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Virtually Here and There: Digital interaction practices on international students’ adaptation and attainment

  • Dates: 2023–24
  • Funding body: LAHRI and School Strategic Funding
  • Primary investigator: Clare Wright (Linguistics and Phonetics)
  • Co-investigators: Zoe Handley (University of York); Chen Yang (Languages, Cultures and Societies); Jinglei Yu (University of York)

This joint study between researchers at the Universities of Leeds and York explored how social interaction affects the success of international postgraduate students in UK higher education. In today’s digitally connected world, students can easily maintain contact with their home networks, but this often leads to increased loneliness and difficulty forming local friendships.

Using a specially developed app to capture live-time experiences, we worked with eighteen international students at both Leeds and York, tracking their social interactions over a typical week, in writing and speaking, online and offline, in English and their home languages, and relating these patterns to their linguistic proficiency and academic attainment scores. The app proved highly reliable in capturing real-time interaction data. Findings revealed that many students experienced significant isolation and relied heavily on their home language. However, those who engaged more frequently in written English interactions also showed higher levels of language proficiency and academic achievement. These results highlight the value of encouraging students in using informal written communication or “slow conversations” as a bridge towards more confident spoken interaction in English, with likely benefits of reducing isolation and improving both linguistic and academic outcomes.

Presentations
Project presentations at:

National Centre for Research Methods (MethodsCon), Manchester 2024;
Internationalisation Practitioner Network webinar, March 2025;
Elinet (Education, Languages and Internationalisation Network) webinar, May 2025.

Impact
Forecast impact outcomes pending future funding; current impact through dissemination in partner institutions aimed at improving student experience and engagement support.

Publications and outputs
ELINET webinar recording on YouTube here