Visitors should follow local customs and behaviours or the host country should welcome cultural differences? Which one do you support and why?
Sample Response
Whether visitors to other countries should follow local customs and behaviours or the host country should welcome cultural differences is a widely debated issue. This essay argues that visitors should respect local customsThis essay deals with it and gives my point of view. Visitors should respect the local customs, mannersdemeanours and cultures of the host country. If the guests behave abusively to the hostemcee, it is not the polite way in our society. Before going somewhere, it is better to know the local traditions of a particulardefinite country. Every country has different customsEvery country does have the same customs, cultures, behaviours and origins. If an individual follows the local customs of others in its respective places, it means mutual understanding to each other. If so, people on the earth will show greater respect for one anotherraise the esteem on one another and every country will reach a compromise, then the world will become the improving, beautiful and peaceful place ever to live in without wars. As an example, many leaders from the world visit Myanmar and they recognise mutual respects and show affection to others such as saying ‘mingalarpar’, making a gesture of respect by putting the palms together and raising them to the forehead. They also value the religious customs by taking off their shoes and wearing the appropriate dresses on the flat ground around the stupa and pagodas. Many local residentsToo many local residents warmly welcome them gladly and heartily. The ignorance of local language and custom may lead to a big problem since it is disrespectful to another culture. For another example, when I was travelling to Saudi Arabia as a visitor, I wore ‘abaya’ and covered my long hairhairs for going outside. This meant just paying respect for other culture and I did not lose my original identity. I even got some help and assistance from local people for my respect towards their traditions. Therefore, to sum up, I strongly agree that visitors should comply with customs and cultures of the host country.
Why this response received Band 6.0
The response maintains a clear position that visitors should respect local customs and supports it with relevant personal and cultural examples. Its main limitation is that the opposing perspective is barely considered, while the single-paragraph structure, occasional leaps in logic, and recurring language errors weaken clarity; the highest-priority improvement is to organise distinct paragraphs and briefly acknowledge cultural differences before explaining why visitor respect remains more important.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The writer clearly supports visitors following local customs and gives relevant examples. However, the opposing idea is not discussed much, so the answer is somewhat one-sided.
Briefly acknowledge why host countries should welcome cultural differences, then explain why visitor respect is still more important.
Coherence and Cohesion
The response has a clear overall direction but is written as one long paragraph, and some ideas jump quickly from manners to world peace.
Use separate paragraphs for position, reasons, examples, and conclusion, with one main idea per paragraph.
Lexical Resource
There is some useful vocabulary about customs and respect, but several words are inaccurate or unnatural.
Use precise cultural vocabulary such as host community, local etiquette, cultural identity, and mutual respect.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Meaning is usually clear, but there are recurring errors with articles, pronouns, and sentence construction.
Edit for simple accurate sentence patterns before adding longer conditional sentences.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Visitors should follow local customs and behaviours or the host country should welcome cultural differences? Which one do you support and why?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.