Computer Simulation as a Tool of Psychological Readiness for Employment Process for Migrant Students

Abstract

Background: Nowadays the number of students studying abroad increases rapidly. Migrant students represent a highly motivated and achieving category and contribute a lot to the economies of the host countries. Coming to the host country they face different challenges, one of them being employment. Previous studies reveal that migrant students during the period of their acculturation undergo various difficulties, and even after graduation, there are such hurdles as pressure, immigration policies, and an uncertain future. If they want to pursue a career in the host country, new barriers such as documentation requirements, problems with language and discrimination could appear.Purpose: The necessity to create a safe environment that can help them acquire the necessary skills needed at a job interview made the research authors consider the use of a VR tool.Materials and Methods: 171 migrant students took part in the research. Based on a needs analysis to depict the barriers migrant students face while seeking a job in a host country the architecture of a computer simulator “Employment navigator” was designed.Results: The identified needs of migrant students, as well as the main barriers to their adaptation, can influence the optimization of the system of adaptation of foreign students in the conditions of host universities. The ‘Employment Navigator’ virtual reality simulator can be used as a tool to assess the readiness of a migrant student to undergo a job interview successfully.Implication: Virtual reality simulators make it possible to repeat actions as many times as necessary to achieve the desired result and proved their efficiency applied to all vulnerable categories of citizens.