First of all, let's talk about the test. In regards to our trip to Tonga the dean of UVU has been very interested and very invested in our group. Like I mentioned before we are very unique situation and one of the first of many, I hope ;) so the Dean has paid for all of us to take this test called: Intercultural Effectiveness Scale test, it helps us determine where we are inter culturally, how we react with different cultures, and basically give us a map of where we can go with our different personalities and our strengths and weaknesses between different cultures. They gave us a little heads up about the contents of the test, but mainly they just wanted us to take it the most honestly that we could and then we were going to get the results back in the form of a packet. So I took the test. It had some really good questions. A lot of them are just asking personal questions of how I emotionally interact with other people and then of course a lot of cultural questions like how I view the world and my opinion and beliefs on different things. It was very interesting to take and I was really interested to see the results. I would share with you what my results were and how I felt about them. When we got the test back there were six different categories: three main categories with subcategories under each of those.
1.Continuous Learning
a. Self-Awareness
b. Exploration
2. Interpersonal Engagement
a. Global Mindset
b. Relationship Interest
3. Hardiness
a. Positive Regard
b. Emotional Resilience
I scored really high on each of the main categories which made my final graph look really full and represented one that has a global mindset or I have a globalist personality. This means lots of things… This is actually what the test result says verbatim:
Globalist: People with this profile are quite attentive to their social environment and quite interested in continuous learning, about themselves and others. Globalists tend to ask a lot of question, observe, and read to satisfy their curiosity. They are likely to be very interested in and more positive about people and things that are new and different. Globalists believe developing relationships with people from other cultures is exciting and a means to more knowledge and understanding. They naturally engage people and places that are different than them. Although this can be stressful, Globalists are psychologically strong and able to withstand the hardships and interpersonal differences that often arise. They get excited about this process helps them understand themselves and their own culture better. Globalists use this self-knowledge to help them build and manage their interpersonal relationships more effectively.
I was surprisingly happy with the results that I got back. I was happy because as I was taking the test there definitely are opportunities where you could fudge with the answers a little bit so you can get the test results that you would want and our teacher actually warned us of this. That's why he was asking us to be as honest as we could so that we would actually get back results that would benefit us a lot more with this trip and everything. The Globalist profile fits me pretty closely. The first thing I did in preparation to go was go to the library to check out books. I actually read In The Eye of The Storm, By John H. Groberg. He served an LDS mission to Tonga and the movie, The Other Side of Heaven. was produced from the experience and his book (which I have watched several times before leaving as well:)) This book has impacted my life to an extent that I didn't think was going to happen and I highly recommend it. My testimony on faith, missionary work, integrity, gratitude, obedience, prayer, and service of all kinds was strengthened through reading this book. It gave me such a love for a people and a place that I have yet to meet and I am so grateful that Elder Groberg took the time and effort to write about his first mission and experience in Tonga. The test was also very truthful about my thirst for knowledge and the interest and curiosity I have of other cultures and just people in general. Talking to people and finding out their life story was one of my favorite parts to serving a mission and something that I have continued to find interesting since the mission. Everyone has a story to tell and you don't know what you might learn until you ask and get to know someone.
I did have a really low score in two areas and the thing that I loved about this test is we didn't just get back a result saying what kind of personality type we were, but it gave us things to do and solutions to help us out in the areas that were low so that we can work on getting those better and try to improve ourselves in those areas before we go.
I think these test results are a result of the times that I have been on a lot of sports teams which has allowed me to be in a lot of different situations and with a lot of different people. Serving a mission also allowed me to live in a different country and associate with different people that I normally wouldn't have or definitely wouldn't have lived with them every day like I was if I had not been blessed with the opportunity to serve a mission. There are some things that I really want to work on so that I can be really beneficial to my students in Tonga and back here in the United States, well, Utah. Haha I love learning about myself (another truth from the test and my personality type), and I loved taking this test. I thought it was a great opportunity for each of us to get to know ourselves better and also allows us to work on things and improve ourselves as well. I'm all about improvement and working on making my weaknesses into strengths. I'm really hoping that I'm going to be able to do that in the weeks and months ahead of me.
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