An exploratory study of the culture shock experience of missionary children homecomers

This Study is concerned with the culture shock experience of missionary children upon return to the USA for college. Participants in the study included 438 college age missionary children, who on the average, left to go overseas at the age of 3.5 and spent 12.61 years overseas. There were three phases to the study. In the first phase, the reliability and validity of the Homecomer Culture Shock Scales (HCSS) was evaluated. The HCSS, which has four subscales, was found to have test-retest reliability coefficients ranging from .60 to .80 over an average 20 day interval. Predicted, significant correlations were found between the HCSS and measures of anxiety, depression, and alienation, thus lending considerable support to the validity of the HCSS. In the second phase, it was hypothesized that measures of emotional differentiation from family of origin, family satisfaction, and family health would be related to the level of culture shock as measured by the HCSS. Using multiple regression, this hypothesis was born out for each family variable, suggesting that the family dynamics of missionary children (MKs) influence MKs' resourcefulness in coping with culture shock. In the third phase, it was hypothesized that MKs approach acculturation in four different ways: assimilation, segregation, integration, and marginality. No support for this hypothesis was found in the study. The significance of the findings in each phase of the study are discussed.