“Somewhere I belong?” A study on transnational identity shifts caused by “double stigmatization” among Chinese international student returnees during COVID-19 through the lens of mindsponge mechanism

Abstract

Chinese international students who studied in the United States received “double stigmatization” from American and Chinese authorities because of the “political othering” tactic during COVID-19. The research used a phenomenological approach to examine why and how specifically the transnational identity of Chinese international students in the United States shifted during the double stigmatization. The researcher conducted a total of three rounds of interviews with 15 Chinese international students who studied in the United States and returned to China between 2018 and 2020, which culminated in 45 interviews through a longitudinal study to probe the transnational identities of this population before and during the double stigmatization; the study also examined how the mindsponge mechanism worked during the identity shifts and the interplay among stigmatization, transnational identity shifts, and the mindsponge mechanism. The study concluded that before COVID-19, Chinese international students had been stigmatized in both China and the United States. And there were three identity clusters for international students’ transnational identity: homestayers, wayfarers, and navigators based on four dimensions: intercultural competence, relocation of locality, diaspora consciousness, and attachment between China and the US. The study concluded that during the double stigmatization, Chinese international students in all three identity clusters took individualism into their core values, whereas Chinese traditional values, such as nationalism, collectivism, and obedience to authority waned. In addition, the study corroborated the trust evaluator’s gatekeeper role and substantiated the validity and effectiveness of cost-benefit analysis on an individual’s decision to accept or reject new information and values.

Exploring the relationship between mental distress and cognitive dissonance across transnational identities using BMF analytics

“…They also tend to be exempt from, or at least less vulnerable to, misinformation and disinformation directed towards a country that they are familiar with since, in the first and second stigmatization, misinformation and disinformation towards China and US were quickly ejected. However, they also went through double mental distress during the double stigmatization, as they became the target of mask-wearing stigma and anti-American campaigns (Jin & Wang, 2022;Yu, 2021).…”

“…For instance, the controversial Chinese author Fang Fang was stigmatized by netizens for her critical view of China in her published diary, in which she documented the mismanagement of the local government (Tao, 2021). Like Fang Fang, Chinese international student returnees had also formed transnational identities and inherited western values, so during this wave of nationalism, they were also forced to take a stand between Chinese collectivist values & ideologies and that of the US ones, which exacerbated their mental distress (Jin & Wang, 2022).…”

“…The mindsponge mechanism has been effectively applied to explore the psychological processes and mechanisms in mental health studies (M. H. Nguyen et al, 2019; as well as psychosocial adaptation during the COVID-19 pandemic (Jin & Wang, 2022;Pang et al, 2022). The integration of the mindsponge mechanism in probing the cognitive dissonance and mental distress of Chinese international students with various transnational identities has many benefits: first of all, it helps to examine how Chinese students' existing mindsets (transnational identity or attachment to one country) shaped their attitude towards double stigmatization (cognitive dissonance); second, the cost-benefit analysis in the mindsponge mechanism would help explain how and why Chinese international students with various transnational identities chose different approaches to overcome cognitive dissonance brought by double stigmatization differently (altering one's cognitions, developing new consonant cognitions, or downplaying the significance of dissonant cognitions) (Festinger, 1957).…”

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“…The Mindsponge mechanism is an information processing framework of how the human mind receives, filters, and accepts (or rejects) new values [37,38], which can be used to explain acculturative processes effectively. In a new (and multicultural) environment, students need to absorb and evaluate new values to adjust their mindset accordingly, which is necessary for them to adapt, regardless of chosen strategies [4]. This framework was used to provide insights into how acculturative stress and social connectedness may affect university students' depression levels [12].…”

“…People coming to a new environment will need to go through psychological adjustments related to their perceptions of new cultural values, which is the process of acculturation [1]. During the acculturative process, one receives and evaluates new values (as well as re-evaluates priorly integrated old values) to decide what to accept and what to reject as a natural mechanism to update one's mindset [2][3][4]. This process is often not easy and may cause acculturative stress to certain degrees [5][6][7].…”