Correlates Of Social Alienation Among College Students

College Student Journal, March, 1999 by Eric J. Lane, Timothy K. Daugherty

Social Alienation has been predictive of negative outcomes among high school and college students. Correlates of Social Alienation were sought in the current study. It was predicted that women would report lower Social Alienation than men, and that members of Greek organizations would report lower Social Alienation than non-affiliated college students. A factorial ANOVA was performed with Social Alienation as the dependent variable and with Gender and Greek Status as factors. The interaction was not significant but two main effects emerged.

Student adjustment to college has received a considerable amount of research attention. Early in a student's career, adjustment occurs both in academic and social arenas. Academically, students typically face more work and less individual attention than may have been available in secondary school (Tripathy, 1986). Socially, family separation and weak campus networking may lead to loneliness for new students (Moroi, 1986). If initial loneliness does not diminish, then social alienation may emerge.

Social alienation involves a persistent perception of being isolated or removed from others. It appears to be predictive of negative academic outcomes. Rejected children (Clasen, 1987) and lonely high school students (Dobson, 1987) tend to achieve lower grades. Daugherty, Vaughn, and Lane (1997) found in a longitudinal study that Social Alienation may be a factor in college attrition. Eventual dropouts reported significantly higher Social Alienation than graduates.

Upmanyu, Upmanyu, & Dhingra (1992) found that loneliness may vary as a function of gender. Specifically, men tend to report more loneliness than women. Perhaps men attribute time alone to personal failure and have difficulty initiating social risk (Schultz & Moore, 1986). However, the relationship between alienation and gender has not been sufficiently studied.

Research indicates that students involved in social organizations report significantly less isolation and loneliness. Prisco (1979) found that sorority membership appeared to reduce self-perceived isolation. Moran, Yengo, and Algier (1994) similarly found better social adjustment among participants in a college student organization.

The purpose of the current study is to examine two purported correlates of Social Alienation among college students. It is predicted that women will report lower Social Alienation than men, and that members of Greek organizations will report lower Social Alienation than non-affiliated students. The interaction of Gender and Greek Status will be evaluated, though no prediction is being made. Given Social Alienation's relationship with college attrition (Daugherty et al., 1997), a better understanding of the correlates of Social Alienation may be useful to those charged with educating, advising, and counseling students.

Methods

Participants

The sample included 87 students enrolled in undergraduate General Psychology courses. The Gender breakdown was 29 male and 58 female (similar to the proportions in the general student body) participants. The age of the participants ranged from 17 to 27 (M=19.8, SD=1.45) years. All participants provided informed consent.

Apparatus

The Social Alienation from Classmates Scale (SACS; Seidel & Vaughn, 1991) is a 26 item self-report inventory. A revision of the scale (Daugherty et al., 1997) was used to assess Social Alienation in this college sample. Each item presents a statement about peer relationships, and subjects are asked to indicate how true the item is for them on a scale of 1 (never true) to 4 (very true). The item average is taken as the total score, with higher scores indicating greater Social Alienation.

A demographic survey included questions about Gender and Greek Status, embedded among other questions. Students indicated their gender by circling "male" or "female." Students circled "yes" or "no" in response to: "Are you a member of a fraternity or sorority?"

Procedure

The demographic survey and SACS were completed by consenting participants in large groups. Confidentiality was discussed and subjects were encouraged to respond openly during the following silent administration.

Results

A factorial ANOVA was performed with Social Alienation as the dependent variable and with Gender and Greek Status as factors. The interaction was not significant (p=.33), but two main effects emerged. Women (M=l.71, SD=.32) obtained significantly lower scores than men (M= 1.93, SD=.31) in terms of Social Alienation (F(1,83)=9.23, p [is less than] .01). More than 40% of the participants were members of Greek organizations. Social Alienation scores were significantly lower (F(1,83)=22.37, p [is less than] .01) among Greek members (M=1.58, SD=.29) than among non-affiliated students (M=1.92, SD=.28).

Discussion

The current study identified two correlates of Social Alienation among college students. As predicted, women reported significantly less Social Alienation than men, and members of campus Greek organizations reported significantly less Social Alienation than non-affiliated students. These results appear to be consistent with past research that examined the relationships of gender and organizational involvement with loneliness (Moran, Yengo, & Algier, 1994; Upmanyu, Upmanyu, & Dhingra 1992; Prisco, 1979).