A students' sense of belonging can be a significant factor in their college success. A sense of belonging diminishes the impact of barriers, sustaining students during the inevitable struggles and stresses of higher education.
Surgeon General report
In 2023 the U.S. Surgeon General released a report on loneliness and isolation. It highlights the prevalence (half of US adults report experiencing loneliness with higher rates among young adults) and health effects of social isolation. It also provides a framework for how all parts of society can contribute to advancing social connection.
NSSE added question
In 2020, the National Survey of Student Engagement asked questions about students' sense of belonging at 4-year institutions:
They found a high correlation between a strong sense of belonging and persistence.
Gallup poll
A 2023 Gallop Poll found that while loneliness is decreasing from pandemic levels, 17% of American adults (44 million) experience loneliness. Rates are higher for young adults, lower income adults, and single adults. Another 2023 Gallup Poll surveying college students found high levels of loneliness, sadness, stress, and worry.
Walton, Gregory M., et al. “Where and with Whom Does a Brief Social-Belonging Intervention Promote Progress in College?” Science, vol. 380, no. 6644, May 2023, pp. 499–505. DOI:10.1126/science.ade442
Briefly: When students are uncertain of their belonging, even common challenges experienced by students in all social groups (e.g., feeling homesick, academic struggles) can appear as evidence that people like them do not belong in college in general. However, when an intervention represents everyday challenges as normal and as improving over time, students are better able to sustain a sense of belonging on campus in the face of everyday adversities.
Intervention: The intervention is a brief (10 to 30 min) reading-and-writing activity that can be self-administered by college students over the internet. It features three elements: (i) results of a survey of older students, showing that everyday worries about belonging—such as feeling homesick, struggling academically, or having difficulty interacting with professors—are normal in the transition to college and can lessen with time; (ii) carefully curated stories from older students describing these worries and how they improved for them; and (iii) an opportunity to reflect on these stories in writing to help future students as they come to college, including how concerns about belonging are normal and typically improve with time.
Lu, Adrienne. "Everyone Is Talking about 'Belonging': What Does It Really Mean?" Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 Feb. 2023, www.chronicle.com/article/everyone-is-talking-about-belonging. Access via database (student login required): https://research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=f9e9e884-f833-32b1-9f56-ef333f822c7e
“The key is to help students connect with a group that supports what they feel is a salient part of their identity."
Murphy, Mary C. "How Social Belonging Impacts Retention at Broad-Access Colleges." Academix Upshot, 16 Dec. 2022, https://www.thirdway.org/report/how-social-belonging-impacts-retention-at-broad-access-colleges
Intervention: The intervention took the form of a reading-and-writing exercise assigned in the required college writing course taken by all university freshmen. Worries about belonging among first-year students play a role in their college persistence and whether institutions can support students by dispelling these concerns and offering strategies for belonging through a structured in-class reading and writing assignment. Students receiving the intervention were tasked with reading stories from upper-level students that highlighted typical academic and social challenges in college, depicted these challenges as common and temporary, and shared management strategies that had worked for them. Students were then asked to complete writing exercises designed to facilitate the personalization and internalization of the core message of belonging.
Results: Students were both more likely to remain enrolled at the university and more likely to earn better grades in their coursework following the intervention—and students who had struggled academically during their first semester of college experienced the greatest GPA gains. Follow-up analyses showed that the reading and writing exercise also reduced the percentage of students from our populations of interest who ranked in the bottom 10% of their class.
Adapted from Heartland Community College Student Belonging LibGuide
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