Interculturality in study abroad

Within the field of applied linguistics, a new trend in research can be envisaged which links study abroad and intercultural learning (Beaven & Borghetti, 2016): while in the ‘90s much research measured the students’ language gains as a result of their sojourn abroad (Coleman, 2015), after the so-called ‘social turn’ (Block, 2003), the field saw a substantial change in perspective; it shifted the focus towards students’ language socialisation abroad, with the aim of understanding what personal and social factors impact on the students’ language learning (Kinginger, 2009). This is the ground on which applied linguistics and the established domains of intercultural communication and cross-cultural psychology dedicated to SA meet; students’ language use abroad is situated in interpersonal relationships, which have the potential to influence the individual’s intercultural development as much as his or her second language acquisition. Thus, also in agreement with the so-called ‘cultural turn’ in language education (Byram, Holmes & Savvides, 2013), SA as a domain of enquiry within the field of applied linguistics is paying now much attention to intercultural issues concerning study abroad, clearly within a mainly language-oriented perspective (Beaven & Borghetti, 2016).