Open Access

Aims: Intercultural competence has become a key-competence, since the world has become more and more volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. Therefore, insights in the development of intercultural competence and its´ links to individual traits are crucial for companies and researchers to face the requirements in a VUCA world. This study examines the relationship between the time, students spent abroad, personality traits and circumstances during this time with the student’s intercultural competence and integration performance in the target culture. The study had a correlative cross-sectional design. Design and sample: A total of 202 academic subjects were surveyed. The average age was 22 years. There was one measuring time, to which 58 % of the participants stated that they have had a stay abroad. Measurements: Metacognitive, cognitive, motivational and behavioural intercultural competence were measured with the Cultural Intelligence Scale. The personality traits involvement, discipline, social competence, cooperation, dominance and stability were captured with the "Bochum inventory for job-related personality description-6F". Work-related attitudes as patterns of behaviour and experience were measured using the "Work-related Behaviour and Experiencing Pattern 44" (German: Arbeitsbezogene Verhaltens- und Erlebensmuster, AVEM). This scale captures the way participants relate to work in general based on the measurement of personality traits and their fit to specific clusters, which describe, whether individuals have healthy or risky patterns. In addition, the demographic factors and characteristics of stays abroad as well as the integration into the target culture based on the Sociocultural Adaption Scale were examined. The data was tested for relationships and differences by tests for mean differences, variance and regression analyses. Results: There was a positive correlation between duration and cognitive, motivational and behavioural intercultural competence. The motivational competence is higher in subjects who have no risk pattern in the AVEM. The different types of competence influence each other at diverse times. Moreover, the suggested structural equation model could be confirmed. This showed the effect of the AVEM pattern on intercultural competence, moderated by the stay abroad and the social competence. Thus, the study contributes to the understanding of both the measurement of intercultural competence and the development process of intercultural competence in a globalized world.

Making solar thermal systems less expensive, often results in a lower system efficiency. However, the cost-benefit ratio is relevant from the perspective of the consumer. The complex impact of component-related and system-related design parameters on the economics of a complete system makes the evaluation and economical optimization difficult. Therefore, a complete simulation environment has been developed, which can automatically optimize solar-thermal systems,including collector and system parameters. The main collector module consists of a one-dimensional thermal model that was validated with a commercial solar collector. The efficiency curve and the production cost werecalculated as a function of several design and construction parameters. The collector module was linked to the commercial software Polysun®, so that parametric studies can be performed with minimaleffort. Optimization problems can be solved by using the Matlab® optimization toolbox. The simulation environment wasused for sensitivity studies and optimization problems in order to analyze the impact of collector design-parameters with respect to system cost, system yield andeconomic values. We will demonstrate how a collector can be optimized and how the ideal system parameters like collector number and storage volume can be easily calculated. Finally, we will show how the optimizer is used for a given system in order to find ideal values for the absorber-sheet thickness and the number of pipes. Due to the holistic approach, the application of this tool set can be used for collector development as well as for system planning.

Es werden ausgewählte Beispiele und Ideen vorgestellt, die Studierende des Moduls "Modellierung und Simulation" besonders motivieren sollen, mathematisch-technische Problemstellungen wissen-schaftlich zu bearbeiten. Dabei werden Fragestellungen aus dem persönlichen Alltag, aber auch aus dem Alltag berühmter Geheimagenten behandelt. Zu diesen Projekten gehören die Erstellung geeigneter mathematischer Modelle, die Implementierung in Matlab/Simulink® sowie die Systemsimulation. Die Erfahrungen zu Motivation und Erfolg, aber auch zu Schwierigkeiten bei der Bearbeitung werden abschließend reflektiert.