Linguistic Markers of Intercultural Competence in Student Blogs

Abstract

This study combines insights from psycholinguistics and text analysis to identify linguistic markers of intercultural competence (ICC) in student blogs about intercultural experiences. By combining holistic ICC frameworks with a more analytical approach at text and word level, we were able to demonstrate that blogs with a high perceived level of ICC contain significantly more I-words, more insights words and less quantifiers. These markers of ICC constitute concrete cues for teachers when assessing reflective writing assignments and allow them to pinpoint concrete areas for improvement in their feedback and interaction with students.