Abstract:

Interculturality and intercultural communicative competence were accepted as significant concepts in second/foreign language learning. In particular, intercultural sensitivity (IS) has been regarded as a precondition for intercultural communicative competence and interculturality. Due to the increased interest in intercultural sensitivity and globalization through technology, more research was needed to explore the concept in different educational contexts with sound, reliable and valid instruments for different participant profiles. In this regard, this study merged two studies to provide two reliable and valid instruments for different research purposes. The objective of Study 1 was to translate and validate the IS scale in the Turkish EFL context, while the objective of Study 2 was to adapt and validate the Turkish version of the IS scale to be used for young English language learners in the Turkish EFL context. Study 1 included 122 language learners, while Study 2 included 95 young learners for the first round and 115 young learners for the second round. The findings revealed that both the Turkish version and the simplified version of the IS scale retained highly significant levels of reliability and validity. Confirmatory factor analyses indicated that the Turkish version represented a better model fit in the analysis and the simplified version represented a better model fit compared to the English version in the analysis. Hence, the study is significant with its contribution to the field through both the Turkish version of IS and IS scale for young learners, which can be used in crosscultural research contexts.

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