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meeting Taiwanese guys and girls. According to most female CIEE students, they agreed with each other that they find Taiwanese guys in general are more passive yet awkwardly initiative. What they meant was that Taiwanese guys typically are too shy to initiate any progress into their relationship but once the relationship is official, the males will glue to the female like no other. On the other hand, most male CIEE students agreed that

Taiwanese girls are conservative and naïve, which makes it harder for “aggressive”

American guys to approach the Taiwanese girls.

On the whole, American students perceived love relationships between males and females in Taiwanese as conservative, naïve and serious, yet individually they are not happy in the relationship. They realized that there seems to be a high percentage of couples in Taiwan, but also felt that most couples are only together for the sake of being together, not actually understanding what they want in a relationship. When students realized that gender roles between Taiwan and America appears to be the complete opposite, female CIEE students tend to be more aggressive by giving it all they got of their Mandarin language skills when speaking to Taiwanese guys. While, male CIEE students also learned to employ the Mandarin language in a more submissive manner in order to successfully approach Taiwanese girls.

4.3.2 SURVEY FOLLOW-UPS

According to the collected data from the survey, it is apparent that there is a differentiation of culture shock experience between two ethnic groups:

East-Asian-Americans and non-East-Asian Americans. Of the East-Asian Americans, majority of the students felt they experienced little to no shock at all during their entire stay in Taiwan. While of the non East-Asian Americans, most students acknowledges that at one point they did went through culture shock in Taiwan.

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In addition to reading the collected data, I met up with the two groups of students individually and asked them to elaborate on two questions: (1) Please explain why you did/did not experience any cultural shock in Taiwan? (2) Please describe a time you felt like learning Mandarin was too hard and bothered you.

When the first question was asked to the East Asian American group, all of their first response was that they did not experience any because Taiwan is part of their heritage, or since they are Asian, a lot of the cultures are similar to their own Asian culture; hence there was not much of a shock. Clearly, they felt that they experienced no shock at all, because they believed that they knew about this cultural difference beforehand and/or has expected this cultural differences; thus students believed that since they understood the disparity between the two countries in advance, the differences did not affect them so much.

However, when students began to talk more about what actually bothered them in Taiwan, they in fact mentioned some cultural notes that they have noticed that annoyed them when they socialized with the Taiwanese. Interestingly enough, when East-Asian American students were asked to answer the second question, they immediately responded with a

“not really, but the tones are so hard,” or “maybe when I can‟t remember how to write Chinese characters on quizzes.” Their responses were usually regarded upon the

uncertainty of if they felt learning Mandarin is difficult, but they do realize that it bothered them to not be able to acquire it quickly.

On the other hand, when non East-Asian Americans were asked the first question, all agreed that there was culture shock yet I received two explanations for their shock.

Depending on the personality traits of the person, a more optimistic student responded that they experienced the shock but tried to oversee it and accept it as it is. For other

non-East-Asian American students, who were more easily irritated, responded that at one point they really hated everything about Taiwan, the food, climate, people, even wanted to give up going to language class. It was also during that same period of culture shock that

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students felt homesick and acquiring Mandarin at that point was thought as an impossible task. Clearly between the two groups, East- Asian Americans denied or did not realize that they experienced any culture shock, when in fact they did not realize that their language acquisition and social living were influenced by the cultural difference. In contrast, non East-Asian American students visibly recognized the experience of the culture shock and openly acknowledge the fact that it affected their language acquisition.

4.4 CONCLUSION

In this chapter, I have attempted to reveal various culture shocks from personal and CIEE students‟ point of view. From the initial observation of personal cultural experience when studying abroad in Taiwan, I admit that in the beginning of the semester, I honestly did not believe I was going through culture shock until I realized that it was causing anxiety and influencing my motive to learn Mandarin.

Likewise, from evaluating CIEE students‟ reflection journals, observing their social behaviors, and conversing casually with the students, it is believed that some American students who were visibly aware of the cultural differences either understood and accept them with no shock or deny that they experience any shock. However, in consistent with the collected data, it is true that all CIEE students indeed faced culture shocks, the only difference is that some did not realize the shock until they stumble upon difficulties in socialization or language learning. Moreover, I have also discovered that at some point during students‟ progress of Mandarin learning, all if not, most CIEE students became unmotivated or less motivated in learning Mandarin in Taiwan.

Even so, it is crucial to look further into the various stages of culture shock students underwent, as well as how enduring these culture shock influence students‟ Mandarin language acquisition. Consequently, detail analysis of the stages of acculturation and a

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thorough discussion on how culture affects language acquisition will be presented in the next chapter.

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CHAPTER FIVE: FINDINGS AND ANALYSES

The goal of this chapter is to examine the various stages learners of second language undergo in the process of acculturation, as well as the degree of impact it has on Mandarin acquisition. Accordingly, it is essential to first explain the various acculturation phases CIEE students underwent, which is discussed in section 5.1. Additionally, in section 5.2, a deeper analysis of East-Asian Americans and Non-East-Asian Americans‟ awareness of culture shock will be discussed in relation to their motivation in continuing to learn Mandarin. Finally, in section 5.3, acculturation of the Taiwanese culture and Mandarin language acquisition will be discussed together to understand the importance of cultural adaptation towards effectively and successfully acquiring Chinese.

5.1 ACCULTURATION PHASES

In the course of learning a new language in a new cultural environment, CIEE

American students typically are comprised of people from distinctive cultural backgrounds whose understanding of Taiwanese culture are of different levels. However, regardless of CIEE American students‟ range of cultural backgrounds, students studying in Taiwan naturally undergo a process of acculturation during the time of their language acquisition.

It is believed that American students studying in Taiwan by large undergo anticipation, cultural shock, disorientation and ultimately adaptation to the culture. Due to the fact that Taiwan holds a culture that is distinctive from the multicultural surroundings of the United States, American students from diverse ethnic backgrounds more or less experience the aforementioned stages in the course of their language learning. These factors not only impede students from having the driving force to learn, but also help them successfully attain the language, if overcame. As a result, it is imperative to analyze the four phases of

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acculturation as well as explore how acculturation can impact American students in the course of acquiring the Mandarin language.