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International students with low proficiency in the English language remain at high risk of academic, social and psychological maladjustment. Using an acculturation theoretical framework, this study aims to show that acculturation stress and social support mediate the relationship between language proficiency and academic, social, and psychological adjustment among 675 international postgraduate students in Malaysian public universities.

Correlational research design was employed to gather data from 227 females and 448 males aged between 22–45 years belonging to Asian, Middle Eastern or African countries. Out of these, 292 students were enrolled in master's degrees, and 383 students were enrolled in Ph.D. Self-administered questionnaires were used which includes Student Adjustment to the College Questionnaire (SACQ) to measure students' academic adjustment, Kwak to assess students' English language proficiency, Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) to assess perceived availability of social support from friends and Acculturative Stress Scale for International Students (ASSIS) to measure acculturation stress.

The hypothesized model was tested using path analysis with manifest variables in Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) 23.0. The findings suggest that language proficiency is a significant predictor of academic, social and psychological adjustment of international students, and this relationship is partially mediated by acculturation stress and social support.

The article concludes with implications and recommendations for international student offices and program organizers to ensure conditions for successful academic, social and psychological adjustment of the international students.

The manuscript has not been published or submitted elsewhere.

Considering the crucial role which academic adjustment plays in student success at university, gaining insight into how several factors affect this key metric is important. This empirical study investigated the impact of value conflict upon the academic adjustment of first-year students at Kuwait University.

The data for this study were collected using the survey method from a random sample of 627 first-year university students. The data were analyzed using descriptive and regression statistical methods.

The findings showed that (1) student perceptions regarding the level of value conflict were moderate, with the highest level found in the political domain; (2) student perceptions about the level of academic adjustment were also moderate, with the highest level found in the goal domain; (3) value conflicts are a significant predictor of student academic adjustment, with political value conflicts influencing academic adjustment the most, and (4) value conflict explained 46.5% of the student academic adjustment variation.

These findings imply that college administrations should integrate activities designed to improve student adjustment into co-curricular activities meant for youth development. Relevant recommendations are included.

While significant attention has been given to student academic adjustment in higher education over the last few decades, little attention has been paid to how different factors predict adjustment especially in non-Western cultures such as higher education in Kuwait.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between parents’ involvement related to their alertness of what happens in school and their identification with school and their children’s attitudes toward school, social adjustment, self-efficacy and academic achievements.

Questionnaires were answered by 339 parents and 343 students, and yielded 34 parents whose levels of identification with school and alertness were low, and 57 parents whose levels were high. 10; path analysis was used (structural equation model). The theoretical model was tested by a software AMOS 7.0.

Involvement characterized by low identification and alertness predicted a direct, significant and negative relationship with children’s self-efficacy; alertness predicted a direct, significant and negative relationship with self-efficacy. The group with high identification and alertness predicted a direct, significant and positive relationship of their identification with children’s self-efficacy.

Further research is recommended because of the small sample in this study. In addition, especially it is recommended to add to the study parents whose identification is low and their alertness is high.

The way to solve problems is not by mutual accusations, but by trusting each other. Parents and school must create useful communication channels and forums for straightening out issues and find solution through cooperation.

This paper reveals that parents’ alienation from school is a predictor of their children’s negative functioning in school. This document is intended for school principals, educational staff and parents to improve students’ functioning.

This study aims to investigate international students’ cultural adjustment, academic satisfaction and turnover intentions using ecological systems perspective and explores factors that affect academic success and turnover by exploring three stages: arrival, adjustment and adaptation.

The sample consists of 208 international students enrolled at a mid-Western university in the USA. Confirmatory factor analysis, structural equation modeling and mediational analyses were used to test hypotheses.

Findings indicate that self-efficacy, as a pre-sojourn characteristic, affects adjustment variables inclusive of cultural adjustment, affecting academic satisfaction and turnover intentions. Adjustment variables (coping, cultural adjustment and organizational support) mediated relationships between self-efficacy and turnover intentions.

The proposed model moves the research forward by examining an ecological systems framework describing how individual, social, academic, cultural and institutional factors function in supporting international students’ transitions. Results may be generalizable to other large US universities with varying dynamics and resources available (or not) for international students.

Given the challenges international students face in the USA in adapting to both new culture and academic setting, it is imperative to identify what elements of their transition and academic environment predict academic success. This is one of the first studies testing the propositions derived from Schartner and Young’s (2016) model.

This paper reports on findings from an ethnographic study of international student adjustment. The paper recommends the use of ethnography as a way to research the experiences of tourists and migrants to build up a body of knowledge on the outcome of cross-cultural contact for these two groups. The aim of my ethnographic study was to capture the adjustment journey of a group of international postgraduate students at a university in the South of England. The ethnographic approach involved regular in-depth individual interviews with 13 students of different nationalities and overt participant observation of the entire postgraduate cohort of 150 students. Research began on the first day of induction in September 2003 and ended upon completion and submission of the Masters dissertation in October 2004. Students' experience of adjustment to academic and socio-cultural life was therefore captured from arrival in the new country to the return home one full year later. This study finds that stress was at its height in the initial stage of the academic sojourn; the struggle to cope with the challenges of foreign language use and an unfamiliar academic and the socio-cultural environment at a time when students were beset with homesickness and loneliness are the causes of this stress. An association was made between the passage of time and a gradual decrease in acculturative stress; however, this was not a generalisable process; there was fluctuation not only in experience across the student body but also in the individual's subjective sense of success across different aspects of life in the new country. This led to the conceptualisation of the adjustment journey as an unpredictable and dynamic process that is experienced differently among sojourners and fluctuates throughout the sojourn as a result of a host of individual, cultural and external factors. The relevance of this study to tourism scholars comes from drawing parallels between the long-stay tourist and the international student who represents an important segment of international travel. However, a gap in the literature exists on the impact of tourism on the tourist that this study helps to fill.

The purpose of this paper is to examine language, academic, social‐cultural and financial adjustments facing mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong.

The current study employed both quantitative and qualitative methods and included over 300 mainland Chinese students from seven major universities in Hong Kong. In addition to a survey questionnaire, in‐depth interviews were also conducted. Purposive and snowball sampling methods were used to recruit participants.

The findings indicate that though mainland Chinese students were satisfied with the quality of Hong Kong's higher education, many expressed that they were having language, academic, social and cultural, and financial challenges during their stay in Hong Kong. The results are consistent with the current literature to a large extent with some variations. Few differences were found by gender and between undergraduate and graduate students.

Two thirds of the sample was undergraduate students and only one third graduate students. Future research may want to include an equal number of participants from both groups to get a more balanced view. In addition, since the sample of our sub‐degree students was very small, generalization to this group will be inappropriate. Future studies are needed to explore the unique challenges facing these mainland Chinese students who are pursuing their sub‐degree in Hong Kong.

Most of the current research is limited to mainland Chinese students studying in Western countries, such as the USA, the UK and Australia. Few studies to date examine adjustment problems of mainland Chinese students studying in Hong Kong. There is a need, therefore, to deepen our understanding of the major adjustment issues experienced by these mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a model regarding adolescent adjustment issues overseas.

Using previous literature on expatriate adjustment and in‐depth interviews with students currently living abroad, a model of expatriate teens' adjustment is developed.

Interviews found that although some issues of adolescent adjustment are similar to expatriate and spouse issues, several were unique. In addition, the interviews suggested that the effective adjustment of the adolescent might lead the expatriate to stay abroad longer than originally planned.

Small sample size and limited generalizability form the main limitations of the exercise.

Effective predeparture training for all family members is imperative for expatriate success.

The papers represent the first comprehensive look at the issues that affect the adjustment of expatriate teens.

Over the past several decades, scholars and universities have made efforts to increase the retention of students in higher education, but graduation rates remain low. Whereas two-thirds of high school graduates attend college, fewer than half graduate. The likelihood of graduation decreases even more for Black, Latino, American Indian, and low-income students, who have a 12–15% lower chance of earning their degree. The importance of psychosocial adjustment to student persistence has received relatively less attention than academic and social integration. Racial/ethnic minority students face unique challenges to psychosocial adjustment in college, including prejudice and discrimination, unwelcoming campus environments, underrepresentation, and a lack of culturally appropriate counseling resources. The current chapter will discuss the impact of these challenges on the persistence, academic success, and health of racial/ethnic minority students, and strategies that universities can employ to create inclusive policies, resources and campus environments that empower students of color and maximize their success.