Browsing by Subject "Male college students"

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Challenging male stereotypes : male student engagement in a co-curricular, interdisciplinary program
(2014-05) Campbell, Lauren Christine; Saenz, Victor B.
The gender gap in American college attendance has grown over four decades (see for example, Sax, 2008). The National Center for Educational Statistics noted that women received 57 percent of all bachelor's degrees conferred in 2009-2010. Furthermore, women engage in college opportunities inside and outside the classroom at greater rates than men. Engagement opportunities connect students to their college environment, support student learning, and contribute to student persistence (see for example, Astin, 1993). However, little research is available that focuses on which specific co-curricular opportunities men and women choose and any gender differences in engagement that exist within those programs (Sax, 2008). Many colleges offer interdisciplinary programs as a co-curricular student engagement option. Interdisciplinary studies allow students to study broad topics from many disciplinary perspectives and synthesize the various methods and theories for an often better understanding of the topic at hand (Newell, 1992). However, there is a paucity of research regarding gender differences in students who choose to pursue interdisciplinary programs. The purpose of the study was to investigate why male students choose or choose not to get involved in a specific interdisciplinary program at a large research institution in the southwestern United States. Moreover, the study examined the perceptions of administrators regarding male student involvement and their strategies to recruit male students. The study design was qualitative, and interviews of students and program administrators were the primary data source. The researcher employed two conceptual frameworks in the study: Terenzini and Reason's (2005) college experience model and Harris' (2010) model of the meanings college men make of masculinities. Key findings of the study indicated that there was a gender imbalance in student engagement in the interdisciplinary program. Furthermore, male students interested in the interdisciplinary program eschewed masculine norms both in their co-curricular pursuits and their academic interests. The study contributes to the field of student affairs by focusing on a research gap in male student engagement in interdisciplinary programs. By examining engagement experiences through the lens of male gender identity, the study provides rich data and offers strategies to student affairs practitioners.
The potential benefits of expressive writing for male college students with varying degrees of restrictive emotionality
(2007) Wong, Yang Joel, 1972-; Rochlen, Aaron B.
This study examined the potential psychosocial benefits of writing about one's best possible emotional connectedness with a romantic partner for male college students with varying levels of restrictive emotionality. One hundred and fifty-eight male college students were randomly assigned to either an experimental or a control writing condition. Experimental participants wrote for 20 minutes each day for three days about how their lives would be different if they had the best possible emotional connectedness with a real or imaginary romantic partner while control participants wrote about impersonal topics. Before and after the writing intervention (on the last day of writing and four weeks after the writing), participants completed self-report measures of their restrictive emotionality, psychological distress, positive relations with others, and personal growth. Participants also completed a questionnaire on their expression of emotional intimacy to their romantic partners/significant others four weeks after the writing intervention. It was hypothesized that experimental participants would report better psychosocial health than control participants. Further, among high restrictive emotionality participants, the experimental group was expected to benefit more from the writing intervention than the control group, although among low restrictive emotionality participants, both conditions were expected to produce equivalent results. The results indicated that the only significant difference between the experimental and control groups on the main outcome variables was change in psychological distress. Experimental participants reported a significantly greater decrease in psychological distress than did control participants four weeks after the writing intervention. None of the hypothesized condition by restrictive emotionality interactions were confirmed. In addition, the expressive writing intervention produced approximately equal results for men who were in romantic relationships and men who were not. Further, a multiple regression analysis of the main pretest outcome variables indicated that participants' restrictive emotionality was positively associated with not being in a romantic relationship and negatively related to their positive relations with others.