The Relationship of Academic and Social Integration to Student Attrition - a Study Across Institutions and Institutional Types.

Abstract

As the population of eighteen to twenty year olds constricts, postsecondary institutions are concerned about their ability to retain those students initially enrolled. For many, student attrition is a major concern and notable problem. Tinto, in attempting to explain attrition, posits that other things equal, the greater the extent of academic and social integration of the student within the campus community, the more likely the student is to persist. This study tests Tinto's theory across a number of institutions and institutional types. During April, 1979, 2410 full time freshman students from eleven institutions, representing two- and four-year colleges, completed the Student Involvement Questionnaire (SIQ). The SIQ collected information on personal characteristics, student commitment to complete college, and student participation in a variety of activities that described academic and social integration. During Fall, 1979, colleges identified those respondents who returned for their sophomore year and those who did not return. Discriminant analysis was used to determine if these stayers and leavers significantly differed on data previously collected on the SIQ. The findings from this study indicate that although stayers and leavers do significantly differ in terms of extent of involvement in academic and social activities, the variance explained by involvement in academic and social activities within a student's decision to persist or drop out is too small to classify students as stayers or leavers. Extent of involvment in academic and social activities could not, therefore, be used to predict which students will persist or drop out. Moreover, the findings suggest that student decisions to drop out are influenced by multiple factors (e.g., external factors--financial difficulties, family problems), many of which may be beyond the power of postsecondary institutions to influence. Within the discriminant analysis the best predictor in identifying dropouts is the question: "Do you plan to return to this college for the next semester?" Over 40 percent of those students who indicated they would not return to campus for the next semester did, in fact, not return. For college administrators interested in identifying potential dropouts, perhaps the best method is to ask students their intentions about returning to campus for the next semester. Last, as one part of the study, the dropout rates for four-year and two-year college women and men students within the response group were compared. With one exception (i.e., women four-year versus women two-year students) there were no significant differences in the dropout rates of the groups compared. When comparisons are made between two-year college students enrolled full time in academic degree granting programs and their four-year college counterparts, it appears there are not substantial differences in the dropout rates across groups. This would tend to contradict much of the earlier research which reported much higher dropout rates for community college students. The findings of this study do not support Tinto's theory. One implication of these results is that the development of a wide array of academic and social activity programs may not have an appreciable impact on reducing student attrition.