Promotion of Intercultural and Refugee-specific Competence
Aims of the project
Aims of the project
Within the research project, work is being done to achieve various goals. The objectives have been defined in different work packages.
Work package 1 concerns current developments in Ukraine and the EU. The attitudes of the German population towards Ukrainian refugees are to be recorded in order to enable the social integration and support of the refugees.
Furthermore, the attitudes of the Ukrainian refugee population regarding the duration of stay in Germany, as well as intentions to return will be measured. Since the mental health of refugees needs to be focused on, possible traumas caused by direct or indirect experiences of violence or family separation will be identified and possibilities for activating resilience and individual and collective mental resources to maintain mental health will be explored. To this end, local support organizations and official agencies will be involved in the research.
Work package 2 will identify frameworks for developing global/intercultural competence and attitudes toward migration in business and society. A survey on the internationalization of universities and business will be developed for the survey. The survey will take place in Germany in companies and universities, as well as among Ukrainian refugees in relation to the future reconstruction of the Ukrainian economy and higher education landscape. Subsequently, the obtained data will be evaluated, analyzed and recommendations for action will be derived.
Planned measures to implement the objectives
Within the project, work is being done to achieve various goals, which are to be achieved through the following measures:
In order to gain quick access to Ukrainian refugees, close cooperation with local social actors is planned. In addition, the involvement of local helpers helps to gain deeper insights into the needs and wants of the refugees, as well as the specifics of the situation. In addition, access to people who can make qualified contributions to the design of measures to promote reception and integration is guaranteed. Here, qualitative interviews will be used to establish relevant constructs and interactions. Especially the critical incident method has proven to be an effective method in intercultural research among refugees. Additionally, questionnaires will be used to quantitatively record and analyze intercultural competencies and psychological symptoms, as well as demographic information of the participants.
After the comprehensive analysis of the available facts, the focus will be on the training of intercultural competencies, as well as competencies in dealing with acute trauma and coming to terms with recent direct or indirect experiences of violence or family separations. To this end, local social actors are to be involved in order to also ensure the effectiveness of the measures and the transfer of knowledge.
The aim is to identify predictors for jointly coping with the global challenge of migration, taking into account culture-specific aspects of Eastern and Western European culture. Furthermore, diversity and intercultural competence will be investigated as key competencies that are crucial for coping with social and economic challenges in the globalized world. In particular, individuals who act as local actors in coping with refugee movements can act as multipliers to ensure the transfer of scientific findings into practice. In addition, the exchange with the business community (via joint discussion rounds and measures) is intended to test and improve the external validity of the scientific findings on diversity and intercultural competence and to identify practice-relevant problems.
Benefits for the future
Due to the Ukrainian nationality of the researchers, it is possible to specifically address peculiarities of the Eastern European cultural space and current developments during the Russian invasion, as well as to identify factors of interaction with Western European and other perspectives. The project results offer an enormous added value and the findings of the cooperation can be used to record and promote global competence, also with regard to forced migration, in an evidence-based manner.
From a societal perspective, the focus is particularly on promoting intercultural competencies. The interaction of intercultural experiences and psychological stress will be given special consideration. In addition, social learning and positive attitude changes as well as the reduction of discrimination and negative attitudes regarding flight and migration are to be achieved. In the long term, diversity should be seen as an opportunity and an enthusiasm for future technologies and innovation as well as the strengthening and formation of personal and economic networks should be achieved. In this way, an expanded and goal-oriented exchange of knowledge can be ensured and existing strategies and measures can be further developed. The aim is to contribute to the creation of a common European cultural area and successful integration as a solution to the global challenges of flight and migration.