Running head: INTERVIEW REPORT

Interview Report: Finding Effective Methods for International Students to Communication with
American Students
Chuande Ye
Purdue University

Author Note
Chuande Ye is a freshman student at College of Liberal Arts, Purdue University.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Chuande Ye.
The College of Liberal Arts, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907
Contact: ye131@purdue.edu

INTERVIEW REPORT

Interview Report: Finding Effective Methods for International Students to Communicate

with American Students
Introduction
According to Purdue Universitys report, Purdue had 9,998 international students in the
2013-14 academic year. It is import to ensure that such a big international student group is able
to communicate with local students efficiently. Oftentimes there are so many barriers like
difference in culture, personality, and language to influence effective communication. Those
barriers are likely to make a vast number of misunderstanding and prevent international students
from communicating with American students. Also, it may cause a negative impact on their study
if they lack effective method to communicate with American Students. For example, they can
hardly join the class discussing workshop or teamwork. In order to find out some effective ways
for International students to communicate with American students, I conducted this interview
with My RA (Resident Assistant) Jon Harrell.
Background of Interview
Since my research topic is about finding effective methods of communication with
American students, I think it is crucial to find a right interviewee who has rich experience in
communicate with international students. Thats why I invited Jon Harrell, my RA (Resident
Assistant) to be my interviewee. He is a junior student at Purdue University and Resident
Assistant of Tarkington Resident Hall, North East 2. As a RA, he needs to communicate with
people from different background and cultural. He handles it well, which shows his rich
communication experiences and social skill. Also, he is an American student who relatively has
many communication experience with International students so he can provides many first-hand
information to me, which is very important for me to complete my research. I believe his

INTERVIEW REPORT

experience and skill would be very useful and helpful for my research. I interviewed Jon in his
room at Tarkington Hall.
Interview Review
First of all, in his opinion, as a Resident Assist, he needs to build a community, which
means to build connection and relationship and to Represent the university and make sure
student academically and emotionally successful. As a result, students are able to take care of
themselves inside and outside the classroom. Also, as a RA, he has to communicate with all
kind of people effectively, and to build connection to put those people who have same interest
together, which means that he should have comprehensive communication skill. The success of
this job depends on the success of this persons communication skills. He made a clear
conclusion. Then we talked about the communication barrier which was caused by culture
difference. As I said, There is much more easer to communicate with people from same culture
than from other culture and international student may feel better in same culture circle. For
example, Chinese maybe not understand Americans Sarcasm and may think it is an offensive but
he can easily enjoy Chinese joke. Jon showed his opinion about this phenomenon. In Jons mind,
international students should try to communicate with American students, even some times it will
not As comfortable as communication with people from same culture. Because The more
interact with American students and international students form different culture, the more you
grow. other and we can grow. I totally agree with this idea. Maybe communicate with people
from different culture is hard to begin, but it is necessary because we can learn from each
As the interview went through, we moved to an unavoidable problem in international
communication: Misunderstanding. His personal way to avoid misunderstanding is that he
tried to slow down when he communicate with international students, also he thought that

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American student should be patience and kindness when communicate with international
students. The lack of patience and the lack of kindness can be a really big problem. as he said.
For international students, the tips for overcoming the misunderstanding and get involving in is
practice as many as you can. To give me an example, he mentioned a Chinese friend, whose
English was not so good when he came American several years ago. On the behalf of improving
his English, he tried to communicate with American and went to the church to meet local people,
join the sermon. Now his English is as well as native speaker. Like Jon said, When international
students are willing to doing the things the domestic students doing and domestic students are
willing to doing the things that international students like to do, the mutual will spirit. The
interactive between international students and American students is the key element in
international communication.
Then, we talked about the Social Phobia, or the International Students Social
Phobia with American Students. For example, for me, it is easily to communicate with Chinese
student but when I communicate with American students, I became nervous and depressed.
Dont afraid! he said just to stay in courage, keep practice, and keep going! After that, we
talked about the communication methods like text and Facebook. For him, he usually texting
people, and texting message is a good way to practice communicate skill same time have chance
to think and look up the word on your phone so You can communicate what you want to
communicate. Moreover, he underlined the important of use good grammar, good punctuation
and good spelling. Because those thing will stand out when other people, for example, a
professor, reading your email or resume or something else. We really should do double check it
before send. As he stressed.

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We ended up our interview with talking about the most important social skill a man
should have. Listening. He said, Listening is more than just be healing the question, it more
about drawing the information. At end of the interview, he told me his tips for international
students to be social. He said that we just need to do something we want to do and find some
person has same interesting with us. The chance are there, there are 40,000 people at Purdue!
Conclusion
This interview impressed and inspired me. Now I have more understand in
international communication. He let me know that sometimes the both side have duty on the fail
of international communication- American students need more patience while international
students need more courage. Also he stressed that communication is based on the interactive, the
most effective way to communicate with American students is to interact with them like joining
their activities and playing with them. We both agree that international students should try our
best to communicate with American student. Like Jon said, Dont afraid and just to stay in
courage, keep practice, and keep going! Also, finding someone with same interests with you
and join their club or community is another effective way to make connect with American
students. Because those guys with same hobbits or interests are easily find same topic, and the
chances are there! It is easy to find somebody share same interest with you among 40,000
students! So, just do it!

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References
Harrell, J. (2015, March 1). Personal interviewee.

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Appendix
Interview Questions
1. Whats your duty as a Resident Assist? Do you think to complete your work, you should have
comprehensive communication skill?
2. How many international students are living in Tarkington now?
3. Do you agree or disagree that international students tend to communicate with students from
their own country rather than communicate with American student? If so, in your opinion, what
is the main cause of this situation?
4. Do you often have misunderstandings or confuses when communicating with international
students? How did you fix this problem? (If answer is yes) What do you think of those
misunderstand and confuse?
5. In your opinion, what is the cause of those misunderstandings or confuses problem?
6. Whats your suggestion about avoiding misunderstandings during mutual communication
between international students and American students?
7. Whats your suggestion for overcoming social anxiety?
8. What kinds of communication methods (like texting or social media like Facebook) are
popular in American, especially among American young people?
9. Whats the most important social skill that a man should have?
10. Do you have any tip for international students to be social?