How Living Abroad Helps You Develop a Clearer Sense of Self
Created time
Aug 7, 2022 12:06 AM
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hbr.org
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Book Name
How Living Abroad Helps You Develop a Clearer Sense of Self
Modified
Last updated December 26, 2023
Summary
How Living Abroad Helps You Develop a Clearer Sense of Self:
- Exploring life outside of where you have grown up or currently live can help develop your sense of identity and self-understanding.
- Author Tamer Atar outlines the potential benefits of living abroad, including gaining social, cultural and global perspectives, learning foreign languages and meeting new people, and navigating challenging experiences with uncomfortable situations.
- Using real-life stories and interviews, Atar shows readers how living abroad helps build competence and confidence and provides the conditions for personal growth and development.
This book is a great read for UX Designers as it can help expand their understanding of different cultures and people, give them the opportunity to gain confidence and competence in new skills, and more broadly learn about how to gain new perspectives and understand the deeper meaning behind their design decisions. Additionally, other books that may be interesting to UX Designers include Designing Connected Products (Katz & Vaugh) and The Art of Explanation (Lidwell, et.al).
🎀 Highlights
job changes or romantic breakups, typically decrease self-​concept clarity.
hypothesis that living abroad will increase self-concept clarity across six studies involving 1,874 participants.
“In general, I have a clear sense of who I am and what I am”
people who had lived abroad reported a clearer sense of self than people who had not.
people who had lived abroad had engaged in them more than people who had never lived abroad.
reflections,
when people live in their home country, they are often surrounded by others who mostly behave in similar ways,
people’s exposure to novel cultural values and norms prompts them to repeatedly engage with their own values and beliefs, which are then either discarded or strengthened.
experience of living in their home country
participants who had reflected on living abroad reported greater self-​concept clarity than participants who had reflected on living at home.
depth to be more important than breadth because the longer people live abroad, the more opportunities they have to engage in self-​discerning reflections;
students view themselves in a similar way as others view them.
enabling people to be clearer and more confident about their career decisions.
Those who lived abroad for longer were more likely to say they were clear about what they wanted to do
undergo an initial phase of “culture shock”—the “anxiety that results from losing all of our familiar signs and symbols of social intercourse’’.
job changes or romantic breakups, typically decrease self-​concept clarity.
hypothesis that living abroad will increase self-concept clarity across six studies involving 1,874 participants.
“In general, I have a clear sense of who I am and what I am”
people who had lived abroad reported a clearer sense of self than people who had not.
people who had lived abroad had engaged in them more than people who had never lived abroad.
reflections,
when people live in their home country, they are often surrounded by others who mostly behave in similar ways,
people’s exposure to novel cultural values and norms prompts them to repeatedly engage with their own values and beliefs, which are then either discarded or strengthened.
experience of living in their home country
participants who had reflected on living abroad reported greater self-​concept clarity than participants who had reflected on living at home.
depth to be more important than breadth because the longer people live abroad, the more opportunities they have to engage in self-​discerning reflections;
students view themselves in a similar way as others view them.
enabling people to be clearer and more confident about their career decisions.
Those who lived abroad for longer were more likely to say they were clear about what they wanted to do
undergo an initial phase of “culture shock”—the “anxiety that results from losing all of our familiar signs and symbols of social intercourse’’.
job changes or romantic breakups, typically decrease self-​concept clarity.
hypothesis that living abroad will increase self-concept clarity across six studies involving 1,874 participants.
“In general, I have a clear sense of who I am and what I am”
people who had lived abroad reported a clearer sense of self than people who had not.
people who had lived abroad had engaged in them more than people who had never lived abroad.
reflections,
when people live in their home country, they are often surrounded by others who mostly behave in similar ways,
people’s exposure to novel cultural values and norms prompts them to repeatedly engage with their own values and beliefs, which are then either discarded or strengthened.
experience of living in their home country
participants who had reflected on living abroad reported greater self-​concept clarity than participants who had reflected on living at home.
depth to be more important than breadth because the longer people live abroad, the more opportunities they have to engage in self-​discerning reflections;
students view themselves in a similar way as others view them.
enabling people to be clearer and more confident about their career decisions.
Those who lived abroad for longer were more likely to say they were clear about what they wanted to do
undergo an initial phase of “culture shock”—the “anxiety that results from losing all of our familiar signs and symbols of social intercourse’’.
