Digital Commons @ SPU

The Impacts of Multicultural Experiences on Young People and Their Attitudes Toward Others: Can Cultural Competencies Reduce Extremism and Radicalization?

Culture is a foundational focus of the educational process, life experience, and 'bridge-building' between and among peoples, whether intentional or not. Culture is a defining construct that shapes behaviors, values, and institutions. Conceptually, a culturally influenced curriculum and concomitant experiences may be strongly influenced by Paideia education that provides an interdependence and cyclical relationship; culture impacts education and education impacts culture. Greek philosophers often used a Paideia approach to facilitate learning. These methods can be used in contemporary society also and may be surprisingly effective in introducing and promoting cultural literacy and acceptance, and possibly reducing and preventing societal destructive and dangerous extremism and radicalization. Unfortunately, cultural conflict is rampant in society and the processes of acquiring cultural competencies are complex and not fully understood. The purpose of this research is to investigate the connections of culture and education in the development of attitudes toward others. We propose to present the results of earlier work and its resulting model that seems to demonstrate that multicultural experiences may positively affect attitudes toward others and suggests the effects may be enduring and long-term.