Study Abroad from the Participants' Perspective: A Challenge to Common Beliefs1

ABSTRACT Much study‐abroad program recruitment literature depicts the overseas experience as a short cut to linguistic fluency and cross‐cultural understanding, a view that is also largely supported by research on the outcomes of a stay abroad; however, when the experience of learning to interact in a foreign language and of adapting to a foreign culture is viewed through the eyes of four American summer study‐abroad students in France, a different perspective emerges. The findings of this study challenge many common beliefs about the overseas educational experience and, in doing so, raise questions that hold implications for study‐abroad programs and foreign language classrooms alike.