Value shifts in Vietnamese students studying in Russia

Background. The extension of intercultural contacts in the present-day world calls for a thorough study of what effect these contacts produce on the human personality. When an individual is suddenly immersed in a different culture, his or her consciousness becomes a battlefield where new values conflict with the old. The person experiences an axiological shock, a "value clash," which urges him or her to undertake a re-examination of his/her value system as a whole. Objective. The objective of this study was to determine the changes occurring in the value system of Vietnamese students obtaining their higher education in Russia. Design. A longitudinal study was performed involving 100 Vietnamese students in Russian universities. The measurement methods used in the study were: 1) the modified M. Rokeach Value Survey (Rokeach, 1973; Kudrjashov, 1992), in which the original set of values was expanded by 20 additional values typical of the Vietnamese people; and 2) the technique for assessing acculturation strategies developed by J.W. Berry (Strategii mezhkul'turnogo vzaimodejstvija..., 2009). Results. In the course of a year of residence in Russia, specific changes (or "shifts") occurred in the value systems of the Vietnamese students which proved to be statistically significant. Among the goal values (the same as terminal values, in the terms of M. Rokeach) which took on more weight were Productive Life and Materially Prosperous Life, while among instrumental values, Tidiness and Frugality became more prominent. A difference between the value dynamics in male and female students was also established, with the value pattern of male students proving to be more dynamic. The next finding was the difference in value dynamics between students coming from urban and rural settlements. There was one more quite unexpected finding: The value pattern changed more noticeably in respondents with an acculturation profile of "Integration and Separation," than in those with profiles of "Integration and Assimilation" and "Pure Integration." Conclusions. Therefore we see that factors such as gender, type of environment (rural/urban) the individual comes from, and the strategy of acculturation used by the individual, act as mediators exerting their own influence upon the dynamics of his/her value patterns.