A Case Study of Using Facebook Messenger for Developing Intercultural Communication of Jordanian and Taiwanese Students

• Main Authors: Alhassan, Alia, 艾莉亞
• Other Authors: Huang, Hsin-Chou
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/70415578318278372502

碩士 === 國立臺灣海洋大學 === 應用英語研究所 === 103 === Telecollaborative projects have become popular after the implementation of Web 2.0 technologies in language classrooms. Among all of the computer-mediated communication tools that enable content sharing and strengthen social links is Facebook. The nature of Facebook can facilitate the communication to enhance learners’ intercultural learning. This study investigates the probability of improving EFL learners’ cultural competence and examining their interactional features by using Facebook Messenger in a semester-long intercultural exchange project. Participants were four Jordanian students studying in the University of Jordan and nine Taiwanese students studying in National Taiwan Ocean University. Before engaging in the synchronous chat of Facebook Messenger, both sides of the students needed to complete cultural tasks by watching two videos about the students’ respective native and target cultures (i.e. Taiwan and Jordan) in the topics of food, tourism, religion, festivals, and traditional dressing to obtain background knowledge of the given topic. These tasks were posted on a Facebook private group, which linked all of the participants and contained announcements and instructions related to the tasks. After that, students discussed five questions related to each cultural aspect of the two countries via Facebook messenger, in which students were asked to have a weekly synchronous chat on Facebook Messenger to engaging in informal discussions for exchanging information, pictures and events, as well as comparing the similarities and differences of their cultures. Taiwanese students were meeting the researcher for remedial sessions each week in order to solve any problems related to the difficulties that they faced during their communication with the Jordanian students and for providing further explanations for each task. Data sources included transcripts of participants’ Facebook chat logs, their reflective journals, and questionnaires. Furthermore, interviews were used for collecting some data about student’s perceptions about the project. To analyze data, the discourse of students’ conversations was analyzed based on two models: Byram’s (1997) model was used for measuring students’ intercultural competence, and Ware’s (2013) model which was utilized to analyze the interactional features of the students. Findings of this indicated that students’ intercultural competence was developed; students proved that they have recruited all of the intercultural competencies reported in Byram’s (1997) model i.e. students proved that they had a general knowledge of the target culture, skills of interaction and discovery, skills of relation and interpretation, and curiosity and openness toward the target culture. Students also proved their ability to acquire new knowledge about the target culture, ability to suspend disbelieve and ability to increase critical cultural awareness. Findings from this study also revealed that students were able to develop their use of interactional features that were reported in Ware’s (2013) model such as the use of emotive words and phrases, the use of personal form of address, topic development, question posing, personal information, display of alignment, the use of emoticons and unconventional capitalization. Regarding students’ perceptions toward the intercultural exchange project, students showed positive attitudes toward the project, and they also showed positive attitudes toward the use of Facebook Messenger to synchronously chat with each others. Findings of this study will contribute to research literature on intercultural communication as well as giving deep insights into the feasibility of using Facebook Messenger as a medium for telecollaborative projects.