Page 27 - Never Too Far Away? The Roles of Social Network Sites in Sojourners’ Adjustment

home- and the host-country networks is important in the study of homesickness. In this dissertation, I examine the relative impacts of various types of interactions, namely face-to-face and SNS with the home- and the host-country networks, on homesickness (Chapter 3).
Homesickness Predicting Sociocultural Adjustment. Homesickness has been theorized as a predictor of sociocultural adjustment (Berry, 2006; Stroebe et al., 2015a; Van Tilburg, 2005; Ward et al., 2001). According to the Dual Process Model of Homesickness (DPM-HS) (Stroebe et al., 2015b), homesickness is a “home factor”, whereas adjustment is a “new place factor”. Homesickness is fundamentally a negative psychological state due to separation from home. This is conceptually different from (new place) adjustment experiences, which are “the demands that are made on the person in the new environment” (Stroebe et al., 2015b, p. 4). Consistent with the theoretical predictions, previous research provides evidence that poor adjustment in the host country could be a consequence of homesickness (English et al., 2017; Constantine, Kindaichi, Okazaki, Gainor, & Baden, 2007; Poyrazli & Lopez, 2007). Therefore, in this dissertation, I predict that homesickness lowers sociocultural adjustment. In Chapter 3, I examine the relative impacts of social interactions on sociocultural adjustment via homesickness ( as shown in Figure 2).
The Question of Directionality
Reciprocal Effects of Social Interactions and Subjective Outcomes
One important issue to address is the directionality of associations. For instance, social interactions, support, and adjustment are often discussed together in theory, but their reciprocal interactions are rarely tested empirically (Trepte & Scharkow, 2016). Meng et al. (2017), in their narrative review, stated that “it remains unclear as to whether SNS impacts social support..., or if social support shapes use of SNSs, or both” (p. 49). Thus, the direction of influence between SNS use and social support remains a critical gap in research.
In the case of social interactions and homesickness, directionality is also an issue. There are findings in the literature showing the possibility that not only does social interaction impact homesickness, homesickness also impacts social interactions: Either homesick individuals seek company (Brewin, Furnham, & Howe, 1989; Thurber & Walton, 2012) or avoid social situations (Thurber & Walton, 2012; Van Tilburg, 2005).
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