Birds of a Feather Fare Less Well Together: Modeling Predictors of International Student Adaptation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is a very well written paper bringing some interesting insights. While some are confirmations of existing knowledge, the study does bring additional knowledge that is of relevance for the field.

I very much appreciate how the authors discuss the results and formulate actionable measures to implement their findings.

A few comments.

• Page 2, line 50. The definition of sociocultural adaptation seems to focus a lot on behaviour while the authors focus mostly on psychological aspects. The definition by Ward (line 56) seems much more suitable so I am unsure as to the relevance of the earlier definition.
• Page 2, line 68. I find the term sustainability underspecified in the discussion.
• Page 2, line 83. I find the definition of cognitive disclosure vague and would appreciate a more concise definition.
• Page 3, line 117. While the hypothesis are clear, I found them almost an exact definition of adaption.
• Page 4, line 131 (and later when discussing missing values on page 6, line 229). The sample size is low. While the authors do knowledge this in the discussion, I would have liked to see some reference to rules of thumb or other measures that would legitimate the use of SEM. Having worked with CB-SEM en PLS-SEM, I know that opinions differ with respect to the appropriate use of SEM. 
• Page 5, line 151. Perhaps a good additional reference to the MHI questionnaire used with students, is: Al Mutair A, Al Mohaini M, Fernandez R, Moxham L, Lapkin S, Ham-Baloyi WT. Psychometric testing of the mental health inventory in an Arabian context: Cross-cultural validation study. Nurs Open. 2018;5(3):376–383. Published 2018 May 9. doi:10.1002/nop2.149
• page 9, line 315. change "it" to "fit" in the sentence "While the overall it of our..."
• Page 10, line 325. The explained variance seems low. The authors do reference that this is in line with Searle & Ward's studies but I wonder if there are other references (more generic from SEM) that would support the statement that such small variances explained are reasonable.
• Page 13, line 430. Add the publication year (or numeric reference) to the Bikos et al. publication 

A final thought on the analysis.
The authors focussed on model confirmation. There are of course other options such as model definition (e.g. with PLS-SEM that is more suitable for smaller samples also) or more traditional inferential statistics to test the hypothesis. Are there any other findings from such analysis that could bring new insights?

Author Response

We thank this reviewer for thoughtful critiques which have afforded us the opportunity to make our manuscript stronger. Our responses to this reviewer's comments are as follows:

-Page 2, line 50. The definition of sociocultural adaptation seems to focus a lot on behaviour while the authors focus mostly on psychological aspects. The definition by Ward (line 56) seems much more suitable so I am unsure as to the relevance of the earlier definition.

We note that the definition of sociocultural adaptation is intentionally broad and captures many different experiences, spanning behavioral and perceptive responses to new environments. We have added more information based on Ward’s updated conceptualization to clarify this definition (line 65).

-Page 2, line 68. I find the term sustainability underspecified in the discussion.

We have integrated a discussion of sustainability into our manuscript (beginning on line 399).

-Page 2, line 83. I find the definition of cognitive disclosure vague and would appreciate a more concise definition.

We have reworded the definitions of key constructs to help clarify their meaning, including need for cognitive closure (line 90).

-Page 3, line 117. While the hypothesis are clear, I found them almost an exact definition of adaption.

This is an interesting perspective.  We suppose in some ways the predictor variables break down sociocultural adaptation into sub-components.  We have not made any specific revisions as a result of this comment.

-Page 4, line 131 (and later when discussing missing values on page 6, line 229). The sample size is low. While the authors do knowledge this in the discussion, I would have liked to see some reference to rules of thumb or other measures that would legitimate the use of SEM. Having worked with CB-SEM en PLS-SEM, I know that opinions differ with respect to the appropriate use of SEM.

We appreciate Reviewer #1’s recommendation to explore alternatives to SEM and concern for sample size.  We have now included Hoelter’s Critical N with the test of the measurement model.  The value produced by the CN test provides an indication of the necessary sample size to produce a significant chi-square value.  The CN for our measurement model was 140 – lower than our N of 161; this we have some evidence of adequate power. We describe CN on lines 280-283 and 297-299.

-Page 5, line 151. Perhaps a good additional reference to the MHI questionnaire used with students, is: 
Al Mutair A, Al Mohaini M, Fernandez R, Moxham L, Lapkin S, Ham-Baloyi WT. Psychometric testing of the mental health inventory in an Arabian context: Cross-cultural validation study. Nurs Open. 2018;5(3):376–383. Published 2018 May 9. doi:10.1002/nop2.149

Thank you for recommending this resource.  Relevant information from it has been added to the description of the MHI (line 167).

-page 9, line 315. change "it" to "fit" in the sentence "While the overall it of our..."

We appreciate your attention to detail, fixed this error (line 322), and have continued to proofread our manuscript to fix our typographical and citation errors.

-Page 10, line 325. The explained variance seems low. The authors do reference that this is in line with Searle & Ward's studies but I wonder if there are other references (more generic from SEM) that would support the statement that such small variances explained are reasonable.

This is an interesting comment.  We were quite pleased with the 35% of variance explained in SCAS (in contrast to the 15% associated with PWB).  Considering Reviewer #1’s comment #5 (that our hypotheses reflected the definition of SCAS), we suppose it makes sense that  more of the SCAS variable was explained.  Given that this notion is new to us, we have not reflected it in the manuscript.

-Page 13, line 430. Add the publication year (or numeric reference) to the Bikos et al. publication

We appreciate your attention to detail, fixed this error (line 451), and have continued to proofread our manuscript to fix our typographical and citation errors.

-A final thought on the analysis. The authors focused on model confirmation. There are of course other options such as model definition (e.g. with PLS-SEM that is more suitable for smaller samples also) or more traditional inferential statistics to test the hypothesis. Are there any other findings from such analysis that could bring new insights?

We appreciate Reviewer #1’s recommendations for an alternative to SEM.  Here, Reviewer #1 suggests that we focus on model confirmation.  As noted in Results/Evaluating the Structural Model our description of our statistical approach, we used a model generating approach, taking advantage of both model trimming and building to specify our model.

Reviewer 2 Report

This is an important study but it requires some rewriting and reorganization to convey the authors’ intended message more effectively.

First, I do not think that the manuscript has an effective introduction. I suggest that the authors began the manuscript with a brief discussion of the field where the study belongs to, that is, international students’ adaptation. What do we know and what do we still need to know about this? Why is it important for us to appreciate how international students’ adaptation can be modelled. Though I found the use of proverb in the title quite thought provoking, I do fear that it may not be interpreted appropriately by different readers due to cultural differences. Therefore, it is desirable for the authors to explain what they mean by the proverb when using it in the first instance. To play the devil’s advocate, I do not think that I can understand the very first sentence of this manuscript properly. I also suggest that the authors check the use of preference as verb in the second sentence. What do the authors mean by ‘international population’?

Second, I am not sure whether we need to call the second section ‘environmental contexts…’. It is important for the study to be properly contextualized. The contextual description can be merged into the introductory section as part of the effort to establish a disciplinary and empirical context for the study. Can the authors elaborate a bit more student diversity in the university context? What kind of international students do they mean here? Why are they there?

Third, I think that the manuscript needs a section on the variety of variables that can be used in the model. Language is certainly one of the most important variables. I suggest that the authors can consult more studies on language learning and study abroad. For instance, Xu,Y. (2019). Changes in interlanguage complexity during study abroad: A meta-analysis, System,80,199-211. Https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2018.11.008.

Deygers, B. (2018). How institutional and interpersonal variables impact international L2 students’ language gains at university. System,76,91-102. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2018.05.012.

Fourth, the questionnaire is quite long. Any comment on its suitability for research? Is it possible for the surveyed participants to feel exhausted about answering the questionnaire (hence the quality of their responses might be compromised)? Which language was the survey administered in? Why?

The content under ‘Research Design’ is actually about data analysis. In addition, the authors need to pay attention to the quality of writing in the manuscript. For instance, I noted inconsistence of verbal tense use in the manuscript. Should past tense or present tense be used to describe questionnaire items? Or when should past tense be used?

Fifth, the results section has information on how data were analyzed. I suggest that the analysis should go to the section on data analysis.

Sixth, reading the discussion, I realized that the use of psychological harmonization is quite important. For this reason, the notion of psychological harmonization should be highlighted much earlier, say in the introduction. I think that the use of the proverb is to do with this psychological harmonization. I suggest that the authors talk about the relevant research on international students’ adaptation and argue why we need to adopt a psychological harmonization approach (which needs to be explained) in the introduction.

Finally, I suggest that the authors move the relevant writing on the study’s contributions to the discussion section. The discussion can be organized into:1) summary of research findings,2)in what sense these findings constitute contributions to the field, 3) limitations and 4) practical implications. Please conclude the manuscript with directions for future research.

Again, please double check the quality of writing in the manuscript.

Author Response

We appreciate this reviewer's comments and feedback, which we believe have afforded us the opportunity to convey the messages of our manuscript more effectively. 

-This is an important study but it requires some rewriting and reorganization to convey the authors’ intended message more effectively.

We thank this reviewer for their attention to our structure, grammar, and style.  As you will see in the revisions, there are highlighted changes throughout.  We hope that the result is more effective and enjoyable read.

-First, I do not think that the manuscript has an effective introduction. I suggest that the authors began the manuscript with a brief discussion of the field where the study belongs to, that is, international students’ adaptation. What do we know and what do we still need to know about this? Why is it important for us to appreciate how international students’ adaptation can be modelled.

We have updated the context for our study within international student adaptation in the introduction (line 36).

-Though I found the use of proverb in the title quite thought provoking, I do fear that it may not be interpreted appropriately by different readers due to cultural differences. Therefore, it is desirable for the authors to explain what they mean by the proverb when using it in the first instance. To play the devil’s advocate, I do not think that I can understand the very first sentence of this manuscript properly.

We appreciate the reviewer’s thoughtfulness of international audiences and have rewritten the first sentence to make the meaning of the proverb clearer (line 29).

-I also suggest that the authors check the use of preference as verb in the second sentence. What do the authors mean by ‘international population’?

We have adjusted our wording and clarified the population of our study (line 35).

-Second, I am not sure whether we need to call the second section ‘environmental contexts…’. It is important for the study to be properly contextualized. The contextual description can be merged into the introductory section as part of the effort to establish a disciplinary and empirical context for the study. Can the authors elaborate a bit more student diversity in the university context? What kind of international students do they mean here? Why are they there?

We have eliminated the heading, “Environmental Context of the Study” and merged it with our introduction (line 52).  In this section we have added some detail about from where the students come and what they study (line 54).

-Third, I think that the manuscript needs a section on the variety of variables that can be used in the model. Language is certainly one of the most important variables. I suggest that the authors can consult more studies on language learning and study abroad. For instance,

-Xu,Y. (2019). Changes in interlanguage complexity during study abroad: A meta-analysis, System,80,199-211. Https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2018.11.008.

Deygers, B. (2018). How institutional and interpersonal variables impact international L2 students’ language gains at university. System,76,91-102. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2018.05.012.

We are grateful for the recommended resources. While the Xu article was heavily focused on language acquisition (only a small role in our study), the Deygers (2018) article really helped drive home the importance between opportunities for social interaction (which we interpreted as being with host country nationals) and L2 acquisition.  Consequently, we were able to work Deygers (2018) into the Discussion (line 365).

-Fourth, the questionnaire is quite long. Any comment on its suitability for research? Is it possible for the surveyed participants to feel exhausted about answering the questionnaire (hence the quality of their responses might be compromised)? Which language was the survey administered in? Why?

In Materials and Methods/Procedures we have added information clarifying that the survey was administered in English (because language of instruction at METU is English), 98 items, and estimated to take 20-35 minutes (line 151).

-The content under ‘Research Design’ is actually about data analysis.

We agree that the information in “Research Design” was a blend of research design and statistical analyses.  We have moved the single sentence about the research design to Methods & Materials/Procedures (line 147).

-In addition, the authors need to pay attention to the quality of writing in the manuscript. For instance, I noted inconsistence of verbal tense use in the manuscript. Should past tense or present tense be used to describe questionnaire items? Or when should past tense be used?

We have worked to be consistent with APA style.  That is, when we reference work that is completed we use the past tense (e.g., “Di Fabio and Tsuda (2018) reported…”).  When we reference an element such as a theory or measure that was written in the past but is used in the present, we use present tense (e.g., “Di Fabio and Tsuda’s psychology of harmonization offers a unique perspective…).  Because measures exist in the present, they are one of those examples that are written in present tense (e.g., “The Mental Health Inventory is a 39-item…”).  When we discuss the implications of our Results we use present or future tense (e.g., “…our results tell us a bit about the…).  We have proofread our manuscript several times and hope we have used these consistently as we have described.

-Fifth, the results section has information on how data were analyzed. I suggest that the analysis should go to the section on data analysis.

We appreciate Reviewer #2’s concern that the description of the research analyses might be better suited in a data analysis section.  However, we have found that we are able to reduce the cognitive load of an article by describing the complex statistics at the time we present the results.  Therefore, we have integrated all description of the data analysis directly with the Results.  We hope you find this to be acceptable.

-Sixth, reading the discussion, I realized that the use of psychological harmonization is quite important. For this reason, the notion of psychological harmonization should be highlighted much earlier, say in the introduction. I think that the use of the proverb is to do with this psychological harmonization. I suggest that the authors talk about the relevant research on international students’ adaptation and argue why we need to adopt a psychological harmonization approach (which needs to be explained) in the introduction.

We have highlighted the importance of psychological harmonization in the introduction (line 43).

-Again, please double check the quality of writing in the manuscript.

We have reviewed our manuscript multiple times and hope that the edits have improved its precision, clarity, and efficiency as well as grammatical and typographical errors.

Reviewer 3 Report

The article doesn't fall within the journal's goal.

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the time they spent reading our manuscript. We hope the revisions we have made will contribute to better alignment with the journal’s goals.