The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to investigate the relationship of students' sense of belonging and first-year college student retention. In particular, the researcher analyzed the relationship of students' sense of belonging, the predictor variable and first-year college student retention, the outcome variable. The…

The purpose of this study was two-fold: to investigate whether there are correlation between and among academic overload, self-efficacy and perceived social support as predictors of academic adjustment among first year university students and to investigate the relative contribution of among academic overload, self-efficacy and perceived social…

This study examined the perceived benefits of drinking alcohol among freshmen women as they relate to the college transition. Using a sample of incoming freshman college students we examined the changes in alcohol use three weeks prior to college and again within a month of arriving. We also examined the relationship between perceived benefits of…

The college preparedness of first-year, first-semester, undergraduate students was researched and analyzed in this study. The research entailed a purposeful selection of 10 first-year, first-semester, undergraduate student participants that transitioned into a four-year public university, University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), from a Nevada…

This case study of families of first-generation college students, drawing from multiple data sources including longitudinal data from 8 parents who were interviewed three times over the span of their students' first college year and focus group data with parents attending college orientation, expands our understanding of parent and family…

Sense of belonging contributes to academic success, persistence, and self-efficacy among students, and is especially poignant for first-generation students who are less likely to engage socially, intellectually, and academically. Residential spaces provide the ideal environment to examine belongingness among first-generation students because of…

Our study examines how negative and positive diversity interactions influence students' psychological well-being. Specifically, we explore how diversity interactions influence students' psychological well-being at the end of their first year of college and how these experiences vary by race. Our findings suggest that while negative diversity…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine how chatbots can be used to address two key struggles that students face in first year--a sense of being disconnected from the instructor, and information overload. The authors propose that chatbots can be a useful tool for helping students navigate the volumes of information that confront them as…

First-year seminars and university induction programmes are embedded with academic and social skills required by students to transition into their first year of study. The first-year seminar at the University of the Free State is a credit-bearing module called UFS101, and is a prerequisite for degree completion. Students are assessed through…

This study aimed to identify and rank the personal, family-related, social, and academic correlates of depressive symptoms in first-year college students. A questionnaire that included the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) was administered to 389 first-year college students (mean age = 18.9; SD = 3.38; 59.4% female). Eight variables…

This study explores how first-year students experience, perceive, and make sense of institutional culture in higher education during the transition from high school to college. Examining institutional culture during the first year remains relevant because nearly 25% of all students who depart higher education do so within their first year (Nalbone…

Transition of learning from secondary to higher education demands new students to do academic adjustments, especially towards the change from rote learning to student-centered learning. Student-centered learning requires students to process learning material with more depth and to regulate their own learning. These skills often relate with…

As young adults transition from secondary education to post-secondary education, they enter a time of life when they are able to independently and potentially for the first time make all of their own food decisions. This shift from childhood to young adulthood and the new-found freedom to make food decisions makes students vulnerable to weight…

Background/Objectives: The objective of the paper is analysis and description of findings of an empiric study on the issue of social and psychological adaptation of first year students to studying in a higher educational institution. Methods/Statistical analysis: Using the methods of theoretical analysis the paper's authors plan and carry out an…

This study examined the effects of gratitude journaling on first-year college students' adjustment, life satisfaction, and positive affect. Students who scored high (i.e., scores between 35 and 56) on the Perceived Stress Scale (Cohen et al. in "Journal of Health and Social Behavior," 24, 385-396, 1983) and low (i.e., scores between 48…