Page 81 - Never Too Far Away? The Roles of Social Network Sites in Sojourners’ Adjustment
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                                In other words, Facebook interaction with the host-country network made international students feel less homesick. This, in turn, helped them manage their daily life in the host country, although this effect is short-term and had no long- term consequences.
Finally, the results also showed that sojourners’ length of stay in the host country did not have any effect on their homesickness and adjustment. According to the systematic review of Stroebe et al. (2015a), there is still a lack of consistency when it comes to the trajectory of homesickness over time. It could be that homesickness peaks in certain occasions (e.g., holiday periods). It could also be that for some, feelings of homesickness fade away after a few months after arrival in the host country; and for others, it could be persistent. It might be too simplistic to assume that homesickness fades over time (Stroebe et al., 2015a). Our study showed that homesickness was not associated with the duration of stay of sojourners in the host country, or the length of time they have been away from home. This implies that people should not assume that sojourners, or other migrants for that matter, are less likely to experience homesickness just because they have been away for a relatively longer period of time. This also points to the importance of providing support even to sojourners or migrants who have been in the host country for some time.
Theoretical and societal contributions
This current investigation extends theorizing in the fields of media and communication, as well as acculturation and clinical psychology. First, we extend current theorizing in sojourners’ adjustment by incorporating a concurrent communication model. Previously, studies on the impact of social interactions on homesickness and adjustment looked at social networks and communication channels separately (Berry, 2006; English et al., 2017; Rui & Wang, 2015; Ward et al., 2001). A concurrent communication model adopts a reinforcement assumption on the simultaneous use of communication channels (Dienlin et al., 2017). This allows for the investigation of the relative impacts of sojourners’ social interactions (with the home- and the host-country networks via two communication channels, Facebook and FtF) on homesickness, and, in turn, on sociocultural adjustment.
This study also contributes by extending the application of the transactional feature of media effects and the Reinforcing Spirals Model (Slater, 2015; Valkenburg et al., 2016) in the context of sojourners’ adjustment. These are important assumptions in media and communication with regards to the
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