Self-disclosure of international students in Japanese classes

Abstract

“Self-disclosure” is a psychological term, proposed by Jourard (1971), which has been shown by many psychological studies to be important for human psychology and interpersonal relationships. In recent years, in foreign language education, specifically in Japanese education, learners write and talk about themselves by Japanese, or in other words, they engage in self-disclosure. This is not only useful for learning Japanese but also helps develop personal communication ability. In this study, we focus on studying the level of personal self-disclosure based on factors such as nationality, content of disclosure and subject. In addition, the authors want to research the influence of self-disclosure through interactions in Japanese lessons on Japanese learning outcomes, with the ultimate goal of proposing strategies to encourage students to express themselves.
The study was carried out in Japanese classes of the Japanese Department, Asahikawa Welfare Professional Training College with international students from the following countries: Vietnam, Thailand, China, Mongolia, Indonesia, and others.