Tolerance of Ambiguity in Culture Acquisition ——Based on Differences in Cultural Perception

This paper probes into a psychological construct named Tolerance of Ambiguity （TOA） to find out how well Chinese college students psychologically tolerate cultural differences between China and Britain. Term papers written by 71 students expressing their opinions on BBC＇s behavior （rehearsing announcement of the queen＇s death while she is alive） were used as data to identify them either as tolerant learners of culture or intolerant learners of culture according to their psychological state concerning perception of death and attitude to cultural differences. Opinions gathered from the data show great differences between two cultures in terms of the concept of death and also great differences between two types of learners in terms of their degree of tolerance. This paper is a qualitative analysis of the data about the students＇ cultural opinions and psychological tolerance. The analysis of the data sheds light on the existence of TOA ＆ ITOA （Intolerance of Ambiguity） in the process of culture acquisition and shows that a certain degree of TOA is needed for better adaptation to an unfamiliar culture in case the students go abroad for further study in the future. It is concluded that fostering higher degree of TOA should be taken into consideration not only by language teachers but also by teachers of culture courses because TOA is crucial for acculturation in this era of globalization. A few strategies are suggested at the end of the paper for teachers to raise intercultural awareness and boost tolerance of differences among students who take culture courses.

Sociocultural Factors in Second Language Acquisition

Since no language can exist in a cultural vacuum, and since no two cultures are exactly identical, second or foreign language learners will inevitably encounter cultural confrontations on their learning route. However, it does not mean that learners must abandon their own culture in order to avoid the potential cultural collision. What they need to do is to accumulate the knowledge pertaining to the target culture so as to develop cross-cultural awareness. This paper will draw on previous research in this arena as well as the author＇s personal knowledge to further explore the relationship between socioculture and second language acquisition from the perspectives of culture and language, cultural confrontation, and culture familiarization.

Cultural Schema and Intercultural Communicative Competence

Cultural schemas, as cognitive structures and generalized collections of knowledge of past experiences that are organized into related knowledge groups, can be used to perceive and understand various cultural phenomena in the communication. People carry different schemas （background knowledge） that play an important role in guiding people＇s behaviors in intercultural communication. The purpose of this paper is to attempt to theoretically apply communication strategies to the development of intercultural communicative competence in light of Cultural Schema Theory. It focuses on the relationship between cultural schema and intercultural communicative competence. Some pedagogical implications are given that cultural schema could be previously intended to help communicaters have a better and easier life when they are living in other countries, such as awareness raising, knowledge acquisition, emotional management, and skills development. This paper is written on the basis of a collection of the Chinese university students＇ experience of culture-learning. The study has certain significance in the practice on cultural acquisition, communication competence, and intercultural communication.