The Influence of Microaffirmations on Undergraduate Persistence in Science Career Pathways

Abstract

The present studies aimed to advance the measurement and understanding of microaffirmation kindness cues and assessed how they related to historically underrepresented (HU) and historically overrepresented (HO) undergraduate student persistence in science-related career pathways. Study 1 developed and tested the dimensionality of a new Microaffirmations Scale. Study 2 confirmed the two-factor structure of the Microaffirmations Scale and demonstrated that the scale possessed measurement invariance across HU and HO students. Further, the scale was administered as part of a longitudinal design spanning 9 months, with results showing that students’ reported microaffirmations did not directly predict higher intentions to persist in science-related career pathways 9 months later. However, scientific self-efficacy and identity, measures of student integration into the science community, mediated this relationship. Overall, our results demonstrated that microaffirmations can be measured in an academic context and that these experiences have predictive value when they increase students’ integration into their science communities, ultimately resulting in greater intentions to persist 9 months later. Researchers and practitioners can use the Microaffirmations Scale for future investigations to increase understanding of the positive contextual factors that can ultimately help reduce persistence gaps in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics degree attainment.

Instructor Strategies to Alleviate Stress and Anxiety among College and University STEM Students

“…Microaggressions-directly or indirectly speaking negatively about student identities-can make students feel unwelcome and thus elevate stress and contribute to anxiety (Harrison and Tanner, 2018). In contrast, the use of "microaffirmations"-any nonobvious verbal or nonverbal cues to demonstrate kindness-can counteract the impact of microaggressions and promote student persistence (Estrada et al, 2019). Such microaffirmations have been suggested to lower stress in certain populations of college students, such as first-generation students (Ellis et al, 2019), perhaps by alleviating a sense of isolation that can be associated with stress and anxiety (Harrison and Tanner, 2018).…”

Instructor strategies to alleviate student stress and anxiety in colleges and universities

“…By directly or indirectly speaking negatively about student identities, microaggresions can make students feel unwelcome and thus elevate stress and anxiety. In contrast, the use of "microaffirmations" -any non-obvious verbal or nonverbal cues to demonstrate kindness -can counteract the impact of microaggressions and promote student persistence (Estrada et al, 2019). Instructors can similarly reduce stereotype threat, i.e.…”

Christianity as a Concealable Stigmatized Identity (CSI) among Biology Graduate Students

“…Although Christians make up the majority of the American public, only a minority of Christians become academic biologists (Ecklund and Scheitle, 2007;Pew Research Center, 2009). Currently, biology education researchers who study underrepresented groups often focus on racial/ethnic identity (Eddy et al, 2015;Jordt et al, 2017;Cooper et al, 2018b;Metzger et al, 2018;Rodriguez et al, 2018;Sbeglia and Nehm, 2018;Estrada et al, 2019;Meaders et al, 2019;Theobald et al, 2020), gender identity (Eddy et al, 2014;Eddy and Brownell, 2016;Freeman et al, 2017;Cooper et al, 2018aCooper et al, , 2018Harris et al, 2019), and generation status/income (Dika and D'Amico, 2016;Jordt et al, 2017;Theobald et al, 2020;Wright et al, 2016). However, Christian students make up approximately half of undergraduate biology students nationwide (Barnes et al, 2020a), and are severely underrepresented in faculty positions in academic biology, but are rarely studied in biology education (for an exception, see Henning et al, 2019).…”