Research into EFL Teachers’ Intercultural Communicative Competence and Intercultural Sensitivity

Abstract

In today’s globalized world, individuals need to be interculturally competent and sensitive to communicate successfully with people from different societies. EFL teachers as key players of language education should themselves be interculturally competent and sensitive to be able to develop their learners’ intercultural communicative competence (ICC) and intercultural sensitivity (IS). The present study aimed to explore Iranian EFL teachers’ levels of ICC and IS and the possible relationship between their ICC and IS. A total of 167 EFL teachers completed the ICC questionnaire and IS scale. The results of descriptive statistics revealed that Iranian EFL teachers enjoyed high levels of ICC and IS. The results of correlational analysis revealed that there were significant relationships between different components of ICC and IS except for the relationship between knowledge dimension of ICC and respecting other cultures and interaction enjoyment dimensions of IS. Finally, the implications of the study as well as suggestions for further research were presented to complement the findings of this research.