Critics of currently available school motivation research consistently identify shortcomings such as the lack of a theoretical basis for defining and interpreting the construct and the poor quality of instruments used to measure it. There is a dearth of reliable, valid, theoretically informed, and cross-culturally comparable standardised measures of motivation. Whilst a number of theorists have proposed that motivation may be a multidimensional construct and may also be hierarchical in nature, partly due to the lack of available multidimensional measurement instruments, there has been limited research testing such theoretical propositions. The present investigation comprised two inter-related study components. The purposes of Study 1 were to (1) develop a valid and reliable multidimensional measure of school motivation based on Maehr’s Personal Investment Theory that was robust in diverse cultural settings; and (2) test the multidimensional and hierarchical structure of school motivation to elucidate the nature and structure of student motivation cross-culturally and further extend motivational theory and research. The purpose of Study 2 was to (1) test the relation of multidimensional components of student motivation and academic achievement in cross-cultural contexts, to further elucidate the relations amongst these constructs; and (2) to identify similarities and differences in motivational profiles for different cultural groups in order to support the validity and usefulness of the multidimensional motivation instrument in educational settings. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to validate the psychometric properties of the measures, and reliability tests were conducted to establish the internal consistency for each scale. Factorial invariance analysis was conducted to examine the equivalence of the data structure across cultural groups, and structural equation modelling (SEM) was conducted to examine the structural relations between eight ISM motivation factors and four outcome measures (Math, English, GPA, School attendance). Multivariate analysis of variances was conducted to examine statistical difference among the seven cultural groups in relation to eight ISM scales. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

University of Technology, Sydney. Faculty of Education. / This thesis examines the construction processes of language, culture and identities in relation to both the macro level of society and culture, as well as the micro-individual level. It argues that there is a need to understand these constructions beyond discrete notions of language, identities and culture. The thesis mobilises performativity theory to explore how exposure to a variety of practices during the life trajectory has an impact on the construction and performance of language, identities and culture. It shows how a theory of performativity can provide a comprehensive account of the complex process of, and the relationships between, hybridisation (engagement in a range of cultural practices) and monolithication (nostalgic attachments to familiar practices). The thesis also suggests that the deployment of performativity theory with a focus on individual biography as well as larger social-cultural factors may fill a gap left in some other modes of analysis such as Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Conversation Analysis (CA). Analysing data from four workplaces in Australia, the study focuses on trans-institutional talk, namely casual conversation in which people from a variety of linguistic and cultural backgrounds work together. Following the suggestion (Pennycook 2003; Luke 2002) that there is a need to shift away from the understanding that a particular language is attached to a particular nation, territory and ethnicity, the thesis shows how discrete ethnic and linguistic labels such as ‘Japanese’ and ‘English’ as well as notions of ‘code-switching’ and ‘bi-lingualism’ become problematic in the attempt to grasp the complexity of contemporary transcultural workplaces. The thesis also explores the potential agency of subjects at the convergence of various discourses through iterative linguistic and cultural performances. In summary, the thesis provides deeper insight into transcultural performances to show the links between idiosyncratic individual performances and the construction of transcultural linguistic, cultural phenomena within globalisation.

The research is a critical analysis of the operational aspects of doing environment business with China through cross-cultural networks. In particular the investigation involved establishing an intensively documented, longitudinal profile of a single network. This network comprised Australian Small to Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and Chinese players based in the People's Republic of China. This profile covers a period of two decades. The research adopted a broad multi-disciplinary and inductive approach, using action research, case study methods, and systems analysis techniques. An innovative approach used time values as a constant to analyse the relativity of player connections, activities and structural levels in the network. This approach drew its applied orientation from the environmental sciences, and its theoretical base from the social science disciplines of marketing and international business. The specific field of study was the structure and evolutionary dynamics of networks. The outcome of the research is a model Australian SMEs can use for doing environment business with China. This model sets environment business in the context of a wider trading network of Chinese, Australian, South East Asian, and Middle Eastern players. The cornerstone of this model is the corporate role of the academic sector in accessing the Chinese environmental market. The research shows in detail how Australian SMEs can, and do, use cross-cultural academic linkages for trade. Such linkages facilitate market research, negotiation, risk management, product development, and the establishment of distribution channels in Asian markets. The study also demonstrates the importance of using a number of parallel nets of Chinese players to facilitate trade and overcome interruptions or obstacles. The research has contributed to knowledge by establishing an Asia-oriented, empirically derived model that differs substantially from the mono-cultural models in current practice in the Australian environment industry. The intensive investigation of the network of SMEs and Chinese players has identified the entrepreneurial strengths of SMEs in the international marketplace. This finding contrasts with the prevailing view that SMEs must depend on larger players for export success. In addition, the research has established that this kind of network has a clan-like structure. This finding is central to the model. The research demonstrates that a clan-like structure is a flexible framework that is compatible with the independence and capacity of small firms to adapt to change and to make decisions. This characteristic of SMEs enables them to proceed without, and at times in spite of, the encumbrances of large and unwieldy corporate and institutional structures. This finding is directly contrary to the belief prevalent in the Australian environment industry that SMEs depend on larger players to enter international markets. The finding also challenges the established view that Chinese networks are relatively closed systems based on family ties. The research shows that Australian SMEs can become part of these systems either directly or through links, and have many common attributes with their Chinese counterparts. The research has made a key contribution to theory by using these findings to develop an organic network model that differs from the so-called contrived network. This empirically derived theoretical model represents the seven dimensions of cross-cultural collaboration. The four social dimensions are the personal, organisational, sectoral and regional levels of a person-centred network, composed of nets of individuals with extensive linkages to other individuals and to organisations. The three dynamic dimensions are the triadic, the temporal, and the trading levels of interaction between the players. This theoretical model also demonstrates the depth of cross-connection between the nets of individual, and the embeddedness of the network in other networks. The model emphasises the centrality of time as the key connector between the social dimensions of the network and the exchange processes that characterise clan-like interactions. The model also represents the layers of evolutionary development that characterise the exchange processes in the network. These layers include adaptive processes, short-term exchanges, and long-term exchanges, and exchanges that derive from particular arrangements of players and market openings at critical points in time. This model extends concepts that have emerged from the original International Industrial Marketing and Purchasing (IMP) Interaction Model, and gives empirical credence to recent philosophical, but untested, views on the relevance of time as a context for interaction.

The first research objective of this dissertation is to extend existing conceptualizations of intercultural communication competence to create a new theoretically grounded construct, the Rainbow Model of Intercultural Communication Competence. The second research objective of this dissertation is to utilize this foundation and assemble a new instrument, the 127-item Intercultural Communication Competence Inventory (ICCI). The ICCI consists of sub-scales to measure foreign language competence, non-verbal communication competence, perceptions of cultural distance, intercultural self-awareness, intercultural communication knowledge, intercultural communication skills, intercultural communication motivation, intercultural communication appropriateness, intercultural communication effectiveness, intercultural contextual relationships, and intercultural affinity. This tool is designed assist strategic international human resource management practitioners to find, select, and/or train the best possible candidates for international assignments in an efficient manner. To accomplish these goals, a quantitative research design has been adopted. In a pilot study and three subsequent studies data was collected between 2005 and 2006 when the ICCI was administered to students in 19 courses with clear intercultural education elements at eleven universities in four countries (New Zealand, Germany, United Arab Emirates, USA) to build four samples of students: self tests (N = 1014) and retests (N = 587), peer tests (N = 613) and retests (N = 529). The ICCI was used as a paper-pencil and an online questionnaire. Using this method is appropriate as it provides intercultural communication trainers with quantifiable results to differentiate candidates and to measure training effectiveness. This dissertation has produced several research findings. Each of the ICCI sub-scales is psychometrically scrutinized and results described in detail. In exploratory factor analyses most scales have supported their theoretical framework as described in the Rainbow Model of ICC. Most sub-scales show independence from a variety of biases, and demonstrate sensitivity to competence changes over time and differences between evaluators. Various hypothesized links between the scales could be verified. The entire ICCI demonstrated that, despite currently still insufficient sample sizes, its conceptual roots, the Rainbow Model of Intercultural Communication Competence, is recognizable in self and peer tests and retests. The implications of the findings of this dissertation are threefold: First, the Rainbow Model of Intercultural Communication Competence has received preliminary confirmation. Second, the ICCI has initially shown a tendency to be a practical and reliable tool for recruiting, selecting of, and conducting training needs assessments that facilitate intercultural communication training effectiveness evaluations for suitable candidates for international assignments. Third, ICCI sub-scales have demonstrated the potential to enhance selection and training efforts in a speedy and specific way to support resource-cognizant intercultural training. The reader, however, is cautioned that a variety of limitations of this study need to be acknowledged. Finally, numerous areas of future research are identified.

This study investigates behaviour in seeking and giving advice in Australian English and Indonesian. It seeks to determine the crosscultural similarities and differences in seeking and giving advice in both languages in the areas of (i) the use of language routines and strategies (ii) the influences of cultural and social aspects. Data were collected from two preliminary questionnaires and a Discourse Completion Test (DCT). The DCT was completed by Australian and Indonesian native speakers in their first language. Analysis focussed on both qualitative and quantitative aspects. Findings reveal that speakers of both languages use similar strategies in terms of politeness, directness or indirectness and Speaker-or-Hearer Oriented utterances. The realization of the language routines of advice seeking and giving in both languages is, however, different. The influence of socio-cultural features is noticeable in both languages in terms of formality, relationship of interlocutors, age and gender. The results are not always consistent with the hypotheses posed in the study. Chapter 1 provides an introduction to the Study and Chapter 2 presents the theoretical background and discusses the concept of advice. In Chapter 3 the methodology of the Study is described and the hypotheses are stated. Chapter 4 presents the results of the analysis of data and Chapter 5 sets out conclusions and recommendations.

Apology is intended to 'set things right' through "remedial work" (Goffman 1971). This involves, in some cultures, a face threatening act on the part of the Speaker who undertakes an apology to maintain or re-establish social equilibrium or harmony (Edmondson 1981 and Leech 1983) between speaker and hearer. Several studies across languages (Cohen and Olshtain 1981, Olshtain 1983, Trosborg 1987, Holmes 1989) investigated the different social and contextual factors that influence native speakers to select one or a group of "semantic formula(s)" (Fraser 1981) in the act of apologizing. Nevertheless the literature is still in its infancy (Fraser 1981 and Holmes 1989) in respect to the gender differences between speaker (apologizer) and hearer (recipient), and in the comparison of Spanish and English. Therefore this study aims to investigate which strategies, semantic formulas and excuses are most commonly used by female and male speakers of Chilean Spanish and Australian English. To determine similarities and dissimilarities between their apologies, a role play was carried out in their mother tongue. Twenty two Chileans (twelve females and ten males) who had lived for not more than three years in Australia and twenty Australians (ten males and ten females) who, like the Chileans, varied in age from 17 to 30 and who were students of secondary or tertiary institutions helped as informants in this study. The speech event was designed to elicit an apology and was held constant for both groups. Results show that Chileans in comparison with Australians make less use of explicit expression of apology. Nevertheless they appear to give more explanations than Australians in the act of apologizing. Dissimilarities in both languages were also found in the use of speaker and hearer oriented apologies and in the the use of some strategies and intensifiers, in which the addressee gender played an important role in both languages.

This Study examines some cross-cultural differences in conveying good and bad news in Australian English and Vietnamese. Three major aspects are taken into consideration: address forms, modality, and directness-indirectness. Theoretical issues are raised and discussed, and questionnaire data collected and analysed. Chapter I shows why it is important and necessary to study crosscultural differences and sets up the aims of the study. Chapter II deals with address forms in general and the use of address forms in conveying good and bad news in the Australian and Vietnamese cultural contexts in particular..The similarities and differences between the two systems are also discussed. Chapter III dwells on modality and its devices: modals, modality markers, subjunctive mood (in English) and lexico-modal operators for subjunctive mood (in Vietnamese). The use of these devices in communicating good and bad news in the two cultures is discussed in detail. Chapter IV is concerned theoretically with directness-indirectness, and the relationship between indirectness and politeness. How directness and in-directness are actually used to convey good and bad news in Australian and Vietnamese cultures is also analysed. Chapter V concludes the Study and suggests implications for ELT.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Western Conservative Baptist Seminary, 1988. / Abstract. Bibliography: leaves 130-133.

<p>En ökad handel med Kina har inneburit att fler svenskar arbetar och bor där tillfälligt. Det betyder att det finns intresse att undersöka kulturella skillnader för att underlätta anpassningar vid arbete och fritid. Åtta personer med erfarenhet av att arbeta och leva i Kina intervjuades. Resultatet visade på betydande skillnader i kommunikation, tidsuppfattning, organisation, relationer och socialt beteende. Kommunikationssvårigheter fanns både under arbete och vid fritid vilket berodde på språket i sig samt olika kommunikationsstilar. Den hierarkiska organisationen bidrog till att saker tog längre tid, men goda relationerna upplevdes minska tidsåtgången. Socialt beteende skiljde sig till exempel vid bordskick. För att motverka skillnaderna underlättar ett gott tålamod samt en kulturell förståelse och acceptans. Resultatet diskuteras utifrån skillnaderna i de kulturella samhällsvärderingarna.</p>

<p>The concept of positioning was first highlighted by Trout and Ries in an article published in 1971 and has since then been a well-studied subject. However, little study has been made regarding the way the positioning strategy changes depending on which country the company is about to enter. The purpose of this master dissertation is thus to investigate culture’s role as a driving force in international positioning. </p><p>The theoretical framework consists of the foundations of the positioning process and international marketing literature about cross-cultural theories. These theories are put together in an analytical model where a connection between the two theories is illustrated that will be used as a foundation in gathering and analysing the empirical data. </p><p>In a qualitative approach, the empirical data was gathered through semi-structured telephone interviews with the Marketing Directors or a corresponding title of five different Swedish international companies. These findings were also complemented with secondary data such as web pages and annual reports of the companies.</p><p>The findings of the study showed that cultural differences are considered to some extent and have resulted to an entirely new positioning strategy for one of the researched companies and to changes in the strategic tools made for consolidating the position in two additional companies. In the two remaining companies, culture has not been a driving force and the companies have thus not considered this in their positioning in international markets.</p>