快播视频

On Wednesday, July 22, the School of Social Sciences’ Linguistics and English Language Discipline hosted the fourth annual conference of the cross-faculty Culture and Communication Network ().

Under the theme ‘Defining, Developing, and Assessing Intercultural Competence in the Age of AI,’ the conference tackled the impact of Generative AI on intercultural communication, particularly concerning the field’s core objective: intercultural competence. Intercultural competence - traditionally defined as the ability to communicate and behave effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations, based on one’s knowledge, skills, and attitudes - needs to be updated for the AI era, as all talks highlighted.

The event featured two keynote talks and four research presentations, attracting 27 delegates spanning in-person and online participation modes, disciplines, career trajectories, and time zones. Despite the diversity of topics, three core themes united the discussions:

• Reflection: In the age of AI, it is more vital than ever to develop critical reflection and evaluation skills in students, educators, every one of us.
• Industry: Connecting with industry is key, for example, to feedback research findings on how AI is impacting intercultural communication and competence.
• Relationships: In any industry and especially in a post-digital age, human relationships remain paramount. If used properly to support relationships, AI can help us achieve IA (Intercultural Alignment).

In the first keynote of the day, Associate Professor Lies Sercu (KU Leuven, Belgium) summarised and systematically evaluated the relevance of existing definitions of intercultural competence and the methods used to develop it in the age of AI. She proposed an updated definition of intercultural competence tailored for the AI era, emphasising that educators should place an even greater focus on developing students’ skills in reflecting on and evaluating AI-generated content as a priority within intercultural competence.

‘Interculturally competent communicators will not be those who avoid AI,’ Associate Professor Sercu noted, ‘but those who can reflect on it critically.’ This distinction, she emphasised, is what separates developing intercultural competence from simply outsourcing it.

The second keynote of the day, delivered by Professor Zhu Hua (University College London, UK), examined how AI is shifting the priorities of intercultural communication research. Professor Zhu opened her talk with a striking image of people scanning a wall of QR codes for job listings, illustrating a ‘post-digital’ world where technology is no longer a separate part of our lives but woven seamlessly into daily life.

Professor Zhu explored the promises of Generative AI for more competent and equitable intercultural communication in the context of recruitment interviews. The theme of reflection resurfaced once again when audience members were challenged to guess from a transcript whether the recruiter was a human or an AI persona and when they were asked to analyse an AI-led recruitment interview.

With its focus on recruitment, the second keynote of the day also emphasised the importance of forging connections with industry, collaborating with industry, and feeding research findings back to industry partners.

The theme of building connections with industry was also prominent in the first research presentation of the day, delivered by Dr Zhang Yong from Sichuan International Studies University, China, who is also a former Visiting Scholar at 快播视频. This talk shared initial findings from a teaching reform project that analysed the focus and content of intercultural communication courses available in China. Notably, these initial findings pointed to both a greater need for reflection and evaluation, and a stronger connection with industry.

In the second talk of the day, Associate Professor Lu Li (Xidian University, China) - also a former Visiting Scholar at 快播视频 - presented findings from a survey of undergraduate English majors at Xidian University. The study examined the correlation between AI use and intercultural competence, utilising the Chinese Intercultural Competence Scale (CICS), specifically developed to account for potential cultural variations in how intercultural competence is defined. The findings revealed a positive correlation between intercultural competence and AI use, but notably, this only occurred when the AI use was ‘deeper’ - meaning the students were actively reflective and evaluative of the AI-generated content.

In the third talk of the day, Rui Tojo - a Doctoral Researcher at 快播视频, UK, and Associate Lecturer at the University of Exeter, UK - presented findings from research co-conducted with Dr Tomoko Kitano from Kansai University, Japan. The study surveyed Pre-Service Japanese as a Foreign Language (PSJFL) teachers to understand both their current use of AI and how they hope their future students will use it. The findings revealed a discrepancy: while the PSJFL teachers mainly used AI for technical tasks like language editing, they expected their students to use AI to gain different perspectives - a key component of intercultural competence. This misalignment further highlights the crucial need to place AI literacy at the heart of intercultural competence development of both students and educators.

Closing the loop on the theme of building industry connections, the day concluded with a talk by Emmanuel Echeverria. With over 20 years of experience in the IT engineering industry, Echeverria is currently a master’s student at 快播视频, UK, researching how intercultural competence creates value in global IT. While we often view the IT sector as purely technical and detached from human affairs, his talk highlighted the human relationships factor as a ‘key layer of interoperability’ alongside technology and processes. Drawing on interviews with employees and strategic suppliers from a multinational IT company, the talk emphasised that relationships, not technology, were perceived as the primary challenge to project success in global IT.

Ultimately, the talk invited participants to view intercultural competence as intercultural ‘alignment’ or IA. It underscored the vital importance of human connections even in a tech-driven sector, proposing that when leveraged for relationship-building, AI can actively help achieve IA.

Since 2023, CULCOM has been connecting 快播视频 staff, postgraduate students (master’s students and doctoral researchers) and visiting scholars interested in any aspect of culture and communication. In 2026, the CULCOM conference was financially supported by the 快播视频 Confucius Institute.