The term “Culture shock” was first introduced by an anthropologist named “Kalvero Oberg”in 1958 to describe the anxiety when a person moves to a new environment. Culture shock is not a clinical term or medical condition, it is a common way to describe the confusing and nervous feelings a person may have after leaving a familiar culture and move to live in different culture. When you move to a new place it may be exciting, stimulating but you’re bound to face lot of changes. It is natural to have difficulty in adjusting to the new environment, as the cultures, values, ideas, the way they are expressed , conversations and beliefs differ from culture to culture. Due to these reasons a person can feel sad, anxious, frustrated etc. This feeling just sets in after the first few weeks of coming to new place. But culture shock is temporary.
The surroundings and the environment have great impact on your behavior and appearance. The environment is not just the air you breathe or food you eat but it is the culture which is made up of common things that a person learns from the family, friends, neighbors, strangers, media and literature.
For example when you move to a new place it may be a different country, state or city you are exposed to different culture or it may be similar to yours. The culture shock can be described as physical and emotional discomfort faced by the individuals while moving to a different place. You may encounter unfamiliar clothes, weather, food, living style, language, different people, different religions, different values and customs but dealing with all these can be difficult at the starting but if you stay calm, patient, observe and learn and keep the things in perspective you can slowly learn to adapt yourself to the new culture or environment.
First stage is the Honeymoon stage: It is the incubation stage where a new entrant may feel happy and pleased of all the new things encountered.
Second stage: A person may face difficulties regarding language, culture etc. There may be feelings of fear, anger, impatience, dissatisfaction, when a person is trying to adapt to new environment.
Third stage: It is characterized as gaining an understanding of new culture. The individual becomes more familiar to the environment and a new feeling of pleasure and sense of humor is experienced.
Fourth stage: In this stage the person realizes that new culture has both good and bad things to offer. The person starts to define himself and sets goals for living.
Fifth stage: This stage is called re-entry shock. This occurs when one returns to his own place and finds everything has changed. For example, the old culture you left is no longer followed as much but has changed to something new. These stages are present at different times and each person reacts differently to these stages of cultural shock.
A person is not born with culture but only with the capacity to learn and use it.