The Influence of Background Characteristics on Socialization Processes in Engineering

• Published in: Association for Engineering Education - Engineering Library Division Papers
• Main Authors: Brennan-Wydra, Emma, Joanna Mirecki Millunchick, Johnson, Aaron W, Finelli, Cynthia J, Henderson, Trevion S
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Atlanta American Society for Engineering Education-ASEE 15.06.2019
• Subjects: Balances (scales); Behavior; Colleges & universities; Demographic variables; Demographics; Engineering; Engineering education; Engineering profession; Psychology; Regression analysis; Socialization; Students; Tactics

Students’ experiences in college, both in and out of the classroom, can have significant impact on their success later in life, yet not all students take full advantage of the opportunities available to them. In order to investigate how students experience and engage with the college environment and what kinds of effects these experiences may have on student outcomes, we developed a theoretical framework and survey instrument that expands on Weidman’s conceptual framework of undergraduate socialization. We examine the mechanisms by which student background characteristics interact with student experiences in college and contribute to particular academic and professional outcomes. Collegiate experiences consist of two major elements: socialization processes- methods students become integrated into the college community- and normative contexts- academic and social situations related to a student’s experience. Both of these act as mechanisms by which various outcomes, such as academic performance, professional identity, and social capital, are achieved. The research question posed in this paper is: “how do background characteristics shape students’ socialization processes into engineering?” Our analysis uses two types of background characteristics: demographics and “college knowledge,” which refers to pre-college resources and experiences . While many variables were taken from institutional databases, data regarding an individual student’s college knowledge were included in the survey instrument. The survey measured students' experiences with two types of socialization processes: institutional tactics--approaches to integrate new students shaped by the institution--and proactive behaviors--actions taken by the students’ own initiative. In order to measure these, we adapted scales from the literature (Ashford & Black; Ashforth et. al) to reflect the context of students entering a college of engineering, and validated them for internal consistency. We invited 4,022 third and fourth year undergraduate engineering students at a large public Midwestern R1 university to complete the instrument, and received a total of 998 responses. We analyzed the relationships between the set of 20 background characteristics and 11 socialization processes by performing a series of stepwise backwards linear regressions. The results show that there are three demographic variables—gender, international student status, and first-generation college student status--associated with both institutional tactics and proactive behaviors. International students, for example, considered their process of entry into the college to be significantly more “formal,” and engaged in significantly more “positive framing” and “feedback-seeking” behaviors than their domestic peers. There are some variables that are only related either to institutional tactics or proactive behaviors . For instance, variables related to private college-going resources, such as having access to private tutoring or college admissions consultants, are associated with various types of proactive behaviors, but no institutional tactics. These results suggest that underlying relationships exist between student background characteristics and how they experience socialization into the college. Understanding these relationships may help explain and predict student behaviors, experiences, and outcomes in college. This study may suggest the design of targeted interventions to improve the involvement of certain segments of the student population, thereby increasing the likelihood of their success. S. J. Ashford and J. S. Black (1996). “Proactivity during organizational entry: The role of desire for control,” Journal of Applied Psychology, vol. 81, no. 2, pp. 199–214, 1996. B. E. Ashforth, D. M. Sluss, and A. M. Saks (2007), “Socialization tactics, proactive behavior, and newcomer learning: Integrating socialization models,” Journal of Vocational Behavior, vol. 70, no. 3, pp. 447–462. J. C. Weidman (1989). Undergraduate socialization: A conceptual approach. Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research, (Volume 5), pp. 289–322.