The growing number of international students at Universities leads to an increased diversity in higher education system. The aim of this project is to investigate the consequences arising from this change, by exploring the challenges faced by international PhD students. Through a qualitative study, based on 10 semi-structured interviews, challenges faced by international PhD students at Lund University was investigated. The interviews focused on belonging, differences in teaching style and academic expectations. It was found that language barriers are a main concern, negatively impacting the sense of belonging among the interview participants. The Swedish teaching style was described as having a low hierarchy and a high independent level, the latter causing problems as the academic expectations were often perceived as unclear.
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