Reverse Culture Shock
The Biggest Shock of All
- Arriving Home
On this page on Reverse Culture Shock you'll find:
There Are Two Types of Culture Shock
- Culture Shock - the initial shock of going overseas to a foreign culture.
- Reverse Culture Shock - the shock that happens upon returning to your own culture.
The shock that happens upon repatriation (returning home) is called 'Reverse Culture Shock'. Most people say Reverse Culture Shock is even worse because it is so unexpected.
Knowing what the experts have said about this phenomenon, can go a long way towards alleviating the symptoms, because it puts you in the Driver's Seat.
Dr. Kalervo Oberg, a world-renowned anthropologist, coined the term 'Culture Shock', to describe the feelings of surprise,
disorientation, uncertainty, and confusion, common to those facing a cross-cultural experience.
When a person returns to their own country, however, after a sojourn in a foreign country that they have become accustomed to, they are often dismayed to find that they feel the same symptoms.
This has been called 'Reverse Culture Shock'.
Dealing with it may be easier once you have an understanding of what's actually going on.
Culture Shock in 3 Phases
In order to understand it, let's take a quick look at what happens to our emotions as a result of 'Culture Shock'. Here is a short summary of Oberg's '3 Phases' of Culture Shock. Some
researchers have expanded this to Four Stages, including a Rejection Stage.
1. The Honeymoon Phase: - involves excitement, euphoria and optimism with the expectation of finding unlimited opportunities.
It is characterized by openness and curiosity, along with a readiness to accept whatever comes.
Judgment is reserved, and the nice things about the job, the country, and the people are enjoyed.
2. The Shock Phase: - can start with a creeping feeling of not quite knowing what is going on, as you begin to experience the 'foreignness' around.
Stress, inability to sleep, irritability, focusing on the negative about the job, country, and people, starts to take over one's life.
This can even move into a hatred for the culture that one is immersed in. This doesn't need to happen, and it can be prevented by understanding the process.
The culture shock reaction stems from an inner uncertainty about yourself, second guessing your decision to move back home, and worry about your future.
Without the familiar context you expected to find, your self concept feels like it is in jeopardy. This seems to threaten the loss of your personal identity.
You begin to wonder: "Where has the secure, safe, 'home', I remember and believed in all these years, gone?" It can be very unsettling.
How you handle this second phase - the emotions, the thinking and the expectations you hold, will determine the outcome - whether you reach a successful adaptation or not.
3. The Adaptation or Recovery Phase: - begins with accepting that the problem needs addressing.
Usually some compromise is reached, between the unrealistic expectations of the honeymoon phase, and the dissatisfactions with the reality being experienced in the culture shock phase.
You recover from the shock and make a satisfying adjustment.
The Main Symptoms of Reverse Culture Shock
- Strain caused by the unexpected effort to have to re-adapt to one's own culture.
- Sense of loss and feelings of deprivation in relation to friends, status, profession and possessions - one cannot always regain one's status at home because a comparable job may not be available.
- Feeling rejected by friends and family, who may not realize how much you've changed, and don't show no real interest in wanting to talk about what you've experienced.
- Confusion in role, values and self-identity - not knowing where you fit in anymore.
- Anxiety and disillusionment - symptoms of grief at the loss of one's lifestyle.
- Feelings of helplessness - inability to understand what is happening.
Understanding Reverse Culture Shock
What causes these symptoms?
Below are some reactions which can contribute to the unexpected feeling of disconnectedness that characterizes 'Reverse Culture Shock'.
An Unrealistic Perception of One's Own Country
Long-term expatriates can feel out of sync with developments in their own country.
They expect a home country that has not changed in terms of practical aspects as well as general values. Often, the home country is idealized during an international assignment.
Especially during stressful times, you hold onto the image you left behind, of your safe, stable familiar environment, where 'things are better'.
This image can be shattered upon return, naturally resulting in disorientation.
Lack of excitement
There is a certain excitement about being a foreigner. Expats on assignment, do not feel the same social restrictions or social controls that they experienced at home,
that they had been socialized into. Once you step outside the national bubble, you have to find your own way, and almost, in a sense, make your own rules, or at least,
decide which ones make the most sense to you in the foreign culture. Then too, there is an excitement about learning new things every day. Upon coming home, after the initial
excitement on arrival, boredom becomes the norm, and a general lack of interest in life sets in.
Social Isolation
Expats long to share their stories with their loved ones, but they soon realize, nobody cares. Friends and family, are immersed in their own lives.
They tire of hearing of stories of places that they've never been. Their eyes glaze over and they interrupt with their own interests, which you no longer share with them.
You feel rejected, neglected or misunderstood.
Former friends try to treat you as if you haven't changed. But deep inside you know something, they may not yet realize. You have changed, and it's beginning to dawn on you that
you can't go back, to those people you once knew, who were your closest friends, and the family you grew up with. In a sense they are strangers.
The place you thought you were returning to, doesn't exist anymore, except in your memories.
Restlessness
Having come through the challenges of adapting overseas, you find a curious and unexpected restlessness coming on. At this point, whether or not a successful readjustment upon return is made,
depends to a great extent on how you envision the kind of future you want in your life 'back home'.
Some people fret and fume over a lost world, the world of their past, which is now gone, and will never come back. Others look at it in a more light-hearted way, making the best of things as they are now. It all depends on the way you look at it.
How have you learned to cope with the challenges of life, while on assignment? Are you able to reorganize your thinking, and call on the social skills you developed overseas, and find an emotional stability that you can live with, at the feeling level that is personally satisfying?
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