Japan and Indonesia Comparative Study: Changes in Communication and Impact on the Level of Social Presence of University Student Organizations Before and During the Pandemic

¹ Japanese Department, Faculty of Humanities, 11480 Bina Nusantara University, Indonesia
² Department of Economics, Wakayama University, Japan
³ Associate Professor, Department of International Relation, Wakayama University, Japan

^* Corresponding author: christy.juneza@binus.ac.id

Abstract

This research studies how changes in higher education’s methodologies from face to face to computer mediated communication during the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the quality of communication amongst students in university student organizations in Japan and Indonesia. With how immense the COVID-19 pandemic’s ramifications in the realm of education, countless studies have covered its impact on a variety of angles and from numerous perspectives, but the same could not be said about university student organizations, thus is why the topic is of value to examine further to better understand it and for future references. In search for the answers, qualitative research method is used, with data collected through focus group discussions held with members from two student organizations, one of Japan’s Wakayama University, another of Indonesia’s Bina Nusantara University which results are then compared with relevant studies and analyzed. This study established the importance of media’s richness and level of social presence within current available selection of discussion methods whilst taking into account whether issues in need of discussion is routine or non-routine in nature, the level of familiarity of each other’s way of communication, and differences in context cultures amongst participants.