“Beyond professional competence”: Intercultural communicative competence development in an EMI medical program

Abstract

Background: Intercultural communicative competence (ICC) has been widely developed in language education, study abroad, and intercultural training—and increasingly applied to EMI programs in Euro-American and East Asian contexts. However, there is limited knowledge about examining how ICC unfolds across varied interactional registers, lectures, group work, and informal exchanges, or how students themselves articulate their intercultural development in the Global South setting like Vietnam. Aims: This study investigates how Indian medical students develop ICC within an EMI medical program in Vietnam. Methods: Drawing on narrative interviews with 31 Indian medical students conducted through six focus groups, the research employs Byram's five-component model of ICC, attitudes, knowledge, skills of interpreting and relating, skills of discovery and interaction, and critical cultural awareness, as an analytical lens. Results: The findings reveal that students’ intercultural development is a dynamic, situated process shaped by their everyday engagements in classrooms, hospitals, and social environments. Participants initially encountered cultural dissonance, particularly around communication styles, hierarchical norms, and classroom interaction patterns. Over time, many developed greater openness, adaptability, and reflexivity, using strategies such as language learning, observation, and peer mediation to navigate cross-cultural encounters. Students reported enhanced awareness of Vietnamese cultural norms in clinical care, and many acted as cultural bridges between their Indian peers and Vietnamese faculty. Conclusions: The findings underscore the importance of culturally responsive support structures in EMI programs to foster students’ intercultural development in meaningful and sustainable ways