Culture Shock
Culture shock is a term that describes the effects of moving from a familiar culture to another that is unfamiliar. As such, it can be simply be referred to as the surprise of a new environment. Being mostly experienced by people who move to other countries such as travelers, students and expats, culture shock includes the initial separation anxieties that happen when these individuals are taken out of close contact with the significant people in their lives. These could be family relatives, friends, partners, workmates and any other people that they would seek advice from when it comes to such situations of anxiety (Lakshmi and Ramchandran). Culture shock therefore affects people who end up living far from home and it goes beyond unfamiliarity with social norms or new foods. Problems that fuel culture shock include information overload, generation and technology gap, homesickness, boredom among others.
Common Elements that Contribute to Culture Shock
Moving to another place where there is different weather from that of the place of origin is major cause of discomfort. Regardless of whether it is moving from a wet and grey climate to an arid, hot area or the other way round, change in weather is bound to cause discomfort. Food is another common element that contributes to the feelings of culture shock. Most of the people after moving to new regions, they find that food is cooked differently, with perhaps a different texture, either more bland or more heavy compared to what they are familiar with. Language is a common cause of culture shock whereby being in a place where everybody else around is speaking in an unfamiliar foreign language is overwhelming and causes great mental fatigue. Even when it comes to international or regional languages such as English, an individual still finds it tiring due to different accents and fast-talkers.
Cultural Differences
While some cultural differences such as food, behavior and dress are obvious, individuals traveling to new parts of the world may find that people there have very different outlooks on the world from their own. As such, there is no longer right or wrong, but only different since they find that people in the foreign place do not share some of the basic core values and beliefs they live by. Every culture has its own unwritten norms that tend to run how individuals interact and treat one another (Kathirvel and Christina 105). It is problematic for an individual to try to fit into a completely system while at the same time trying to disregard their own. For every person who moves to a new region, one of the unfamiliar elements he/she encounter is code of dressing. It is never easy to just tune into a new way of dressing For example, moving from a region of warm climate to that of cold, a lot of effort is needed to wear heavy clothing. Much worse, one may find that in the region they have moved into has culture prohibitions on the types of attire they regard as normal.
The Four Stages of Culture Shock
Culture shock commonly moves through four different phases: honeymoon, frustration, adjustment and acceptance. When a traveler, student, or any other individual moves to a foreign region, he/she has to face a host of emotions as well as reactions that range from awe rejection, isolation to assimilation. All these feelings encompass the four phases of culture shock.
Honeymoon
At this stage, an individual experiences goes through a period that he/she feels extreme joy and enthusiasm. An individual responds to the new environment with a lot of fascination and he/she will enjoy and embrace the differences in various aspects of life such as fashion, food, social customers among others. This phase is exciting, full of new discoveries and observation, but unfortunately, it only lasts for a few days or weeks (Kathirvel and Christina 105).
Frustration
The rejection phase is marked by criticism, resentment and anger. It is at this stage that the individual will consistently have challenges with language, housing, friends as well as understanding the eccentricities of the new culture that mostly results to frustration. The individual realizes that doing even the simplest tasks is a daunting challenge for them as an outsider. The high expectations set at the honeymoon phase start to appear much further out of reach (Presbitero 29).
Adjustment
With time, the individual's frustrations are subdued when he/she starts to feel more familiar and comfortable with the various aspects of the foreign region such as culture, food, language and values. As a result, navigation becomes easier, and friends and social circles of support are formed while details of the local languages start to become more identifiable.
Acceptance
Eventually, after fighting with the above phases of emotions, the final stage is acceptance whereby the individual realizes that complete understanding of the new culture and environment is not necessary for them to function and flourish in the foreign region. It is at this stage that the individual acquire the familiarity and are able to bring together the resources they require to feel at ease (Presbitero 32).
Works Cited
Kathirvel, N., and IM Christina Febiula. "Understanding the aspects of cultural shock in international business arena." International Journal of Information, Business and Management 8.2 (2016): 105.
Lakshmi, V. Selva, and S. Ramchandran. "A Phenomenological Study About the International Student's Cultural Shock in India." (2016).
Presbitero, Alfred. "Culture shock and reverse culture shock: The moderating role of cultural intelligence in international students’ adaptation." International Journal of Intercultural Relations 53 (2016): 28-38.
