Reply to Hammer, M.R. A Response to Punti and Dingel’s Critique of the Validity of the Intercultural Development Inventory for BIPOC Students. Comment on “Punti, G.; Dingel, M. Rethinking Race, Ethnicity, and the Assessment of Intercultural Competence in Higher Education. Educ. Sci. 2021, 11, 110”

Gemma Punti,Molly Dingel

doi:10.3390/educsci12030180

Abstract

Hammer claims that the IDI has been validated for BIPOC in the US, but after careful re-examination of the data we presented, we reiterate that there is no evidence of this validation. The studies provided by Hammer reveal how the development of the IDI instrument and its validation focused on international cultural experiences not on cultural diversity within the US. There was no validity testing done on a racially diverse sample of U.S. Americans, and our qualitative data questions the validity for BIPOC individuals from the US.

Highlights

Punti and Dingel’s Critique of the College of Individualized and Interdisciplinary Studies, Metropolitan State University, Saint Paul, MN 55106, USA
Hammer indicates that the IDI was tested across “218,111 international and domestically diverse respondents along with additional testing undertaken with 20,015 respondents who are self-reported they were members of an ethnic minority” (p. 1), but, though they refer to them on three different pages, no citation is provided for these numbers, and they do not appear in the largest study cited, Wiley [7], or the other sources they cited. All these studies reveal how the development of the IDI instrument and its validation focused on international cultural experiences not on cultural diversity within the US
As we have demonstrated above, there was no validity testing done on a racially diverse sample of US Americans

Summary

Validation of IDI for BIPOC in the US

Hammer claims that the IDI has been validated for Black, Indigenous, and People of. Color (BIPOC) in the US, but after careful examination of the data presented, we reiterate that there is no evidence of this validation. 1, 2, 5), no citation is provided for these numbers, and they do not appear in the largest study cited, Wiley [7], or the other sources they cited All these studies reveal how the development of the IDI instrument and its validation focused on international cultural experiences not on cultural diversity within the US. In the development of the IDI instrument, the authors selected individuals from several countries [3,4] Such a strategy does create a widely diverse sample and contains two important assumptions: first, that one country equals one culture, and second, that culture equals national origin. The IDI focuses on international cultural encounters not intercultural experiences within the United States or one nation While stating that this approach is valid for BIPOC respondents, the author conflates international diversity with diversity in the US. These assumptions are undermined by data showing deep divisions between how black and white people in the US experience the same settings [10–12] and that there are complicated divisions between black people who have lived in the US for generations and more recent black immigrants to the US [13,14]

Validity

Methodological Choices

Timing of Interviews

Sample

Coding

Dunning–Kruger Effect

Cultural Difference

Final Thoughts