This activity challenges participants to recognize the importance of understanding cultural behaviors from an insider’s perspective. They will read the essay “Deep Play: Notes on a Balinese Cockfight” and then discuss it in terms of the methods Geertz used to write the essay, how it portrays the Balinese society, and the differences between insider and outsider interpretations in anthropological writing. 

In this activity, participants practice observation in a new situation and discuss cultural values based on behavioral observation, gaining a variety of perspectives on what is considered "normal" cross-culturally.

This activity challenges participants to practice ethnographic research skills in order to discover relationships between cultural behaviors and values and the physical spaces that people occupy in their daily routines. In this activity, participants visit a grocery store and note things like the products available, how the store is arranged, how people are behaving, etc. Then, they attempt to interpret their findings using a cultural lens. Note: Janet Bennett recommends this for students in the Denial stage on the intercultural development continuum (IDC).

This creativity-training activity was designed for a Spring Break study abroad program at Purdue University titled Amsterdam: Creative Thinking & Innovation in Collaborative Leadership. Specifically, it was designed to help travelling students use their airport "down time" productively. It is adapted from the well-known activity Martian Anthropology, which was created by Donald Batchelder. For this activity, participants are placed on teams and asked to observe what is happening in an airport through the lens of a “Martian”—meaning that they will not understand the purpose of the airport, just that it is an important location where many humans gather. They will use ethnographic field research techniques to investigate a hypothesis and answer questions provided to them. Then, during the next meeting time, they will prepare a three-minute report that synthesizes their research and either supports or negates that hypothesis. Note: This activity could be adapted to take place in a variety of settings, such as a student union, an office building, a restaurant, etc.

From the abstract: "Implementing targeted intercultural activities into STEM-based courses may be one method to develop students' intercultural competencies and improve their ability to thrive in a diverse workplace."

Wickenhauser, J .L. & Karcher, E. L. (2020). Developing student intercultural competence in an introductory STEM-based course. NACTA Journal.

From the abstract: "...the objective of the study was to measure changes in student IC before and after participating in the remote course with intercultural learning (ICL) assignments embedded into animal science topics."

Wickenhauser, J., Rosenkrans, A., Ebner, P., Flaherty, E. A., & Karcher, E. L. Intercultural competence: Fostering skill development during emergency remote learning. NACTA Journal. 65: 288-296.

From the abstract: "In this work-in-progress paper, we discuss the impact of an interactive online module on the development of the intercultural competence of twenty-five first-year computer science students. After completing the online module, students were required to reflect on a scenario where the student's role was to manage a culturally diverse team. The students were asked to identify the cultural differences that could lead to conflicts on the team and to reflect on the ways cultural differences could benefit the team."

Jaiswal, A., Starr, L & Stahl, A. (2023). Assessing the impact of curriculum integration on the intercultural learning gains of first-year computer science students. IEEE Frontiers in Education (FIE). https://www.computer.org/csdl/proceedings-article/fie/2023/10343046/1TsCbWwOhwc

Data is presented from 3 administrations of the BEVI (pretest, posttest, and delayed posttest) in an evaluation of the 2018-19 Global Dialogues Program at Purdue University.

Starr, L., Acheson, K., & Ham, T. (2019). Purdue University College of Science Global Dialogues program: 2018-19 program assessment. HubICL Research Repository.  https://hubicl.org/publications/75/1

This study uses mixed assessment methods to analyze learning outcomes for six cohorts of students in a first-year "global science" learning community for international and domestic students.

Starr, L. & Yngve, K. (2020). Global Science Partnerships learning community: The first six years. https://hubicl.org/publications/82/2.

From the abstract: "The authors build on their existing project-based inquiry model to include global themes (e.g., poverty, global water and sanitation, climate change) and cross-cultural exchange. This theory-into-practice article explains the Project-Based Inquiry Global process and six design features that enable teachers to facilitate collaborative inquiry projects with their students."

Spires, H. A., Himes, M., Paul, C. M., & Kerkhoff, S. N. (2019, January 10). Going global with Project Based Inquiry Global: Cosmopolitan literacies in practice.  Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 63(1), 51-64.

Sapkota, B., Zhou, L., Mbewe, R., Newton, J., & Phillion, J. (2022). Fostering pre-service teachers and intercultural competencies through global cross-cultural collaborations. In C. Ullom & N. Guler (Eds.), At school in the world: Developing globally engaged teachers (pp. 212-237). Rowman & Littlefield.

From the abstract: "The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relative impact of embedding intercultural learning activities on students’ intercultural competence when included in an on-campus course compared to a study abroad program."

Krishnan, LA., Jin, L. & Calahan, C. (2021). Enhancing Intercultural Competence: Can it be done without Studying Abroad? In Press. Teaching and Learning in Communication Sciences & Disorders. 

From the abstract: "Participation in a study abroad program to Zambia with intentional intercultural activities embedded in the course curriculum has been shown to enhance cultural competence as measured by the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI®) (Krishnan, Masters, Holgate, Wang & Calahan, 2017). The purpose of this study was to assess whether a new program to India, developed using a. similar model, was effective in increasing student intercultural competence and to compare student outcomes with the previous program to evaluate possible differences in outcomes related to the destination country."

Krishnan, LA., Diatta-Holgate, H. & Calahan, C. (2021). Intercultural Competence Gains from Study Abroad in India. Teaching and Learning in Communication Sciences & Disorders.(5), 2, Article 6.  https://ir.library.illinoisstate.edu/tlcsd/vol5/iss2/6

From the abstract: "This study is guided by the research question, how can intercultural competence be characterized for students enrolled in a first-year introductory cybersecurity course?"

Jaiswal, A., Thomas, P.J., & Karabiyik, T., (2023). Characterizing intercultural competence among cybersecurity majors. IEEE Frontiers in Education.

From the abstract: "This study used Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) instrument to understand the intercultural learning gains of technology students by administrating the survey in the program’s first year and final year."

Jaiswal A., Jin, L., & Acheson-Clair. A. (2024, January 5). Evaluation of STEM program on student intercultural development: Do intercultural interventions work? Innovative Higher Education. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10755-023-09691-4

From  the abstract: "Drawing on the guidelines in the AAC&U Intercultural Knowledge and Competence VALUE Rubric, [the author] argues heavy metal music can serve as a model for using music to increase students’ intercultural knowledge, competency, and awareness, as well as their ability to critically reflect on issues in their own society, including gender, race, and class."

Guberman, D. (2020). Teaching intercultural competence through heavy metal music. Arts and Humanities in Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474022220903403

From the description: "The purpose of this article to highlight one university’s new approach to transforming global higher education and eLearning with competency-based education, link this new and innovative approach to research, and provide implications and recommendations to build the case for a new teaching and learning paradigm."

Bosman, L. (2020). The Future of Education: Transforming Higher Education with Integrated Competency-Based Education. https://hubicl.org/publications/90/1

From the abstract: "In this article, the authors propose and argue for an intercultural competence–oriented approach to internationalizing writing programs through a linked course model curriculum that pairs international and domestic students in separate second language–specific and mainstream FYW classes. The linked course model curriculum develops and assesses students’ intercultural learning and writing skills as core learning outcomes. This article presents the curricular design and interventions, the research design of the study conducted across three semesters of curriculum implementation, and the reflective writing results from the pilot semester to communicate the preliminary effectiveness of this curricular model."

Banat, H., Sims, R., Tran, P., Panahi, P., & Dilger, B. (2021). “Developing intercultural competence through a linked course model curriculum: Mainstream and L2-specific first year writing.” TESOL Journal 12(3).

From the abstract: "The current study addresses the gap in the [Human Resource Developmen] HRD literature by conducting the first empirical research related to VR technology and its impact on training. The paper examines [virtual reality-based simulations] VRBS with a mixed methods research design within the interpersonal skills training context, comparing the effectiveness of this new medium to more traditional training platforms such as [video-based training] VBT."

Akdere, M., Acheson, K., & Jiang, Y. (2021). To simulate or not to simulate? Comparing the effectiveness of video-based training versus virtual reality-based simulations on interpersonal skills development. Human Resource Development Quarterly.

Acheson, K. (July, 2020). A “conversation” with the HubICL: A hub of resources for interculturalists. InterCom. TESOL International, Intercultural Interest Section.

Miller, A. (2019, March 11). Purdue intercultural learning center flourishes with the help of HUBzero. Purdue IT Newsroom. Purdue intercultural learning center flourishes with the help of HUBzero | Purdue University IT

Winner of the 2019 Innovation in Technology award from GoAbroad

Gesing, S., Stirm, C., Klimeck, G., Zentner, L., Wang, S., Villegas-Martinez, B. M., Moya-Cessa, H. M., Diaz Eaton, C., Donovan, S., Song, C., Zhao, L., Kim, I. L., Strachan, A., Zentner, M., & Kalyanam, R. (2023, January-February). Computing in Science & Engineering(25), pp. 34-42. 10.1109/MCSE.2023.3285092

Gesing, S., Stirm, C., Klimeck, G., Zentner, L., Wang, S., Villegas Martinez, B. M., Diaz Eaton, C., Donovan, S., Zhao, L., Song, C., Kim, I. L., Strachan, A., Zentner, M., & Kalyanam, R. (2022). Open Science via HUBzero: Exploring Five Science Gateways  Supporting and Growing their Open Science Communities. Proceedings of the 55th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences.