"HOW TO FIT IN?" - NETWORKS AND GROUP WORK AMONG INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS

Student heterogeneity in German Higher Education has been increasing over the last years and ‘Diversity’ has become an important area for academic research and policy. Students differ from each other in a great variety of ways and international students, in particular, stand for the resource-oriented perspective that is at the heart of the diversity concept. A number of factors play a role when students try to adapt to new social and educational organisations, behaviours and expectations (Tinto 1975). Dropout rates, for example, are disproportionally high for this group despite good starting conditions - a pattern that has been explained by deficits in academic and social integration (Berthold/Leichsenring 2012).

In our study, we want to highlight some of these factors by assessing the relationship between different diversity categories. For that purpose, we will conduct a survey among a group of culturally highly diverse students including more than 25 different nationalities. A network analysis will be used to map the degree and strength of social ties (nodes) within this group. These ties will then be related to different student characteristics including skill levels, language proficiency, academic background and nationality.

In a second step, the role of group work in assessed projects will be examined. Multicultural group interactions involve a considerable level of anxiety and uncertainty that students seek to reduce (Strauss et al. 2012). We want to show how group work and different methods of group formation are perceived by international students and how this is related to different diversity categories as well as the students’ position in the social network.