ACCULTURATION AND PERCEIVED TRUSTWORTHINESS OF TECHNICAL INFORMATION AMONG MIGRANT PROFESSIONALS

Abstract

Migrant workers face difficulties in evaluating the accuracy of technical information in a new cultural and organizational context. Acculturation, the process in which a person or group from a specific culture adopts the behaviors of a different culture, significantly influences how technical information is perceived and accepted. This study looks into how different acculturation styles—assimilation, integration, separation, and marginalization—affect the credibility of technical information in multinational corporations. We aim to identify the patterns of trust perception, communication, and information processing as well as the trust perception concerning information’s credibility in a given context among a group of 150 migrant workers from the engineering, healthcare, and IT sectors using a mixed-methods approach. The findings suggest that perceptions of integration and assimilation processes positively correlate with perceptions of trustworthiness, and separation and marginalization processes correlate with lowered trust thresholds. The study proposes an acculturation-informed trust assessment model with HR and training program recommendations. This model additionally allows organizations to better assist migrant professionals in critical information-dependent contexts.