This study examines the impact that SL has on Higher Education Students´ level of Intercultural Sensitivity (IS) and to see whether it differed from results coming from a non-Service Learning (SL) approach. To this end, we compared two groups of undergraduate students at Pablo de Olavide University (Seville, Spain) enrolled on the same Didactic course, and in two different formats: SL and non-SL. A quasi-experimental design of repeated measures pretest and posttest, using a comparison group, was implemented. The sample consisted of 233 Higher Education students.
IS has led to different models for analysis, evaluation and design of studies and experiences. This paper opts for the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS) to understand the different orientations of cultural differences (Bennett 1993). Bennett (2004) conceptualizes how people react to cultural dissimilarities through various processes of cultural adaptation. The DMIS was used for data collection. The inventory reflected a five-factor structure (denial/defence, minimization, reversion, acceptance/adaptation, and encapsulated marginality). Our hypothesis predicted that SL students would report higher levels of IS and the data confirmed this. The results indicated that the students of the two groups are in the minimizing phase and that the posttest scores are higher than the pretest for both groups, although the SL group revealed a significantly higher level in all subscales (reversal, acceptance/adaptation and encapsulated marginality) with the SL course except in the denial/defence and the minimization stages. The discussion focuses on the effectiveness of SL to develop the level of IS in Higher Education students.
Currently, numerous studies have highlighted IS as one of the key competencies in professional work in contemporary multicultural democracies, where the need to interact effectively with people from other cultures has become a matter of vital importance (European Commission 2015). Employers seek professionals capable of working in different contexts. However, interculturality has not been carefully and meaningfully integrated into Higher Education (Deardorff and Arasaratam-Smith 2017). If the role of IS as a predictor of success in intercultural relations is to be recognized, it is necessary to explore which methodologies add to its development to contribute to the training of active citizens (Hammer, Bennett and Wiseman 2003).
Our reason for choosing SL is that it represents a teaching methodology designed to establish a reciprocal learning relationship between students (and their educational institutions) and the community, offering a service based on the community’s needs, helping students gain experience in practical and real-life issues. Thus, SL breaks the gap between university studies and the daily problems of society (McMillan, Goodman, and Schmid 2016). In practice, SL places students in real contexts where they encounter people and communities that are unfamiliar to them, but about which they often have previous attitudes or beliefs. Studies have demonstrated that SL helps students to use their knowledge and skills (Gerholz, Liszt and Klingsieck 2017).
As a pedagogical approach, Service Learning (SL) has succeeded in the field of education, proving its effectiveness regarding social commitment and in relation to academic engagement (Caspersz and Olaru 2017; Rodríguez-Izquierdo 2019, 2020; Wang, Zhang and Yao, 2019). However, previous studies have not paid enough attention to the relationships between the development of IS and SL (Chan, Ngai and Kwan 2017) indicating the need for more definitive empirical data on the influence of SL on IS development (O'Grady 2014, Rodríguez-Izquierdo 2018). The focus of this article links with debates on intercultural education, diversities, and global citizenship in the context of Higher Education.