Effectiveness of an Acculturation Programmein Developing Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC) in EFL College Students: a Mixed-Methods Study

This study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of an acculturation programme designed for college learners. The researchers utilized an experimental research design involving a pretest, a posttest and a control group, and collected both quantitative and qualitative data. The participants who joined a language enhancement programme (LEP) in different colleges were chosen by convenience (N=52) and were equally distributed to the study groups. The acculturation programme was specifically designed to stimulate and awaken the intercultural communicative competencies among the experimental participants during one academic year. Findings from the t-test comparisons, effect size and the Blake’s gain ratio corroborate the effectiveness of the acculturation programme in developing intercultural communication competency in experimental participants. Qualitative data from the interviews affirm the results of quantitative data analysis, revealing six themes that verify the ICC survey results. Finally, the study concluded that the development of ICC skills can occur along with the development of language proficiency in college students