Journal of Counseling Psychology 2015, Vol. 62, No. 3, 464 – 475

© 2015 American Psychological Association 0022-0167/15/$12.00 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/cou0000076

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Religious Practices in Cross-Cultural Contexts: Indonesian Male Science Students’ Adjustment in Taiwan Yung-Lung Chen

Mi-Chi Liu

National Tsing Hua University

National Tsing Hua University and Kaohsiung Municipal Hsin Chuang High School

Tsu-Wei Tsai

Yueh-Hua Chen

National Taiwan University

National Tsing Hua University

Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, little is known about how Muslims, as a minority group, cope with the challenges associated with engaging their religious practices in a predominantly nonIslamic context. This study aims to investigate how international Muslim science students dealt with the difficulties they faced in their religious practices in a foreign context, and specifically in their research laboratories and in the wider Taiwanese society with its pluralistic spiritual beliefs. Fourteen male Muslim graduate students from Indonesia were recruited to participate in a qualitative interview. In terms of conventional content analysis, their adjustment issues were related to their religious issues, including gender roles both inside and outside of the laboratory, inconvenient practices relating to prayer needs, and eating halal foods and having to face social discrimination off campus. Two types of major adaptation strategies were identified for dealing with such struggles, including religious coping through their Islamic beliefs and bicultural connections. Their major concerns about religious practices (e.g., praying 5 times per day) were resolved by communicating their needs directly with their laboratory classmates and advisors; however, they navigated the gender boundaries in the laboratory both subtly and inwardly through their Islamic beliefs. The practical implications regarding counseling and education are discussed both in a local and a global context. Keywords: Muslims, religious coping, acculturation, science students, gender roles

religious practices, and have faced a rise in the level of negative attitudes toward them (e.g., Amer & Bagasra, 2013). Nonetheless, little is known about how Muslims tackle the challenges associated with engaging their religious practices in multiple foreign contexts (e.g., schools, communities, the workplace; Berry, 1997; Güngör, Fleischmann, Phalet, & Maliepaard, 2013; Kuo, 2010; TummalaNarra & Claudius, 2013). Thus, the religious practices of Muslims embedded in the non-Islamic research and social settings of Taiwan, a nation with pluralistic beliefs, provide a unique opportunity through which to advance our understanding of human adaptation to diversely complex and unfamiliar environments (Fu & Chang, 2009; Hwang & Chang, 2009; Taiwan, Republic of China, Minister of Education, 2014). In this era of globalization, many research universities and governments around the world, including Singapore, the United Kingdom, and Australia, have proactively recruited international students and workers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) to advance their scientific research (e.g., U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2012). Scientific research work in STEM fields often requires intense collaboration and mutual trust among laboratory colleagues and faculty members from diverse backgrounds (Börner et al., 2010). However, little research has been conducted to investigate the adjustment issues faced by international Muslim students in terms of integrating in scientific laboratories where most people will have different spir-

Over the past decade, a significant number of studies have been conducted to investigate the experiences of minority ethnic groups with Islamic beliefs in North America, Europe, and Australia, following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 (e.g., Padela & Heisler, 2010; Poynting & Noble, 2004; Velasco González, Verkuyten, Weesie, & Poppe, 2008). The studies, conducted in Western Europe and the United States, have indicated that such groups often experience discrimination and prejudice against their

This article was published Online First May 25, 2015. Yung-Lung Chen, the Center for General Education, National Tsing Hua University; Mi-Chi Liu, the Department of Foreign Language and Literature, National Tsing Hua University and Kaohsiung Municipal Hsin Chuang High School; Tsu-Wei Tsai, the Office of Research and Development, National Taiwan University; Yueh-Hua Chen, the Institute of Learning Sciences, National Tsing Hua University. This study was supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology Grant NSC 101-2629-H-007-001 in Taiwan, Republic of China, and National Tsing Hua University. We are grateful to our research participants and assistants, including Che-Yi Hsiung, Yun-Chien Lin, Hung-Chun Liu, Mi Lee, Yun-Pu Du, Yu-Ting Peng, and Fang-Yu Chang. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to YungLung Chen, the Center for General Education, National Tsing Hua University, 101 Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan, Republic of China. E-mail: [email protected] 464

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RELIGIOUS PRACTICES IN CROSS-CULTURAL CONTEXTS

itual beliefs to their own. In addition, scholars from a variety of domains in the social sciences have investigated the minority experiences of women with the aim of improving the recruitment and retention of women in STEM (e.g., Singh et al., 2013). Nonetheless, few studies have considered male students in such fields in foreign contexts as a minority group that could experience vulnerability to additional negative emotions and stresses (Heppner & Heppner, 2009). Thus, this study aims to examine the religious adjustments made by male Muslim students in STEM in a predominantly non-Islamic laboratory and in wider society in Taiwan, because among the growing number of international students in Taiwan, many are Muslims from the Middle East, Indonesian, Malaysia, and other countries (Taiwan, Republic of China, Minister of Education, 2014). A group of Indonesian Muslim students in STEM was chosen because Indonesia is home to more than 212 million Muslims, which is the largest number of any nation (Roudi-Fahimi, May, & Lynch, 2013).

Muslim Students’ Adjustment to a Predominantly Non-Islamic Society As part of an international student body, Muslim students not only face the common adjustment issues often encountered by other international students (e.g., language barriers, homesickness, and social prejudices), but also must learn how to deal with the psychological struggles related to their religious practices in a predominantly non-Islamic society (Tummala-Narra & Claudius, 2013). The attitudes of local people toward international Muslim students and immigrants in their host society could have a significant influence on their adaptation. For example, international Muslim students in North America and Europe often encounter a lack of understanding, respect or support for their religious practices (e.g., there are no available class schedules to account for their prayer needs; e.g., Tummala-Narra & Claudius, 2013). In recent studies, international Muslim students or immigrants have expressed their experiences of being discriminated against in the U.S. on account of their religious backgrounds, raising their concerns about the fears they face as members of a religious minority (Ali, Liu, & Humedian, 2004; Tummala-Narra & Claudius, 2013). According to a literature review and a survey concerning religious beliefs in Taiwan, a large majority of people in Taiwan have pluralistic spiritual beliefs incorporating Buddhism, Taiwanese folk religion, Daoism, and Confucianism, whereas a relatively small proportion of the population is Christian (Fu & Chang, 2009; Hwang & Chang, 2009), and the proportion of Muslims in Taiwan is less than 1% (Fu & Chang, 2009). Although the rise in negative attitudes toward Muslims in North America and Europe may not be replicated in Taiwan, Islamic beliefs and practices may be regarded as elements of an unfamiliar religion by Taiwanese people (Asia Today, 2013). Thus, Muslims may not be accepted and treated with respect and dignity, and sometimes they may even face discrimination in Taiwan (Taipei Times, 2013). For example, although the government in Taiwan has called upon employers to be respectful of their Islamic beliefs, some Taiwanese employers have asked Indonesian Muslims to eat pork or even to raise pigs without understanding that pigs are considered unclean according to Islamic beliefs (Taipei Times, 2013). Muslims may have different perspectives of gender roles than those commonly found in a predominantly non-Islamic context.

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For example, in Taiwan, sons and men have been given preference over daughters and women, but since 1990, gender equality for women in Taiwan has been implemented gradually through democratically legal and educational reforms. As a result, some traditional gender roles of women and men, often those associated with expressive traits (e.g., sensitivity to others’ needs) and instrumental traits (e.g., independence and perseverance), respectively, have been weakened (e.g., Lu, 2011). On the other hand, historically, gender roles have been diverse in ethnic cultures across Indonesia (Robinson, 2009). Because the spread of Islam in Indonesia is influenced by political forces, particularly over the past few decades, the rights of women (e.g., their choices in dress, movements) have been restricted significantly (e.g., Brenner, 2011; Robinson, 2009). Although Indonesia has made some progress in promoting gender equality (e.g., combating domestic abuse) advocated by Muslim liberals, Muslim men and women are often socialized to follow proper dress standards, such as women wearing hijab and maintaining appropriate physical boundaries (e.g., not shaking hands) when they are unrelated (e.g., Brenner, 2011). It is likely that the ideas held by male Indonesian Muslim students about gender roles may not be congruent with those found in Taiwan.

Adjustment in Cross-Cultural Religious Practices Across a diverse range of disciplines in psychology over several decades, scholars have researched people’s methods of coping, highlighting the important human capacity to tackle stress through their strengths and resources (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). Nonetheless, most studies and theories on coping have been grounded on the assumptions of individualism (e.g., being problem focused and emotion focused; Kuo, 2010). A growing trend of theories and models on coping have been proposed to incorporate both cultural and contextual perspectives (e.g., Aldwin, 2007; Chun, Moos, & Cronkite, 2006; Hobfoll, 2001), nevertheless, they have mainly addressed coping mechanisms within a shared cultural system (e.g., individualism and collectivism; Kuo, 2010). Furthermore, a large number of studies have investigated the differences in coping strategies among individuals from various countries and cultures (Kuo, 2010), however, these empirical studies and models have not captured how ethnic minorities with certain cultural backgrounds tackle adjustments in foreign cultural contexts. Several recent studies have investigated acculturative stress in terms of Berry’s (1997) bicultural model, assuming that stress is rooted in the intercultural contact between two cultural dimensions, including cultural heritage and host culture (e.g., Berry, 1997; Wei, Liao, Heppner, Chao, & Ku, 2011). Nevertheless, Berry’s model has not identified the roles of the various life domains of acculturation (e.g., politics, economics, linguistics, religion) that have diverse influences on human experience (Miller, 2007; Schwartz, Unger, Zamboanga, & Szapocznik, 2010). Newer mutual acculturation models suggest adaptation as a result of the levels of compatibility in various life domains between the acculturation strategies adopted by ethnic minorities and the demands of a host society toward international students (e.g., Horenczyk, Jasinskaja-Lahti, Sam, & Vedder, 2013). For example, ethnic minority groups could smoothly adopt more of the host culture in the more materialistic domains (e.g., economic) to meet the expectations of their host society to help them better adjust, yet

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may resist accepting mainstream values in the more symbolic or interpersonal domains (e.g., family relationships) of the host culture, to maintain certain aspects of their original culture. In these newer models, four types of acculturative strategies from Berry’s (1997) model have been often adopted to conceptualize and assess individuals’ adaptation in various life domains. These include integration (i.e., participating in the new culture and maintaining one’s cultural heritage), assimilation (only participating in the new culture), separation (only maintaining one’s cultural heritage), and marginalization (neither participating in the new culture nor maintaining one’s cultural heritage). However, these strategies have been critiqued for their practical application (Ward, 2008). In this study, these four strategies are not applicable to Muslim students’ religious adjustments either in the laboratory or in wider Taiwanese society. It is unlikely that international Muslim students would participate in any religious practices related to integration, assimilation, or marginalization in the local Taiwanese context, because their own religion is considered an essential part of human life (e.g., Horenczyk et al., 2013). Working in research laboratories, they cannot fully avoid the intensive social interaction or collaboration with Taiwanese students and advisors for the purposes of maintaining their religious practices (e.g., praying five times per day), thus, the separation strategy is not an option. Little is known about how ethnic minorities deal with different incompatible life domains, such as the conflicts between the demand of sojourners’ religious practices and the expectations of host cultures (Güngör et al., 2013; Horenczyk et al., 2013; Ward, 2008). Furthermore, their adjustments could take place in different ways in multiple social contexts (e.g., schools, communities) in which members of the host society may hold inconsistent attitudes toward their cultural traditions, such as religious practices. Nonetheless, these models have not addressed the complexity of their adjustments directly (Horenczyk et al., 2013). Research on Muslim Indonesian students’ religious adjustments in Taiwan both inside and outside the laboratory and also off campus could reveal the complexity of human adaptation in an intercultural context.

Religious Coping in a Cross-Cultural Context Although religious coping has been extensively researched over the past few decades, few studies have investigated how it is adopted to deal with the adjustment issues of ethnic minorities in a foreign context (e.g., Abu-Raiya & Pargament, 2015; Wei et al., 2012). Furthermore, because the vast majority of studies of religious and spiritual coping have investigated adaptation associated with the religious beliefs of Christianity (Abu-Raiya & Pargament, 2015), an investigation of religious coping based on Islamic practices may enhance the understanding of its particular practices and the wider human capacity to overcome life challenges in a global context (Roudi-Fahimi et al., 2013; Smith, 1991; Lehman, Chiu, & Schaller, 2004). Islam may be conceptualized as religious beliefs and practices based on monotheism in which individuals fully submit to the Islamic God (Allah) and read the Qu’ran to understand the truth of the universe. There are five pillars that help Muslims maintain their practices and transcend normal life to achieve oneness with the Islamic God, including faith, ritual prayer, almsgiving, fasting, and pilgrimage (Smith, 1991).

The Current Study Because few studies have investigated how Muslim ethnic minorities cope with religion-related adjustment issues, a qualitative research method was adopted to investigate such adjustments by Indonesian Muslim male science students embedded in multiple contexts in Taiwan (Heppner & Heppner, 2009; Wester, 2008; Wong, Steinfeldt, Speight, & Hickman, 2010). The authors acknowledged that the participants’ worldviews, based on Islamic beliefs, were different from their pluralistic spiritual beliefs. Therefore, the research paradigm of this research is grounded in social constructivism (i.e., the existence of acknowledged multiple realities in different societies and settings) rather than postpositivism (i.e., a single reality that is imperfectly captured with causeeffect assumptions) or critical ideological approaches (i.e., multiple realities mediated by power relations constituted socially and historically; Ponterotto, 2005, 2010). Grounded theory, consensus qualitative research and psychological phenomenology are often adopted in counseling research. Grounded theory is mainly based on social constructivism with the aim of building a theory or model, whereas consensus qualitative research leans toward postpositivism, emphasizing the interpersonal consensus on coding (Ponterroto, 2005). Meanwhile, psychological phenomenology seeks to describe the essence of the lived experience in great detail in the researched phenomenon by bracketing researchers’ prior experiences and not being grounded in any research paradigms described above (Wertz, 2005). The aims of this study are neither to build a theory nor to capture the essence of participants’ lived experiences; rather, a conventional content analysis was chosen to investigate the students’ adjustments through which the researchers may immerse themselves in data to allow new insights to emerge without the use of preconceived categories, being well-suited for social constructivism. (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005). In this study, two research questions were proposed: First, how do Indonesians cope with the challenges associated with engaging their religious practices both inside and outside the laboratory and also off campus in a predominantly non-Islamic context such as Taiwan? Second, how do they use their particular religious beliefs and practices to adapt to these challenges?

Method Participants A group of Muslim graduate students from Indonesia, from one university campus with more than 100 Indonesian students with Muslim backgrounds, responded to the request of this study. The director of the international student office from the university campus was consulted multiple times via e-mails and by telephone with regard to the academic climate and university policy toward Muslim students (e.g., their efforts to create culturally supportive environments for Muslim students), academic training and procedures of the first author conducting cross-cultural research. The leader of the Muslim Indonesian Student Association on the campus was contacted to discuss appropriate times for interviews to avoid midterm examinations. Fourteen male graduate students in STEM, who self-identified as a Muslim from Indonesia, were recruited from the campus, located in northern Taiwan, to partic-

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ipate in an interview lasting for between 70 and 130 minutes (the average time was approximately 90 minutes) with their informed consent. Their ages ranged from 23 to 37 (M ⫽ 25.38, SD ⫽ 3.61) and they had been in Taiwan for between 4 and 24 months (M ⫽ 12.71, SD ⫽ 9.22). Three were pursuing a doctoral degree and three were married. The vast majority of the students had one parent with a high school or college degree in Indonesia, including three who had fathers with an advanced degree (i.e., master’s or doctoral degree). All of the students self-identified Islam as their religious belief and their ethnicities included Bugis, Javanese, Sundanese, and Banjarese (three students did not indicate their ethnicity). Only three had been abroad before coming to Taiwan; none had learned Chinese before coming to Taiwan, and all had passed English examinations prior to admission to their graduate programs in Taiwan. The students came from 14 different research laboratories and specialized in a variety of research areas, including electrical engineering, material science and engineering, industrial management, computer science, construction engineering, and information engineering. The laboratories in which they worked had between 2 and 19 members (M ⫽ 8.00, SD ⫽ 4.02) and all students had between 1 and 5 female laboratory mates, except for one student who had none. Most laboratory mates were supervised by their advisor; six participants had two advisors, including one working at another university. All, except one, had one or more research projects in the one or two other laboratories in which they were expected to work with other research teammates or needed to consult them under the supervision of their advisors or their advisors’ collaborators. All of the advisors were men. To help readers to follow the story of the students, the students’ names were replaced with pseudonyms.

Research Procedure A funded international students’ project was launched in Taiwan to investigate the adjustment made by science students from India and Indonesia with spiritual and religious beliefs in Hinduism and Islam, respectively. The flyer about this project was sent to the eight best-known international universities across Taiwan and distributed through their offices (Taiwan, Republic of China, Minister of Education, 2014). Although several Muslim graduate science students from the Middle East, Europe, and India, and other nonscience Muslim students from three of the eight universities expressed their interest to participate in the study, they were not invited for the interview because there are diverse worldviews among Muslims from different countries, and students with a nonscience background may not have laboratory experience. Furthermore, one international Muslim student from India, who studied technology management on a campus other than the participating students’, was consulted by the first author about his religious practices (e.g., the barriers to finding halal foods), before the interview. Although he did not make use of a research laboratory, he shared his experiences as an international Muslim student interacting with his peers and advisor. All interviews were conducted in English by the male first author, aged 39 years, with the experience of publishing qualitative research. After receiving his doctoral degree in a counseling psychology program accredited by the American Psychological Association, he had two and a half years’ experience of providing

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mental health services on his campus as a national licensed counselor. A qualitative research expert was consulted by him with regard to conventional content analysis. Based on this analytic method, an interview approach was adopted to explore male Indonesian students’ overall and particular religious adjustments both inside and outside the research laboratory (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005). A semistructured interview guide with eight questions was developed through a review of relevant literature (e.g., Börner et al., 2010), information from the Indian Muslim student (see the Appendix for the interview guide) and research team discussion. To facilitate the interview process, students were first asked about their decisions to study in Taiwan. A group of seven female undergraduates, aged between 19 and 21 years old, all from the Department of Foreign Language and Literature (DFLL), except for one from the Department of Information Engineering (DIE), transcribed the audio recordings for all interviews. Two female secondary authors then reviewed the transcripts under the supervision of the first author. Undergraduate assistants received 2 hr of training from the first author on an introduction to qualitative study, guidelines for transcriptions (including being coached for the first transcription by the first author), and multicultural empathy (e.g., not being judgmental about students’ non-native English speaking tones). Furthermore, the two female secondary authors also participated in the data analysis after attending training which comprised six 1-hr meetings throughout the project, provided by the first author, including reading articles about qualitative study and content analysis, in addition to the same training provided to undergraduate assistants, as described above. The first of the secondary authors, 29 years old, was a graduate student in the DFLL and a former high school teacher who was interested in promoting multicultural education for her future students in Taiwan. She had also completed a qualitative research course. The second, 25 years old, received a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and had extensive experiences of working for more than two years with international students at both Chinese and foreign language centers at the first author’s university. Over the course of this project, the first of the secondary authors participated in designing the interview questions and e-mail flyers, and the second female author joined the project two months after it had been launched. The subthemes, themes, and corresponding quotations were audited by the third author, a female 23-year-old graduate student from the Institute of Learning Sciences, with training in qualitative research and a major in counseling in her undergraduate program. Each author and four assistants self-identified their ethnicity as Minnan (Hokló) Taiwanese; one assistant, Hakka Taiwanese; one assistant, Hakka and Mainlander Taiwanese; and one assistant, Hakka and Minnan (Hokló) Taiwanese. In terms of their spiritual and religious backgrounds, the first author identified his as Buddhism and Daoism; two female secondary authors and one assistant, agnostic; the third author and one assistant, both Taiwanese folk religion and Buddhism; three assistants, Taiwanese folk religion; two assistants as Christianity and Buddhism, respectively. Furthermore, the first author identified Taiwanese Minnan as his mother language whereas the two secondary authors, the third author, and each of the seven assistants identified their mother language as Mandarin, except for one assistant who identified hers as Mandarin and Taiwanese Minnan.

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Data Analysis Four steps of conventional content analysis have been identified by Hsieh and Shannon (2005). First, the researcher read all transcripts repeatedly to obtain a sense of the whole. Second, the researcher read the transcript word by word and derived codes by highlighting any words representative of the key concepts. Third, through taking notes from the initial analysis and by identifying and relabeling codes, an initial coding scheme was constructed to apply to all the data, and the researcher remained open to the emergence of new codes from any new data. Finally, in terms of coding relations, the categories were developed to organize codes into meaningful clusters. Throughout 4 months of intensive data analysis, the two female secondary authors and the first author immersed themselves in the data by reading the entire transcript a number of times to gain a broader understanding of the adjustments being made by the students. To ensure they remained reflectively aware of potential researchers’ biases and perspectives on the data and in team discussions, each of the team members wrote down their initial impressions and ideas independently. Next, each research member reread every transcript, paying closer attention to the interviewees’ responses, line by line and carefully to highlight the key words about the adjustments made by the students in Taiwan, from which the team derived the codes collaboratively. Because the team had a limited understanding about the types of adjustments being made, the analysis of the adjustment issues was not only limited to the students’ religion. For example, the below statement was coded with “supportive laboratory mates” and “language barriers”: If I have difficulty, they [the lab mates] would give me some help of some kind, like when I have problems to sign [a document], to fill some form which is mostly [written in] Chinese characters, they would write it for me.

Furthermore, with the assistance of note taking on thoughts and the initial analysis, a preliminary code scheme was identified after open-coding four transcripts. With the preliminary coding schemes, each research member reviewed every transcript carefully and marked them independently, while being open to any additional emergent subthemes. Through numerous deliberations and discussions during team meetings, the preliminary coding schemes were revised and refined to provide a coherent account of the students’ experiences. For example, one additional code, related to the association of Islamic beliefs with terrorism, emerged from social discrimination. Finally, 32 preliminary subthemes were constructed, with two students taken as the minimum number for identifying a conceptually unified theme (Braun & Clarke, 2006). However, nine subthemes were eliminated because they played only minor roles in their adjustment process, including five subthemes about the students’ decisions to study in Taiwan and four subthemes (as only two students indicated each of them), including “academic stress,” “being a moderate Islamic believer (e.g., being more flexible in eating halal foods off campus),” “homesickness,” and “being culturally shocked by local religious practices (e.g., how some Taiwanese worship during the Ghost Festival with food and drinks).” Therefore, 23 subthemes were initially collapsed into 10 subthemes and seven themes, which were further placed under three major categories according to their conceptual relationships. For

example, three preliminary subthemes related to gender roles in public, including “women’s sexy attire,” “intimate relationships before marriage,” and “the meaning of wearing hijab,” were collapsed as “culturally shocked by gender behavior outside the laboratory,” because they were related to the students’ astonishment concerning gender roles in Taiwan. During the 4 months of intensive data analysis, the research team experienced numerous disagreements with regard to their understanding of the interviews, and the meaning of the initial ideas. At the beginning of the research project, the power differences among the team members were discussed. The two secondary authors were sensitive about their own perspectives and proactively raised questions for the discussion. Through a deliberate process of egalitarian discussion, rereading of the transcripts and listening to the interview recordings, the research team reached a consensus about various issues. Repeated patterns of responses were observed and no additional patterns emerged, suggesting data saturation had been reached. Therefore, no follow-up interviews were conducted. Finally, an Excel file was created with the 10 subthemes, seven themes and corresponding quotations for the 14 student participants.

Trustworthiness The trustworthiness of the data in this study was confirmed through a variety of rigorous approaches previously suggested by researchers who are familiar with conventional content research (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005; Morrow, 2005; Ponterotto, 2005). More specifically, these approaches included triangulation, reflexivity, developing good rapport, negative cases and auditing and member check. In terms of triangulation, notes based on consultations with the director of the International Student Office were incorporated into the conceptualization of the students’ adjustment. In addition, the first author was invited by one of the students to visit a halal food court and prayer room (Mushola), thereby helping the team to understand the students’ religious practices in Taiwan. Regarding reflexivity, during the group meetings, the first and the two secondary authors’ biases related to international Muslim students (e.g., diligence of Indonesian workers in Taiwan, conservative gender roles) were discussed throughout the project. In the first several interviews, students indicated the meaning in their religion of respecting women, and this conflicted with the first author’s and the two secondary authors’ assumptions about gender roles in Islamic society, which had been learnt from local and international media (e.g., gender inequality). The team reflectively discussed their views on Taiwanese gender roles and acknowledged a limited understanding and biases about the issue and decided not to impose biases on the students’ perspectives on gender boundaries. Furthermore, minutes from meetings were kept each week to maintain an audit trail. In terms of rapport relationships, one student asked the first author about his personal spiritual beliefs before the interview and three students asked questions related to Taiwanese religions and about the increasing study of Muslims in international society. The first author shared opinions about their questions and his spiritual beliefs as described above, easing their concerns about a crosscultural study of religion. Furthermore, four students informed the first author that they needed to conduct their prayers during the interview, as a result of which the interviews were suspended for

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approximately 20 min. These examples show the trust established between the students and the first author. Furthermore, the complete results and student information were e-mailed by the first author to each student to solicit feedback. No additional question was raised, and five of the students specifically indicated that the results were congruent with their experiences. The auditor, described above, was aware of her biases toward their religious practices (e.g., intensively engaging in religious practices) and set aside her own religious beliefs to better understand the students’ experiences. A few quotations were removed because they were incongruent with the meaning of the subthemes. In the interests of clarity, any carefully edited words and annotations in the results section have been presented in square brackets.

Results There are three categories in the results, including religious adjustment issues, language barriers, and two major adaptation approaches embedded in multiple contexts. The language barriers category was organized and presented as a second category, because it was different from the first category, religion-related adjustments, comprising gender issues, inconvenient practices off campus, and social discrimination. The final category was the students’ major adaptation approaches, including religious coping through Islamic beliefs and bicultural connections (see Table 1).

Religion-Related Adjustment A variety of spiritual adjustment issues occurred in multiple social contexts. The students encountered some uncomfortable or unfamiliar situations related to gender roles both inside and outside of the laboratory, as well as inconvenient practices and social discrimination off campus.

Table 1 Themes of Adjustment Issues and Adaptation Approaches and Numbers of Interviewees Category I: Religion-related adjustment 1. Gender issues a. Culturally shocked by gender behavior outside the laboratory (n ⫽ 8) b. Setting appropriate boundaries with female Taiwanese laboratory mates (n ⫽ 5) 2. Inconvenient practices off campus a. Inconvenient to find halal foods off campus (n ⫽ 6) b. Difficulty finding a place for their prayers off campus (n ⫽ 6) 3. Social discrimination a. Disrespectful remarks and acts against their practices (n ⫽ 6) b. The association of Islamic beliefs with terrorism (n ⫽ 3) Category II: Language barriers 1. Language barriers outside of the research laboratory (n ⫽ 5) 2. Language barriers in the research laboratory (n ⫽ 11) Category III: Major adaptation approaches 1. Religious coping a. Prayer (n ⫽ 7) b. The journey is decided by God (n ⫽ 5) 2. Bicultural connections a. Religious support from Taiwanese laboratory mates and advisors (n ⫽ 10) b. Nonreligious bicultural connections (n ⫽ 8)

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Gender issues. Many of the students stated that they encountered gender issues that were incongruent with their religion. Therefore, they were forced to reconceptualize their gender perspectives and interact appropriately with female Taiwanese students. In particular, for those who had not previously been abroad, they often were culturally shocked by gender behavior outside the laboratory (n ⫽ 8). According to the gender roles specified by their religious beliefs, men and women need to dress and act appropriately. For example, Darma noticed that Taiwanese heterosexual couples had physical contact in public areas. This kind of behavior is not congruent with their religious beliefs. Darma stated that, “the thing is, the behavior between men and women in Taiwan, [from] my perspective . . . it’s too [pause] close . . . it’s something like they are already [acting] like husband and wife . . . however, they are not married.” In addition, several students who had not been abroad before coming to Taiwan felt embarrassed by the way female students dress and tried to inhibit their temptation to look at them, as described by Fendy: Because in Indonesia when I see women wear hijab, [they are] not too attractive, but here [they] are very attractive. . . . People here are kind of, yes that’s okay, because it’s kind of the culture and they have already [had] it for many years. [The] experience, for me . . . it’s hard to control [my temptation to look at them].

Fendy elaborated on the reason why women wear hijab, which is to protect them from inappropriate interactions (e.g., harassment) and to help men control their sexual desires. He stated that, “I think it’s kind of what God said for the Muslims . . . , because we’re Muslim, and the Holy Qu’ran said we have to do this.” Matius shared a similar perspective about gender boundaries, adding “so we need to obey what Allah said in the Qu’ran, and what the Prophet Muhammad said in the Hadith.” On the other hand, a few of the participating students tried to express their respect for women while describing gender-based cultural shock. For example, Kali pointed out that, “Heaven is . . . below the feet of your mother, the women. Heaven is below [the] feet of women . . . it’s just a sentence . . . that represents, how precious women are in our religion.” The second subtheme is setting appropriate boundaries with female Taiwanese laboratory mates (n ⫽ 5). Based on their beliefs, a few students stated that they needed to learn how to maintain appropriate boundaries with female Taiwanese laboratory mates to show respect and be faithful to their beliefs as described above. For example, Netro said, Because I don’t know exactly the women’s behavior here . . . I didn’t think it’s an issue talking with the males because the men here like joking. I also like joking. . . . But for the females, especially I [keep] a little distance [between us] and talk a bit politely . . . because in my religion, I must respect the women.

Similarly, in addition to being polite to female laboratory mates, Darma tried to stay near them at night time to offer support. He pointed out that “during the experiment at 9 [p.m.], I try to wait for her experiments and accompany [her] and then see her experiment . . . pay more attention to [her needs].” On the other hand, Garuda, who was married, indicated that he was more cautious when communicating with a female laboratory mate during meetings at night and tried to identify strategies to avoid meetings with only one female:

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It’s okay for Muslims to go out with boys . . ., but if [I am] the only boy who goes out with one girl, it’s not okay for me. We need another friend; at least for example we don’t go out as a couple. . . . So I usually use Skype. . . . If I use Skype, usually I’m here and she’s in her own room. . . . [Interviewer: Did you tell the students why you don’t want to meet in person?] . . . Yes, I have . . . but sometimes I tell it a different way. . . . I am already married, so it’s not okay for me to go with you like that [the real reason]. And, another reason is I’m [too] lazy to go to the lab . . . [I] just use this Skype.

Although a few students tried to identify strategies for interacting with female laboratory mates, others felt comfortable interacting with them in the laboratory and did not mention how their religious beliefs influence their interactions with females. Inconvenient practices off campus. The vast majority of students did not experience any challenges in practicing their religious beliefs on their university campus. However, they found it inconvenient to find halal foods off campus (n ⫽ 6). Agus pointed out that, with the exception of the area near the Mosque in Taipei, he found it difficult to find halal food off campus: Because in my country the majority religion is Muslim, even [when] we want to go to another restaurant, it’s easy to find halal food. But yeah, maybe here just for . . ., it’s just hard for the first time to find halal food, but . . . we can find it in Gongguan (公館 in Chinese), and . . . nearby the Taipei Grand Mosque, we can easily find halal food.

On the other hand, several of the participants mentioned that the halal food court on campus is very crowded because it provides for more than 100 students in a small area. The second subtheme is difficulty finding a place for their prayers off campus (n ⫽ 6), because the Muslim population in Taiwan is very small. In particular, some of them described feeling uncomfortable washing their feet before prayer because they could not find a wudu tap, as described by Jaka: Yes, so when I wanted to do wudu, at that time, I traveled to [the] TWTC-Taiwan World Trade Center. At that time, I had been living in Taiwan maybe for two months, so I know that in Taiwan we don’t have . . ., in the restroom, we don’t have . . ., how to say, a small place to wash our feet, so at that time, I just put my leg to the top of the washer, and some people [said] something to me.

Because Taiwanese people do not understand why Indonesian or other Muslim students would need to wash their feet in a sink, they often make inappropriate remarks. Social discrimination. The students felt the discrimination against them took place in two ways. The first theme is disrespectful remarks and acts against their practices (n ⫽ 6) in local society. Because the students practiced their religious beliefs overtly off campus, they not only received strange comments, but were also photographed when praying. For example, Iman felt embarrassed after being photographed when praying. He stated that “maybe I feel ashamed. . . . It [taking photographs] is not common in my country. . . . When people [in Taiwan] saw me [at prayer], they asked, ‘What is he doing?’” Therefore, some of the students sought out a private area for their prayers to avoid harassment. Eddi indicated that he tried to find a private place to pray because he was afraid of comments from Taiwanese people. He pointed out that, “We have to find a space and maybe [it’s a] place [that’s] a little bit . . . hidden [private]. . . . Because in an

open space, everyone [Taiwanese] is like, ‘What are you doing?’ Everybody is like that.” The second subtheme is related to the association of Islamic beliefs with terrorism (n ⫽ 3). After studying abroad in Taiwan, three students became sensitive about the minority status of Muslims within international society. They felt that negative media reports in the news about Muslim society are unfair and disappointing. For example, at the end of the interview, Candra stated that “Every time if I hear or see that the media gives negative information about Muslim society, I feel really sad. Something like that. . . . I believe that this [Islam] is a peaceful belief.” He felt that he had a responsibility to help international society understand their religious beliefs, stating “It is our job, our duty to give more, you know, more knowledge to the other people that we are . . . [pause] peaceful, and we don’t like to be a terrorist or anything.” On the other hand, Matius became aware of his Muslim minority status when his friends and he were questioned about their prayer off campus by strangers or security guards who did not understand their behavior. Therefore, he was committed to helping Taiwanese people understand his religious beliefs by improving his Chinese and expanding his social network with Taiwanese friends. He stated that, “I try to get better skills in the Chinese [language]. . . . I understand that it’s quite difficult actually to introduce Muslim culture in Taiwan.” Furthermore, he indicated a desire to change social stereotypes about Muslims in Taiwan: The main reason is we just want the negative perspective that [is] carried by the media about Islam . . . in Taiwan [to be changed]. . . . When they [Taiwanese] know about the 9/11 tragedy, maybe we [are] just afraid that they will conclude . . ., they will imply that Muslims are something like that [a terrorist]. So that’s why we have . . ., we have to do this, [to] introduce what actually Muslims are. . . . We want to introduce to them that our culture is . . ., it’s just like . . ., it’s nothing, nothing bad at all inside.

Two students expressed their concerns about Indonesian Muslim workers in Taiwan not being treated appropriately. For example, they expressed concern that workers are not provided with prayer time and that female Muslims may face additional discrimination because of their hijab. Candra stated, “most of them cannot use the hijab when . . . working [in Taiwan].”

Language Barriers Only a few of the students indicated experiencing any psychological or academic stress, however, the vast majority experienced language barriers in communicating with Taiwanese students both inside and outside of the laboratory. Some students also indicated language barriers outside of the research laboratory (n ⫽ 5). Although some of them indicated that they took Chinese language courses, they found it difficult to learn the language in a short time. They described the challenges faced in understanding Chinese in several situations, including ordering food, purchasing things in stores and reading information about the courses and research activities in their departments. For example, Fendy stated that “I can’t [speak] Chinese [中文 in Chinese]. So . . . I go to the restaurant, I have to talk in English; sometimes the employees in the restaurant can’t speak in English; it is hard for me.” Furthermore, many of them stated that language barriers in the research laboratory (n ⫽ 11) were particularly challenging be-

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cause collaboration is essential in a research setting. For example, Candra stated that “my professor asked me to write a proposal for [the] NSC [National Science Council] research project. . . . I am frustrated because all the templates I have are in Chinese . . . especially in the computer science research field.” Furthermore, in certain cases students found it difficult to communicate with collaborators from outside their departments. For example, Netro pointed out that, “When meeting in Taiyuan [pseudonym of the company], I don’t understand what the people talked about. So I must ask my friends.” Some students sought support from their laboratory mates to cope with barriers in these situations; however, the students also observed that some of their laboratory mates were embarrassed to speak or were unable to communicate in English.

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Bicultural connections. The vast majority of students stated that they coped with their adjustment struggles by connecting with Taiwanese friends, faculty members, Indonesian friends, and family. The first subtheme is religious support from Taiwanese laboratory mates and advisors (n ⫽ 10). Most of the students communicated their need for religious practice (e.g., praying five times a day and eating halal foods) when their practices were hindered or influenced by the academic culture and lifestyle in Taiwan. For example, Jaka shared details about how his advisor was supportive of his prayer needs: For example, when I wanted to pray, I asked [my advisor] for permission. He would give permission. So, he never troubled me. . . . Maybe for one of my friends who spent more time in [the] Mosque, he was looking for him. When he knew [his practice], he said “Oh, okay.”

The vast majority of students adopted two approaches to deal with their adjustment struggles, including religious coping and bicultural connections. In particular, the students attempted to gain social support for their religious practices from their laboratories to facilitate adaptation and fulfill their religious needs. Religious coping. Many of them adopted religious coping to deal with a variety of stresses and adjustment issues related to their academic stress, relationship concerns with their spouses, as well as their uncertainty about studying abroad and suffering from homesickness. The first subtheme is prayer (n ⫽ 7). Through prayer they communicated their needs directly to their God during regular worship, as described by Harto:

After the research laboratory mates came to understand the religious concerns of the Indonesian students, sometimes they would take the initiative to clarify whether the food at parties was appropriate for them. Fendy pointed out that,

Sometimes we feel [we] want to give up [our research] and then when . . . because we have spiritual [beliefs], or we have religion so we have space to . . ., how to say, to share our feeling [with God] and hopefully, when we share our feelings we have ideas, we have like support, how to deal [with] it with that. So I think it’s kind of . . ., a role from my religion because I can keep my mind in a good situation.

The person that knows that we need to have a place is my lab mate, so my lab mate proposed a special place for me and my friend, to my advisor. So my advisor will not locate a desk in there, because, previously, we need to . . . in my room, it can have five [people], but because we need to have space for my prayers, so we only have four people in my room. That’s why they are. . . . I think they are [showing] respect to me for praying.

Prayer sometimes also helped the students cope with the uncertainty that they faced in their relationships when separated from their spouses in Indonesia. In addition, the students often communicated with each other, as described by Langit: “One day before I came here, I just married . . . sometimes I feel so lonely. . . . I just pray for her and she also prays for me. Just like that so we are actually connected.” The second theme is the journey is decided by God (n ⫽ 5). A few students indicated that studying in Taiwan was not entirely their decision because they also believed that their God played an important role in their decision to study in Taiwan. Kali stated that, “Yes, because what I do here is . . . sometimes not just only my decision, it is God’s decision.” Sometimes they felt blessed by God for a variety of things in their life and attributed their success to God. Candra described this as follows: I think, if Allah sent me to [come] to Taiwan, and to study in Taiwan, I believe that Allah believes that I can; I can prove that. “You can,” “You can do this.” [inner dialogues]. . . . Yeah, because I have so many experiences [which are] similar like that, like, um, you know . . ., when I have something in my life, in my life, I think it is not only because of me, or because of Allah. . . . So I really, really believe that, since I came to Taiwan I can finish, I can graduate [with] a master’s degree.

Last Christmas day, we exchanged gifts and we had some food. However, before we ate the food provided in the meeting, my friends asked me, “Can you eat this? Can you eat this?”. . . So, I think my lab mates tolerated [my religious practices].

In addition, Harto was grateful about having a place where he could pray in the laboratory with the support of his laboratory mates and advisors:

The second subtheme is nonreligious bicultural connections (n ⫽ 8). In addition to the religious support that they gained in the laboratory, they also looked for the support of their laboratory mates and advisors in a variety of forms, including language support, help with schoolwork and so on. Several of them indicated that there is a large group of international students from Indonesia studying at their university, including Chinese Indonesians. Therefore, they did not feel alone and also received support from their compatriots. For example, Fendy described this situation as follows: I arrived in the airport and I had no friends from Indonesia at that time. . . . So I had to go alone from the airport to the university. I had planned a lot of how to go by bus and MRT, but that was the first Time I went aboard. . . . Some people in Taiwan also had no ability in English. . . . I felt uncomfortable. But after I arrived here [the university campus], met some friends from Indonesia and . . . I felt eased. . . . Because in here, we had [a] student organization for Indonesians, [it] could provide any information to solve any problems that we have. So I think it’s easy to live here, even it’s like my own country because lots of Indonesians live here.

After developing relationships with their laboratory mates, they sometimes had social gatherings, which contributed to their adap-

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tation and sense of belonging in Taiwan, and as Basuki indicated: “I went out a lot with my lab mates. We went out to dinner, almost once [every] 2 weeks.” In summary, many students gradually identified strategies they had adopted to cope with a variety of religious adjustment issues and language barriers after living in Taiwan for several months.

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Discussion Very few studies have investigated Muslims’ cross-cultural religious adjustments in complex foreign contexts, such as Taiwanese study laboratories and in a society steeped in Buddhism, Taiwanese folk religion, Daoism, and Confucianism (Fu & Chang, 2009; Hwang & Chang, 2009; Tummala-Narra & Claudius, 2013). The results of this study capture the challenges and inconveniences faced by Muslim Indonesian science students and by male minorities with cross-cultural religious practices inside and outside of a laboratory setting and also off university campus in Taiwan (e.g., Amer & Bagasra, 2013; Wester, 2008). Contemporary literature about cross-cultural coping and the acculturation models has not yet conceptualized how minority ethnic groups resolve any incompatibilities between their acculturation strategies, particularly in religion, and the demands of the host culture (Berry, 1997; Horenczyk et al., 2013; Kuo, 2010; Ward, 2008). The current study demonstrates how the participating students deal functionally with the major concern associated with their religious practices in the laboratory context through their unique approach, which is beyond commonly researched acculturation strategies (Güngör et al., 2013; Ward, 2008). More specifically, they have directly communicated their needs for prayer and consumption of halal foods to their laboratory mates and advisors, in addition to which they have navigated the gender boundaries in their laboratories both subtly and inwardly through their religious beliefs, while proactively adopting religious coping for their inner strength across a diverse range of foreign contexts. The inconvenient practices relating to prayer needs and the eating of halal foods, which may be considered as overt religious adjustment issues, were resolved in different ways within the laboratory and off campus. In the laboratory context, the students gained social support for their overt religious practices, however, although they felt that it was less convenient to undertake such practices off campus, they rarely expressed facing similar concerns when off campus in Taiwan. It is likely that they would perceive significant language barriers and a lack of social connections when it comes to communicating their religious needs with individuals in northern Taiwan, most of whom would not be familiar with Islamic religious practices. Furthermore, for many Indonesian Muslim science students who had not been abroad before coming to Taiwan, the gender boundary issues challenged their assumptions about physical contact between men and women (Brenner, 2011; Lu, 2011). These were presented as covert religious adjustment issues, which they dealt with without communicating their concerns with Taiwanese friends and colleagues. The resolutions of covert religious adjustment issues have rarely been discussed in acculturation literature (Güngör et al., 2013; Horenczyk et al., 2013; Ward, 2008). In this study, when encountering displays of intimacy before marriage, both on and off campus, some students conceptualized it as part of local culture that is different from their religious practices, and

came to respect it inwardly. Furthermore, five students indicated their intention to subtly negotiate the boundaries with female Taiwanese students, because these issues were involved directly in their social interactions. These five students often chose not to communicate their gender role concerns with their Taiwanese peers or professors as many had done for their overt religious adjustment issues in the laboratory. It is likely that they felt inconvenienced or challenged by trying to help Taiwanese people understand their religious beliefs about gender role assumptions. Moreover, some students adopted reactive approaches to deal with social discrimination against their overt practices off campus, such as seeking a private place for prayer, although a few tried to educate the Taiwanese about their religion. Even though many of the students did not think that Taiwanese people perceived them as being associated with terrorism, three of them did express their concerns about how the local media portraying Muslims as terrorists could have a negative impact on Taiwanese people’s understanding about them, especially with the rise of negative attitudes toward the Muslim faith around the globe. The experience of studying abroad could make them more sensitive to such reports about Muslim groups in the international media. Furthermore, disrespectful attitudes toward their religious practices reflected a lack of understanding about Islamic beliefs and the ethnocentric attitudes of local people in northern Taiwan. The education system in Taiwan seems to assume that foreign students can learn Chinese in a short time, however, the struggles faced by the students in trying to learn Chinese bring this assumption into question, although it should be stressed that they received support from laboratory mates. In terms of dealing with the stresses related to a variety of adjustment issues, they adopted religious coping by their sincere devotion to God (Allah) through prayer and faith (i.e., the journey decided by God), and all of these practices supported them in the adaptation process (Smith, 1991). Concerns about being able to practice their regular prayer sessions in Taiwan had been frequently on their minds before leaving Indonesia. Nevertheless, the journey decided by God is a unique form of religious coping that they may only experience in a cross-cultural context, and such issues have been the subject of little discussion in the existing literature on religious coping (AbuRaiya & Pargament, 2015; Kuo, 2010).

Limitations This study was conducted with a sample of male students on a university campus, using a single interview. Consequently, the results may not be a comprehensive reflection of their adjustment issues, and they cannot be applied to explain the adaptation of other Indonesian or international Muslim men on other campuses in Taiwan. Moreover, the results of this study cannot be applied to explain the adjustments which would need to be made by female Muslims in a cross-cultural context, nor their perspectives on gender roles. Over the past few decades, gender equality issues in Islamic society (e.g., women’s human rights) have raised significant concerns and debate among scholars around the globe, although some scholars have asserted that the Qu’ran states that women should be respected (Ali et al., 2004; Smith, 1991). Therefore, more research into international female Muslim students from diverse backgrounds (e.g., various sects or schools of belief) needs to be conducted to understand their particular perspectives on

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RELIGIOUS PRACTICES IN CROSS-CULTURAL CONTEXTS

gender roles and boundary issues (Amer & Bagasra, 2013). In addition, this study did not consider each Indonesian student’s specific religious sect, their Islamic philosophy nor their level of religious belief. Thus, in this study the understanding of how different religious beliefs within Islam are related to their adaptation is limited (Amer & Bagasra, 2013). Furthermore, the university in this study has provided a prayer room and offers halal food to the students, and many faculty and staff members are aware of their religious needs. This allows the sample university to create a comfortable learning environment for Muslim students. Thus, the students’ particular backgrounds and the context of this particular university campus in northern Taiwan need to be given further consideration to explain their religious adjustments.

Implications for Practice The results of this study provide implications for counseling and educational practices in both local and global contexts. In the global context, such as in the United States, university administrators, counselors, and faculty members need to be aware of the religious beliefs of Muslims and need to learn how not to impose their own religious worldviews on students and clients. Thus, universities should include policies and strategic plans to implement religious diversity (e.g., respecting their religion and providing prayer rooms), particularly with the rise of negative attitudes toward Muslims. Multicultural dialogues and events that enhance the understanding about diverse cultures and religions, including Islam, should be held on campus and within laboratories by counselors with competency in multicultural issues. Laboratory faculty members need to both provide support for individuals’ religious practices (e.g., offering prayer times) and must be sensitive to gender role attitudes in laboratory management. University counselors and staff could also provide orientations or educational brochures to help Muslim students understand the various adjustment issues that they could face, and suggest strategies to deal with such issues. In particular, they may be advised about how to search for an advisor or faculty members that support their religious practices before joining the laboratory (e.g., receiving a list of the faculty members providing multicultural advice) and how to communicate their needs for their particular religious practices. In the local contexts of Taiwan, the education system needs to provide a bilingual environment for Indonesian and other international students. Furthermore, many of the students experienced religious struggles and discrimination off campus, so it is important for the Taiwanese government to educate the Taiwanese public about Islamic beliefs and practices through a variety of strategies, including multicultural education from elementary school to graduate school level, while continuing with education for government employees and police officers to create environments which are supportive of a variety of religious needs.

Future Research Future studies could further investigate international Muslim students’ religious adjustment experiences both inside and outside of the laboratory context, and also the effectiveness of multicultural advice provision and the culturally sensitive interventions related to their religious adjustments. Researchers also need to investigate international female Muslim students’ adjustment is-

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sues, as described above. Furthermore, quantitative studies could be adopted to verify some of the research findings in this study, such as the impact of a variety of religious adjustment issues on students’ well-being, the contribution of the two adaptation approaches mentioned above (e.g., social support for their religious practices within a laboratory setting) to their adjustment processes, and any covert adjustments used to cope with gender boundary issues. Longitudinal studies also need to be conducted to investigate the process of adjustment among Muslim students, particularly in relation to their religious practices at a time when there is an increase in negative attitudes toward Muslim minorities around the globe.

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Appendix Interview Guide for Indonesian Students ⬍Decisions to Come to Taiwan & Career Implications⬎ 1.

How did you decide to study in Taiwan? What were your considerations when choosing Taiwan? How will your experience of studying abroad influence your career development?

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⬍Cultural Shock⬎ 2.

When people move to a new country or place, they have some psychological reactions to unfamiliar environments, such as surprise or uncomfortable feelings. This kind of experience could be referred to as cultural shock. Have you ever had any cultural shock?

⬍Overall Adaptation Issues in Taiwan⬎ 3.

Have you ever experienced any uneasy or uncomfortable moments as an international student in Taiwan? How do you adjust yourself or cope with uneasy or uncomfortable moments? How do religious beliefs and practices play a role in helping you cope with your adjustment issues?

laboratory mates? Have you ever experienced uncomfortable moments fitting in to your research laboratory? ⬍Coping With Adaptation Issues in Research Laboratories⬎ 5.

What have you done to fit in to your research laboratory?

⬍Relationship With Advisor⬎ 6.

Are you close to your advisor? How would you describe your relationship with your advisor? Does your advisor treat you differently from local Taiwanese students?

⬍The Influence of Gender Issues⬎ 7.

Do you feel differently about working with male and female colleagues in Taiwan? If there is a difference, how does your spiritual or religious belief influence your interaction with your female lab mates?

⬍The Final Question⬎ 8.

Is there anything else that I did not ask, but which you would like to share with me?

⬍Adaptation Issues in Research Laboratories in Taiwan⬎ 4.

Could you describe how your advisor runs a research group? Do you think it is easy or difficult to talk to your

Received September 13, 2014 Revision received February 27, 2015 Accepted February 27, 2015 䡲