
4.2.2. Quantitative cluster analysis with NVivo® and quantitative encoding of the categoriesIn order to gain an overview of the quantitative features of the text, coder1 used NVivo® to produce cluster analy-
ses, including word counts, coding densities, and semantic clusters. Additionally, both coders categorized all text sampleswith respect to the five core categories in an interval scale from −2 to 2 (strong negative manifestation, medium nega-tive manifestation, neutral manifestation, medium positive manifestation, strong positive manifestation) and produced themean-values for each category for each letter. This method is an adaptation of Rössler’s “Inhaltsanalyse” (content analysis)which is designed for communication science (Rössler, 2010) and has recently been described in mathematical terms byFalco and García-Lapresta (2014).
4.2.3. Principal components analysis (PCA) across the five categories and their polynomial interpolation (PI)In order to search for underlying structures in our five categories, we performed Principal Component Analyses (PCA)
with the free software package “R”. “PCA seeks to composite scores of observed variables” (Kasper & Ünlü, 2013, p. 2) ratherthan latent variables, and to “reduce the measured variables to a smaller set of composite components that capture as muchinformation as possible in the measured variables with as few components as possible” (Park, Dailey, & Lemus, 2002, p. 563).
We hypothesized that the coding of the categories produced possibly correlated variables, and PCA allows to convertthose to a set of values of linearly uncorrelated variables, which are called “principal components” after Hotelling (1933)and carry a loading matrix which can be computed rather than estimated. Hence, PCA is not dependent on a critical numberof data and is especially suitable for small sample sizes (Kasper & Ünlü, 2013). Thus, we were able to have a stochasticallyindependent look on each category and account for their distribution patterns across the four cruises by interpolating the
points of mean- and median-values in each category into the “underlying” polynomial function and testing our data againstthe “second” U in the UU (W)-curve theory, which would be mathematically expressed by a 2nd grade polynomial functionwith a > 1.
U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87 77
Fig. 2. Displayed are the coding densities of the five categories across the four cruises. One can see similar distribution patterns over the cruises withtrp
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wo exceptions, i.e. a relative increase of reintegration narratives in cruise 3 (eight months at home), which is consistent with the U-curve model, and aelative low level of reports about perceived programme effects in cruise 4 (four weeks at home), which is consistent with the relative increase of perceivedrogramme effects over time (cf. Fig. 5).
.2.4. Development and test-of-fit of the statistical model and stochastic exploration of significant differences of the groupsIn order to check for non-normal reference points in variables of the PI, and in order to look into potential gender effects,
e compared the mean values of the five categories over the four cruises with one-way ANOVA using Tamhane’s T2 post hocest in SPSS 22, which is designed for situations in which population variances differ and which is rather conservative andobust to small sample sizes (Tamhane, 1979). In order to minimize the level of variance and stabilize the data, we decidedo run the ANOVA on a median-split of the data (Cohen, 1983).
.2.5. Qualitative contextualizationIn the last interpretational step, the findings of the quantitative analysis have been contextualized with anchor examples
n order to discuss the data in their original form. We chose to concentrate on examining only a few “anchor examples”Mayring, 2010) in order to exemplify each topic.
. Empirical findings and data interpretation
.1. General observations on the text
As mentioned in the previous section, five core categories have been emerged from independent encoding of the text:1) reintegration narratives (RN), (2) perception of schooling (PoS), (3) self-perception (SP), (4) perceived programme effectsPPE), and (5) social context (SC). Hereby, the coding densities according to the four sub-groups (coded as “cruise”, turns 1, 2, 3,) show very similar patterns: “perception of schooling” (PoS) and “perceived programme effects” (PPE) are less representedcross all four sub-groups than the other topics. The latter three, “reintegration narratives” (RN), “social context” (SC) andself-perception” (SP) differ in their frequencies across the four sub-groups with a strong peak of reintegration narratives inruise 3 (cf. Fig. 2). The peak in RN might already hint at the U-curve model: this group has had eight months after the return,bviously time enough to go through the valley of “depression, anxiety and discomfort” but timely enough to remember
t vividly and still have an urge to report and reflect. The relative jump in the response rate at cruise 3, also hints into thatirection.
Global semantic cluster analysis using the NVivo® word-count function showed very interesting results with respect tomissing) gender and time-related effects. Among the 20 most frequently used semantically relevant words, independently
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Fig. 3. Displayed are the word frequencies in percentage of coverage with reference to the whole text, according to gender effects. We can clearly see thatout of the 20 most used words, 13 are used by boys and girls in similar distribution patterns. This hints at missing gender differences in the perception ofthe programme and is consistent with the ANOVA group comparisons.
searched among male and female participants across all four sub-groups, 13 words are commonly used by boys and girls(aged 16–20) in similar relative frequencies (cf. Fig. 3).
The words listed can be referred to the five core categories and are congruent to the general observations on the text.That shows that the participants’ topics are consistent across time and gender. The very fact that there does not seemto exist any gender-related differences in the participants’ reporting of the experiences is also backed by the stochasticexploration of the categories showing non-significant mean-value comparisons. This finding is also consistent with thecoders’ phenomenological experiences with the texts. It may be the case that boys and girls are objected to the same difficultiesafter the return, but it is surprising to us that they obviously perceive those obstacles in the same way and develop the samecoping strategies. This might indicate successful gender-mainstreaming on board, which is one of the prominent pedagogicaltopics of the KUS-Projekt, but might also result from the strong pre-selection of the group in the course of a thorough
participant screening and main-streaming.
The analysis of underlying structures, so-called principal components, in our data set offers some interesting insights intothe data-structure. We first performed an analysis of the importance of the components of all variables, and Table 1 shows acorresponding matrix of loadings of the variables on the components. We can see that PC1 accounts for approximately 76%
Table 1Principal component analysis of all variables.
Reported are the importance of the components in a principal component analysis of all variables, and a corresponding matrix of loadings of the variableson the components. We can see that PC1 accounts for approximately 76% of the variation in the data, and that PC2 explains circa 10%. Together, PC1 andPC2 retain about 86% of the total variation in the process of dimensionality reduction. The remaining three components are not taken into account here,since they represent only roughly 14% of the variances in total.
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f the variation in the data, and that PC2 explains circa 10%. Together, PC1 and PC2 retain about 86% of the total variationn the process of dimensionality reduction. The remaining three components are not taken into account here, since theyepresent only roughly 14% of the variances in total.
The corresponding plot over all variables shows a clear and robust U-curve, however, the stationary point of the curveould be at cruise 2 (cf. Fig. 6, light red and grey curves), which seems contradictive to the impression we got from reading
he texts. We therefore analysed the data distributions of each variable across the four cruises individually in a polynomialnterpolation of mean-values, median-values and a robust estimator (Huber, 1981), which will be discussed in detail inhe next chapter. Post hoc testing of the mean-values in the five categories over the four cruises added information on theeliance of the mean-values and lead to a deeper understanding of the variances of the data over the four groups.
.2. Polynomial interpolation and qualitative contextualization across the five categories
.2.1. Reintegration narrativesThe polynomial interpolation of the mean values in that category (RE) – together with a more robust estimator – shows a
ery clear and straight-forward U-curve (cf. Fig. 4, upper left plot). The category “reintegration narratives” subsumes thoseext samples that are most likely to show topics relating to any potential reverse culture shock symptoms.
Shortly after arrival, the students’ reports are quite euphoric about coming home, but we can detect a sudden drop in therst year home.
‘It felt as if nothing had changed at home, as if someone had cut out half a year out of my life and now I continueexactly from that point – and this still makes me afraid.’ (4f)2
After a period of feeling of deprivation, the students seem to cope better with the new situation at home and the spiritso constantly up again. Many of the young sailors claimed that they were really looking forward to seeing their families andriends again, but shortly after arrival back home, they realized that they missed the routines on board of the Thor Heyerdahl,heir “home” for six months, and the separation from their “second family”, the other KUSis, made them feel alien at home:
‘But after a few weeks, one felt like falling into a deep hole [. . .]. The “German every day life” seemed to be completelywithout any sense and I felt the desperate need to do something useful. I also did not get along as well with my friendsat home as before the journey. There were simply too many things one had experienced and was not able to sharewith others, because no one can really comprehend you.’ (3f)
The young sojourners felt as if they had slipped back into daily routine quite fast and it soon became normal to be atome and in school again. Most of the students claimed that one of their strongest impressions was that nothing at homeeemed to have changed.
‘I had the impression that I got accustomed to my old life at home very quickly after the journey. I already kneweverything there was at home. In contrast to life on board of the Thor, nothing new or unexpected ever happens.On board, every day was different and brought something new, whereas at home, I was drawn back into all the oldroutines quite fast. I went to school, met my friends and was bored.’ (3f)
What really got to some of the students was the disinterest of many of those who had stayed at home. Friends seemedo either envy them or to be more eager to tell of what had happened during those six months at home! And some of theeachers did not even ask them anything about their travels – not even, if one of the countries they had just recently beeno was part of the curriculum. So they felt more and more isolated from the other students and divided their social world inUSis – those who really understand – and non-KUSis with a complete lack of understanding. Especially in cruise 3, we find
relative high density (11 out of n = 20) of reports, that the students want to “go home to the Thor” (3f) or that they “missheir real home, the Thor” (3m).
Apart from the feeling of being part of a close community where everyone helps each other, there seems to be anothermportant aspect of life on board. Everything one did, had direct influence on all the others and therefore made immediateense. One knew exactly why things were done and experienced their outcome instantly.
‘But even worse was the disinterest of some people, for example teachers or fellow students. It is definitely no nicefeeling to come back into a class that is bored by its daily routine and you would like to tell the teacher why you wereabsent for half a year and he only nods and tells you to sit down.’ (3f)
All in all one might say that after a first phase of grief, where they miss their fellow travellers immensely and yearn to be
ack on board, most come to terms with being back into home-and-school-routine and take a quite pragmatic view of theirituation: this is simply the way they have to live right now – but when they finish school, the real life in freedom will beginnd new adventures await them! These statements hint at the consistency of the U-curve model in our data set.
2 The numbers in the brackets refer to the cruise number, the letter “f” indicates female, the letter “m”.
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Similar to students returning from a Greenland expedition in 1997, evaluated by Allison (2005), this adjustment “appearsto be in two primary themes. The first relates to tangible perspectives on objects while the second is more concernedwith social adjustments and values” (p. 19). Several KUS-students described feelings of irritation when confronted with the“luxuries” of Western society.
‘I find it hard to suddenly have to regard everything as before [the journey]. After having experienced other culturesand in a certain way also poverty, how then should one consider our supermarkets as something ordinary and naturallyovernight?’ (1f)
‘The first ride into town was quite a shock. All around were people, everybody spoke German and everything wasthere in abundance.’ (3f)
Some report that their rooms at home suddenly seemed to be huge and that they started to throw away things. For mostof the home comers, there began an intense phase of mourning.
‘If I think about my return home, I notice that I was not aware that our journey was actually at an end, I had not realisedthis. [. . .] My home seemed totally strange to me and it felt soooo huge. When I went to bed all by myself in my roomin the evenings, I felt very lonely and all on my own for a long time.’ (3m)
This latter quote from cruise 3, one year after return and, according to our data, the deepest point in our U-curve, illustratesthe feeling of loss and solitude; and in contrast to the quote above from cruise 1, the girls who had been at home for threeyears, the boy’s statement is very emotional, whereas the girl sounds very reflective and distant, indicating a phase ofmaturation and personal growth, supporting the U-curve model.
5.2.2. Perception of schoolingThe category “Perception of Schooling” (PoS) shows a similar U-curve pattern as the category “Reintegration Narratives”
(RN). However, the entry-values of PoS are considerably lower than those of RN, indicating a more sudden shock and revealingagain a rather constant adjustment process after about eight months at home, the apex of the U-curve (cf. Fig. 4, plot at theupper right).
The general feedback about the differences between school on board and school at home is that school on board was muchmore interesting because a lot of what one had to learn made immediate sense. Whether it was a language like Spanish thatone needed in the countries that were visited or meteorology whose physical phenomena the young adventurers experiencedon the sailing ship every day or astronomy to navigate the ship or something about plants and rainforests that one actuallysaw at the same time: the lessons did not appear as something theoretical apart from one’s own life, but were an integralpart of what everyone faced during the travels. That was also the reason given by many of the students for being much moremotivated to learn. At home, many students have the feeling that they just wait until school is over and “boredom” is one ofthe most common used words of description.
‘On board of the Thor there was simply very little time to prepare for school. But the lessons were much more practicallyoriented and one understood instantly what the use of all this was. What I learned, I was often able to use for dailyroutine on board or when we were ashore and by this I managed to deepen the things learned. Now, that I am back inschool I am not yet really motivated, because the practical side often is missing or the surrounding is so boring.’ (4f)
Furthermore, as the days on board were just packed, the students quickly learned to separate the important from theminor information and became quite well structured and more effective. They had to learn quite a lot in a self-determinedway – as everyone had to meet different requirements from their individual schools. “Learning by teaching” and small studygroups were often used methods on board. Again, as a contrast to the illustration of the sudden shock, here is a typical quotefrom a boy who had been on cruise 1 and had thus almost three years of re-entry adjustment:
‘I rely more on myself. And I understand now, that most things I want to achieve depend on my commitment for thesethings. And I also came to know that it is almost impossible to achieve those aims without the help of “co-workers”and that it is also much more fun when you work together with others to achieve that aim. It is not longer mereknowledge that is most important for me, but to understand and to actually use what I learn.’ (1m)
Additionally, on board, students often had to present oral reports and therefore feel now more comfortable to speak infront of others. Many claim, that after the journey it is easier for them to discuss and to find arguments for their opinions.
‘I think I have a better time management by now and that I learn in a more structured and organised way. Especiallyall the reports on board helped me quite a lot. As we learned many practical things during the journey, I still try notto simply memorize facts from the schoolbooks but to connect those things with the practical experiences during the
journey.’ (3f)
Another very important factor seems to be the relationship between students and teachers. On board, the teachers werealso part of the ship routines, they had to cook and clean the same as every student and were therefore seen more as partnersand not as adversaries. One simply got to know each other much better and met not only the teacher/student, but also the
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U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87 81
erson behind this one function. This helped both sides to understand the other much better and generally to treat eachther with more respect.
Whereas at home, the relationship between students and teachers seems to be at best impersonal and often, the twoppear to be opponents, especially in the fresh perception of the newly arrived:
‘I discovered that teachers are also only human beings – which was a very important realisation for me personally.During class, this became obvious in the way how we treated each other, not only more personal, but also morefriendly and with more respect [. . .] It was a shock for me to see how the student-teacher-relationship was in the“normal” world. I was sitting in class [. . .] and felt like being completely in the wrong movie. The teachers on boardwere never insensible to us, here, everyone is – at least it feels that way. At school, everyone lives simply for herself,but never together with the others.’ (4f)
Another side-aspect might be, that all in all, school and top marks seem to have lost their over-all importance. Manytudents report that now they know what really matters – and in their opinion this is definitely not always having the bestesults in school. Friendship, being true to oneself and adventure appear to have the higher significance (other than beforehe journey) and travelling seems to have opened up many students’ minds and awakened their interest in other things, likeifferent cultures or political and social themes apart from the curriculum.
.2.3. Self-perceptionThe polynomial interpolation over all four cruises in the category self-perception (SP) shows a U-curve from cruise 4
high), over cruise 3 (lowest) to cruise 2 (medium high), and a little drop from there to cruise 1 (cf. Fig. 4, plot on the lowereft). However, we excluded the quantifications of cruise 1 from the plot, because only three students wrote anything hintingn that direction at all, and all references are very reflective and hint at great maturity. We thus plotted only the U-curverom cruise 4 through 2.
Despite the relative decrease of values in self-perception, every single feedback we received said that the participantselt to be more mature than their peers at home. They reported to have more self-confidence, to act more spontaneous ando being more open-minded.
In the KUS-project-survey, many students relate that they do not have the feeling that they had actually changed thatuch during their half year abroad, but that they simply became more themselves.
‘Personally I think, I have not changed fundamentally but I have been strengthened in my personality through KUS –which has lead to my having more self-assurance and also more self-confidence.’ (3f)
Some claim that – other than before – they began to have political opinions and do care more about society and globalssues. As they have had the chance to experience other cultures, this led to a higher awareness of their own home countrynd the different ways to see things.
‘I do think that I have become more open-minded because of KUS and that I care and think more about the rest of theworld and that my focus is no longer only on my very own, close, and familiar surroundings.[. . .] But what I think is most apparent is that one learned to really cherish simple things that many people take forgranted. A simple example for this would be the daily shower or the abundance of food that we have here.’ (3f)
Again, this can be found with Kaplan and Talbot (1983), who wrote that in a follow-up study, the participants remem-ered the journey “as awesome, and is felt to have offered a compelling glimpse of a real world, and of a way ofelating to one’s surroundings and responding to one’s daily opportunities and challenges, that was immensely satisfying”p. 182).
Pedagogical elements like the complete handing over of the sailing ship into the responsibility of the KUS-students oraving to organize field trips all by themselves also helped to further their self-esteem.
‘During the journey I was able to learn a lot from others. On the one hand practical things but on the other hand alsofrom their behaviour and their character. This changed my way of dealing with people immensely. The “simplicity”in many countries and their very different way of treating nature made a great impression on me. My own attitudetowards nature has changed because of this and I am trying to care much more for her than before. Moreover, I ammore independent and self-confident. During the journey for example, I took over the project leadership while westudents had been given the commission of the ship. I would never even have thought about taking over a job withthat much responsibility before the journey.’ (3f)
Having to live so close together with other people also influenced one’s over-all handling of people and things.any students claim to be more relaxed when they are confronted with other ways of living. Because of the fact that
ne could literally not get away when one is on a sailing boat, one simply had to learn to get along with all sorts
f people.
The young adventurers have had many occasions where they felt to be stretched to their personal limits and to experiencehat sometimes it may be necessary to even overstep one’s bounds and not always to satisfy one’s own needs first but totep back for the benefit of the community on board.
82 U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87
Fig. 4. Huber robust location estimates for the observed (unrotated) data with interpolating polynomials for the variables RN, PoS, SP, and PPE plotted againstcruise. Omitted Turn1 and Turn3 axes are due to sparse or outlier data, respectively. The interpolation polynomials are 1.228 − 0.705 · x + 0.366 · x2 − 0.041 · x3
(stationary point SP = 1.212) for RN, 0.757 − 0.217 · x + 0.124 · x2 + 0.001 · x3 (stationary point SP = 0.865) for PoS, 2 − 1.798 · x + 0.798 · x2 (stationary point
SP = 1.126) for SP, and for PPE 0.224 · x + 0.036 · x2 (no stationary point in range of interest).
‘Thanks to KUS, I’ve gotten to know myself much better and became more mature. I took with me back home anincredible team-spirit and the motivation to help others, a swimming home, the motivation to learn that for which Ihave a passion [. . .] and something the Thor can communicate in a very special way – the love for living.’ (2f)
5.2.4. Perceived programme effectsThe polynomial interpolation of the variable “perceived programme effects” (PPE) shows a different pattern than the
U-curve (cf. Fig. 4, plot on the lower right). We decided to exclude cruise 3 from the plot, since according to the post hoctesting of the variances of mean-values, students in cruise 3 ascribe a significantly, i.e. exceptionally, high positive effectto the programme, which may be due to the different setting on board brought in by the camera-team which produced adocumentary that was broadcasted nationwide. This might have affected the variable “perceived programme effect” insofaras the students received nation-wide feedback on the effects of this “cool” programme before, during, and after the inter-vention. However, apart from a few hints on the effects of the TV production on the social life on board – which were mainlynegative and had been regarded as a stressor, since only a handful of students had been elected to appear in the show – wedo not find specific textual proof of this explanation.
The students seem to value the positive effects of the programme gradually in stages after return – with the lowest valuesshortly after arrival, but without any declining phase thereafter.
The effects reported include considering themselves as more mature, more tolerant and self-confident. About one third ofthe returners also referred to a very high ambition to travel and see the world again, and equivocally spoke of being “affected
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y a travel bug”. Some claim that they want to go abroad after their final exams and that KUS opened up new possibilitiesor them that they had never thought of before. The project is often described as an initial chance that offered the possibilityo look over one’s own nose.
‘Admittedly, KUS has even encouraged my already strong wanderlust. So I will go on an interrail tour for four weeksafter my final exams and for half a year to Canada and another half year to Latin America in order to work in socialprojects there and to study and perfect the languages. Moreover, nautical science really became a potential field ofstudy for me.’ (3m)
As they have lived through so many difficult situations and had been confronted with all sorts of trouble, they noweel themselves to be strong enough and well prepared for whatever the future may have in charge for them – or theresent.
‘It was not only a coming back into the “old reality” but more precisely an attempt to change this reality. [. . .] Moreover,I am on my way now into active youth work, because I simply need more contact with other people after the journey.’(3f)
During the journey they had to get along with everyone on board – as there was no chance to separate oneself from theroup and everything one did directly reflected on the whole community. After the return, similar to Allison’s finding ofhe above mentioned 1997-Greenland expedition evaluation (Allison, 2005), many KUS-students “go through a period ofdjusting their perspective”. Money lost quite a bit of its attraction and is more seen as a mere means to go travelling aroundnd meet with friends. Being true to oneself, experiencing new cultures and people, living the moment to its fullness noweem to be the things of real worth.
‘Thanks to the journey I was able to experience what it means to be happy. In Germany, the people are often notsatisfied with what they do not have [sic!]. Instead they should be glad about what they have. Happiness doesn’tmean that one has a lot of money.’ (3f)
Most of all, they have had the chance to collect precious memories that will last for a lifetime and they have made “true”riends with people who they feel can really understand them. They seem to have managed to extend the “Lessons of theroup” and to “Use the Group as a Compass for their Future”, as Allison, Davis-Berman, et al. (2011) described it – or in theords of one of the KUS-students:
‘The adventure KUS has presented me with lasting memories and awakened the wish for more adventures that mightagain lead me beyond the constraints of our society. KUS has made me adventurous, more rigorous to myself, moresocial, more self-confident and more responsible. It offered me the chance to experience my personal boundaries andtook away the fear of the unknown and of my future – whatever it may bring. I enjoy my life now the same way I didduring my time with KUS. The first phase of mourning for the journey was over soon – especially thanks to the factthat I still have a lot of contact with many KUSis, teachers, students, and staff, and due to our frequent meetings. Lifeis beautiful – with and thanks to KUS.’ (3m)
.2.5. Social contextThe variable “social context” (SC) shows the most constant and robust pattern across the four cruises: a nearly flat line
maybe with a little positive inclination over time – with random fluctuations in both directions (cf. Fig. 5). All studentseport that KUS created a new, stable social community for them, which consists of “real friends” bracketed into their “old”ocial context.
‘I think because of KUS, I have found real friends and this is something that no one can take away from me. [. . .] Therewas never an “alone”, we always stuck together and helped each other when someone couldn’t go on.’ (4f)
This stable social context in the re-entry is certainly different from going abroad, as “the re-entering sojourner hasdvantages in culture learning that were not present in the host culture” (Martin, 1984, p. 121), and in a way, the KUSis bringheir newly acquired and integrated social context back home.
The students claim that they had managed so many difficult situations together and shared so many experiences that theynow each other better than anyone else possibly could. And when you are so close to each other, it is almost unavoidableo become true friends.
‘Because of KUS, I was able to make a lot of valuable contacts and friends – and I think most of them will be my friendsfor the rest of my life. One simply gets to know each other and oneself much better when one had to be responsiblefor oneself for such a long time and had to get along in a big group, and had to function.’ (4f)
This sworn community stays intact after the return via social media and regular face-to-face meetings. The KUSis haveormed a strong social network between the participants of all the different cruises and try to spend as much time withach other as possible. Some even go on holiday trips together that they organize by themselves. And if an outsider actuallyhows a deeper interest for their travels – mostly family – the KUSis feel that no one can really understand what they hadeen through, who has not himself been part of the journey.
84 U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87
Fig. 5. Observed values of the variable SC plotted within each of the four cruises with fitted, and rather constant and linear, cubic smoothing spline (Green& Silverman, 1994) in red colour, showing only random fluctuations over a virtually constant baseline with a very slight positive inclination indicating ata very robust course of social interactions.
‘Of course, I can tell people how it was, but who is actually able to really and truly understand or imagine it? Only theothers [of the cruise].’ (4f)
This group-bonding illustrates well the difference of sojourners who went out on an expedition with a group to individualtravellers. They got to know other cultures during their journey as a group and have adopted new values as a group – whichoften also gives them a feeling of being different than the friends and classmates who had stayed at home.
As they had been through much worse situations, they cannot take the so-called problems of their friends at home veryseriously. Quite a few claim that they have the feeling of being more mature than the ones who had stayed at home. Manystudents report of changes in their former circle of friends. They claim to be more self-assured, to speak up their mindsmore freely and not to care as much about what others think of them. Especially material values seem to have lost theirimportance (although of course one has to keep in mind that most of the KUSis come from higher/middleclass backgrounds)and some of the students even start to think about alternative ways of living in the future.
‘I believe that one day, I will at least partly turn my back on this society to either live on a sailing boat or to start a newlife somewhere else.’ (3m)
5.3. Principal component analysis after exclusion of PPE
Since the polynomial interpolation has shown that the variable “perceived programme effects” (PPE) represents a linearfunction rather than a 2nd grade polynomial (U-Curve), we re-performed the principal component analysis with the exclusion
of PPE. The variable “social context” did not – irrespective of the seemingly same pattern, i.e. a “straight line” rather thana U-curve – pose this problem, since SC remains a cubic function, if a very flat one. So we could include SC in the principlecomponent analysis. Table 2 reports the importance of the components and the corresponding matrix of component loadingsof the variables. The first principal component has by far the largest standard deviation, with loadings that show it to be
U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87 85
Table 2Principal component analysis with PPE excluded.
Reported are the importance of the components in a principal component analysis of all variables except for PPE, and a corresponding matrix of componentloadings of the variables. The first principal component has by far the largest standard deviation, with loadings that show it to be an “expeditionary reversecTi
avpo
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ulture shock” effect (cf. also Fig. 4). We can see that PC1 accounts for approximately 79% of the variation in the data, and that PC2 explains circa 12%.ogether, PC1 and PC2 retain about 91% of the total variation in the process of dimensionality reduction. The remaining three components are not takennto account here, since they represent only roughly 9% of the variances in total.
n “expeditionary reverse culture shock” effect (cf. also Fig. 4). We can see that PC1 accounts for approximately 79% of theariation in the data, and that PC2 explains circa 12%. Together, PC1 and PC2 retain about 91% of the total variation in therocess of dimensionality reduction. The remaining three components are not taken into account here, since they represent
nly roughly 9% of the variances in total.
The corresponding plot of this matrix shows a clear and robust U-Curve across the four cruises and supports strongly thesecond) U-Curve theory of expedition reverse culture shock (cf. Fig. 6, bold red and black curves).
ig. 6. The rotated data on the first principal component as a “expeditionary reverse culture shock” effect (PC ERCS) of a principal component analysis ofll variables (light red and light grey) and again with PPE excluded (bold prints), shown as aggregated mean and robust location measures in each cruiseTurn4–Turn1), black and red dots, respectively. For the robust variant, Huber’s (1981) M-estimator was used. Uniquely determined polynomial interpolationurves are depicted as well. The polynomials are 2.375 − 0.798 · x + 0.453 · x2 − 0.062 · x3 with stationary point SP = 1.160 for the mean calculation and.379 − 0.813 · x + 0.444 · x2 − 0.058 · x3 with stationary point SP = 1.196 for the robust estimates for the plot without PPE.
86 U. Dettweiler et al. / International Journal of Intercultural Relations 44 (2015) 72–87
6. Discussion and pedagogical implications
We believe to have given empirical support to the (second) U-curve stage model in expedition reverse culture shocktheory, meaning that the first phase after arrival back home may appear easy enough but that feelings of psychologicalstrain and isolation are very likely to follow in the course of the first year. But the sun rises again and the support from thepeer-group (KUSis) together with personal growth facilitates the re-adjustment to the alien old world, or, in other words:“to the home culture as a new culture” (Martin, 1984, p. 121).
Furthermore, our findings confirm very strongly the first category that Allison, Davis-Berman, et al. (2011) came upwith, namely the “Sense of Isolation”. We were also able to discern some of the symptoms Oberg talks about, most of all“psychological strain”, “a sense of loss” and “a feeling of deprivation”, maybe even as far as feelings of rejection by the new– which actually is the old – culture. All of our students, boys and girls equally, described very similar feelings about theircoming home – sometimes even with almost the same words as the young explorers in Great Britain. This might suggestthat the duration of the journey is not that important, as our youths stayed abroad for half a year whereas the expedition ofthe British kids took only six weeks. It seems that the remoteness of the places visited, the close companionship with peoplein the same situation, and the vivid impressions of the journey have a much deeper impact.
Gender does not seem to make a difference which contradicts empirical findings of Brabant, Palmer, and Gramling (1990)who concede that re-entry may be more problematic for females than for males. And we could also not find the opposite,i.e. that “women were more satisfied with re-entry life”, as Rohrlich and Martin (1991) found in their study. However, as wehave discussed above, our group may not be typical with respect to gender-role variance and the pedagogical interventionmay have done its part here, too. Neither were we able to discern different coping styles (Adler, 1981), which may be due tothe very homogenous group selected in the application process.
We think that the mix of methodological approaches to the reports pays off the flaws that each individual method mighthave. The inhomogeneous response-rate with its critical effect to the statistical operation, is paid off by the possibility to speakof “significant” or “not-significant” differences between the groups and reveals effects which would not have been visible byjust reading the texts and analysing them by means of “classical content analysis”. Most importantly, the principal componentanalysis (PCA) and the polynomial interpolation revealed patterns that could not be detected by any other of our methodsthat clearly – but the plots would, of course, be useless without the understanding from the texts themselves. The NVivo®-coding and semantic analysis revealed rather superficial patterns of the texts, and many of our originally performed analyseswere simply pointless. However, the word-counts and coding-density-analyses uncovered textual features and patterns thatwould, without the use of computing techniques, not have been detectable by classical content analysis. Finally, the classicalcontent analysis, which bares the most profound but also the most “subjective” understanding of the texts, is escorted byrobust “objective” data. It would have been useful to perform follow-up interviews for in-depth understanding, e.g. withrespect to our hypotheses concerning the camera-team in cruise 3, or the U-curve allegations. Of course, a longitudinaldesign would have promised much better results. However, man and women-power in this project were limited, and moreinterviews and prolonging of the data-interpretation beyond the budget.
We nevertheless think to have shown that the returning students show symptoms of expeditionary reverse culture shockafter their return, very similar to what Allison et al. have found. We have also shown that there is hardly any difference ofperception of the expeditionary experience over time, and that the students are very competent in developing copingstrategies within their peer group. And we must not forget that despite all adjustment problems, we found many passagesin the text that express great gratitude for the experiences in the programme which helped the sojourners grow. Thiscorresponds well with the findings of Kaplan and Talbot (1983) who took students on week-long wilderness trips wherestudents reported positive psychological experiences, such as “increased ability to distinguish the significant from the trivial”(Kaplan & Talbot, 1983, p. 184).
However, support for participants, their families, and teachers in their home schools should be offered before, maybeduring, and after the return from such programmes (Beardmore, Dooley, & Neumann, 2008).
We recommend that similar research be conducted with returners from non-expeditionary over-seas-school exchangeprogrammes, too. Then, the life after the return would be even more “beautiful – with and thanks to the [programme].” (3f)
Acknowledgments
Dr. Peter Allison and Dr. Simon Beames of the University of Edinburgh have read an earlier draft of this paper. We owemany of the ideas and literature quoted to their very thorough comments and stipulations. We want to especially thankreviewer 2 for extensive and very critical remarks on this article.
The research on this topic was partly made possible by money granted by the Staedtler Stiftung to the Friedrich AlexanderUniversität Erlangen/Nürnberg.
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