Your friend, Tasha, is about to move to Italy with her family. She fears interacting with people she doesn't know, who speak a language she doesn't speak, and who have different cultural traditions and worldviews. What advice can you give Tasha about understanding and communicating with the new people she will meet?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

- This essay can go in a number of directions, but one approach would be to follow the guidelines for improving intercultural competence: the ability to adapt one's behavior toward another in ways that are appropriate to the other person's culture. To do so:
* Develop knowledge by seeking information about the other person's worldview, culture, language, and history, for example.
* Ask questions and listen effectively.
* Create a third culture with someone from a different cultural background.
- Tasha can develop strategies to accept others who are different from her by tolerating ambiguity, developing mindfulness, and avoiding making negative judgments.
- Or, Tasha might want to develop skills to be capable of putting into action what she knows and wants to achieve. The skills underlying being interculturally competent are to:
* Develop flexibility-learn as you communicate on the spot.
* Become other-oriented by socially decentering-cognitive process in which you take into account the other person's thoughts, values, background, and overall perspective.
* Appropriately adapt her communication to others-based on the individual, the relationship, or the situation.