ASSESSING INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCIES: A COMPARISON OF TWO MEASURES AND THEIR UTILITY IN PHYSIOTHERAPY EDUCATION

P. DiBiasio¹, H. Eigsti²

¹Elon University, Department of Physical Therapy Education, Elon, United States, ²Regis University, School of Physical Therapy, Denver, United States

Background: Healthcare education programs have implemented curricular content to target skills related to the development of intercultural competencies (ICC) however; there is enormous variability in approaches to assess intercultural competencies in higher education. Program goals and student outcomes must be assessed to validate the investment of resources and support desired outcomes. There are no previous studies examining the congruency of assessments of intercultural competencies in healthcare settings with those that measure intercultural competencies in a wider world context.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between two measures of intercultural competencies, one more widely used, the other designed for healthcare students. It was hypothesized that there would be strong correlations allowing educators to forgo one measure for the other based on utility, resources, and sustainability.

Methods: This study utilized an exploratory cross sectional design. Participants were 145 physiotherapy students in one academic program who completed the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) and the Inventory for Assessing the Process of Cultural Competence-among healthcare professionals-Student Version (IAPCC-SV). Descriptive statistics were calculated for means, ranges, standard deviations, and 95% confidence intervals. Spearman-rho correlations and Chi-square statistical tests were used to analyze the relationship between the two measures.

Results: There were significant, p<.05 (negligible to low, rho = .16 -.28), relationships between the IAPCC-SV total and three constructs with IDI Perceived Orientation (PO) scores, and the IAPCC-SV total and two constructs with the IDI Developmental Orientation (DO) scores. There were significant (p<.05) (negligible to low, rho = .18 - .35) relationships between IAPCC-SV total and construct scores with the IDI Acceptance and Adaptation orientation scores. Students with scores in an IDI DO of Acceptance or Adaptation were significantly more likely to have an IAPCC-SV score in the category of Culturally Competent (X²=3.70, p=.05).

Conclusions: The discordance of the two measures suggests that the instruments measure unrelated constructs (worldviews, attributes or skills) of intercultural competencies that are exclusive to each measure and context dependent. Context specific measures may not be generalized to a greater worldview, and vice versa. Multimodal assessment that triangulates data and supports student learning outcomes may be the most effective strategy to capture the impact of physiotherapy curricula and intentional learning experiences on students’ development of intercultural competencies.

Implications: The IDI and IAPCC-SV measure different aspects of ICC and are not strongly related. Any measure of ICC specific to the healthcare setting should be used in combination with less contextually dependent measures of ICC when learning objectives include skills that are expected to be generalized to a broader community or setting. Triangulation of quantitative data and qualitative analysis of students’ work would result in a deeper understanding of students’ intercultural development across settings, allow students to set personal goals, and provides rich data for student learning outcomes and programmatic assessments.

Funding acknowledgements: This study received funding from Elon University's Faculty Research and Development Grant.

Keywords:
Intercultural Competencies
Healthcare education
Outcome measure

Topics:
Education
Education: methods of teaching & learning
Professional issues: diversity and inclusion

Did this work require ethics approval? Yes

Institution: Elon University

Committee: Internal Review Board

Ethics number: 16-132