First-generation (FG) college students often confront cultural mismatches between their interdependent backgrounds and university contexts that promote independent norms. Past work has documented this mismatch with various methodologies (e.g., self-report, lab experiments, longitudinal designs), but behavioral explorations have been minimal. Thus, the current study examined students' interdependent familial roles and the ways in which they enact either soft (e.g., self-expression) or hard (e.g., self-reliance) forms of independence. In-depth semi-structured interviews with 34 low-income, Latinx and Asian American FG students (25 females, 8 males, 1 other; mean age = 19.89, SD = 1.35) were conducted. Grounded theory analysis revealed six family role themes. Students described providing parents with emotional support and advocacy, language brokering, financial support, physical care, life advice, and heavy sibling caretaking. FG students also shared enacting four types of soft independence-including gaining freedom, becoming selfexpressive, pursuing their individual interests, and becoming mature-and five types of hard independence-including being resilient, being self-reliant,
Women leave STEM majors at higher rates than men. This may be due to problematic messaging in gateway courses such as (a) mismatches between students’ cultural norms and those of the learning context and (b) fixed ideas about ability as unchangeable. The current study investigated how culturally relevant growth messages impacted help-seeking behavior and grades in a gateway STEM course. Undergraduate students (168 men, 285 women) were randomly assigned to receive an email invitation to a peer-led tutoring program that included factual information (control), growth messages, or culture-matching growth messages emphasizing effort and interdependence. Tutoring sign-ups, number of sessions attended, and grades were collected. Path analyses showed no impact of messaging on men’s sign-ups. Yet, growth messages increased women’s sign-ups relative to the control, which led to more sessions attended and, subsequently, higher course grades. Unexpectedly, the culture-matching growth condition decreased sign-ups for women. Follow-up exploratory survey data on students from the course (161 men, 268 women) revealed that more women perceived peer interactions as competitive than men, which may shed light on the unexpected findings. Programs should implement growth messages to recruit more women and to improve collaboration in peer-learning settings.
Objectives: For many low-income, Latinx and Asian first-generation students, family is a central motivator for obtaining a college degree. Yet, striving for upward mobility yields unanticipated psychological consequences. Specifically, family achievement guilt is a socioemotional experience related to "leaving family" to attend college. As a relatively understudied phenomenon, prior work has likely underrepresented the ways low-income, Latinx and Asian first-generation students experience guilt in the university. To address this gap, the current study aimed to refine the concept of family achievement guilt by exploring its different facets. Method: We utilized in-depth, semistructured interviews with 34 low-income, Latinx and Asian first-generation students. Results: Using both inductive and deductive analytic methods, we constructed four facets of guilt. Participants shared feeling guilt related to leaving family behind, having more privileges in the university context, becoming culturally different than family members, and experiencing financial distress. Conclusions: Unpacking family achievement guilt experiences of a fast-growing student population contributes to our understanding of theory and of possible support mechanisms.
Public Significance StatementPursuing a college degree and subsequent economic stability might unexpectedly foster family achievement guilt-a socioemotional experience related to leaving family to go to college-for low-income, first-generation students of color. Through interviews, we documented the different ways these students experience family achievement guilt while navigating college.
Food insecurity is a persisting problem that has negative consequences on student performance. The food insecurity literature depicts some students, like those from low-income and Latinx backgrounds, as "high-risk," yet scarce work examines the influence of both income and race/ethnicity on experiences of food insecurity in Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs). Secondary analyses of institutional data with 283 Latinx and 324 White students countered the high-risk narrative. Food insecurity was negatively related to grades for low-income White students only. There was no link for low-income Latinx students, suggesting resilience to negative effects of food insecurity. We discuss how these findings inform servingness in HSIs.
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