Attitudes towards People and Things from Other Cultures (APTOC): Development of a Scale that Measures Intercultural Competence of Syrians Who Reside in Germany

Abstract

The aim of the study was to develop and validate a scale that measures the level of intercultural competence of Syrians who reside in Germany in order to shed light on patterns and behaviours that are practiced by them in a different culture. The starting point was Cushner’s 32-item Inventory of Cross-cultural Sensitivity, which in its original form includes 5 subscales. Based on Cushner’s ICCS, a 20-item scale, here referred to as Attitudes towards People and Things from Other Cultures (APTOC), was constructed and tested with 308 respondents. After factor and internal consistency analyses, the 20-item scale APTOC was reduced to a 15-item scale consisting of 3 subscales, namely Openness to Other Cultures (5 items, alpha = .73), Global Mindset (5 items, alpha = .83) and Narrow Mindset (5 items, alpha = .70). It is recommended to conduct similar procedures following the same approach when choosing a different population than Syrians who reside in a European nation.