The "High-Recognition, Shallow-Cognition" Paradox: International Communication Competence among Chinese Foreign Language Majors and Implications for Curriculum Reform

Taoni  Zhang; Haoyang  Liu; Yichen  Zhang; Zhiping  Liu

doi:10.54691/t1267s80

Authors

Taoni Zhang
Haoyang Liu
Yichen Zhang
Zhiping Liu

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54691/t1267s80

Keywords:

International communication competence; foreign language education; curriculum reform; telling China's story well; mixed-methods research; competence evaluation.

Abstract

With the implementation of China's "telling China's story well" strategy and the emphasis on international communication capacity building articulated at the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, foreign language majors in Chinese universities have been positioned as a crucial reserve force for the nation's external publicity and international communication. However, systematic empirical evidence on the actual state of these students' international communication competence (ICC) remains limited. This study employs a mixed-methods design integrating a nationwide questionnaire survey (N = 194), semi-structured interviews (N = 11), and a comparative analysis of undergraduate curricula at nine leading Chinese universities to diagnose current gaps and propose targeted interventions. The findings reveal a distinctive "high-recognition, shallow-cognition" paradox: while students demonstrate remarkably strong value-level endorsement of international communication as a national mission, their substantive grasp of related policy frameworks, theoretical knowledge, and practical methods remains notably underdeveloped. Nearly half of the sampled students had never participated in any international communication practice, with particularly scarce opportunities for lower-grade students. Curriculum analysis further confirms that credits dedicated to international-communication-related courses remain consistently low across institutional types, revealing a structural mismatch between learner demand and institutional supply. Drawing on these findings, this study proposes a five-dimensional reform framework—value leadership, curriculum restructuring, platform construction, faculty upgrading, and evaluation reform—and introduces the International Communication Competence Indicator System (ICCIS), a four-dimension, twelve-indicator, thirty-observation-point instrument for diagnostic assessment and curriculum design.

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