Putting Belonging in Context: Communal Affordances Signal Belonging in STEM

The SAFE Model: State Authenticity as a Function of Three Types of Fit

The SAFE model asserts that state authenticity stems from three types of fit to the environment. Across two studies of university students, we validated instruments measuring self-concept, goal, and social fit as unique predictors of state authenticity. In Study 1 (N = 969), relationships between fit and state authenticity were robust to controlling for conceptually similar and distinct variables. Using experience sampling methodology, Study 2 (N = 269) provided evidence that fit and authenticity co-vary at the state (i.e., within-person) level, controlling for between-person effects. Momentary variation in each fit type predicted greater state authenticity, willingness to return to the situation, and state attachment to one's university. Each fit type was also predicted by distinct contextual features (e.g., location, activity, company). Supporting a theorized link to cognitive fluency, situations eliciting self-concept fit elicited higher working memory capacity and lower emotional burnout. We discuss the implications of fit in educational contexts.

Purpose reflection benefits minoritized students' motivation and well-being in STEM

Students from groups historically excluded from STEM face heightened challenges to thriving and advancing in STEM. Prompting students to reflect on these challenges in light of their purpose can yield benefits by helping students see how their STEM work connects to fundamental motives. We conducted a randomized, controlled trial to test potential benefits of reflecting on purpose-their "why" for pursuing their degrees. This multimethod study included 466 STEM students (232 women; 237 Black/Latinx/Native students). Participants wrote about their challenges in STEM, with half randomly assigned to consider these in light of their purpose. Purpose reflection fostered benefits to beliefs and attitudes about the major, authentic belonging, and stress appraisals. Effects were robust across race and gender identities or larger for minoritized students. Structural and cultural shifts to recognize students' purpose in STEM can provide a clearer pathway for students to advance.

Gender Inclusion and Fit in STEM

Despite progress made toward increasing women's interest and involvement in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), women continue to be underrepresented and experience less equity and inclusion in some STEM fields. In this article, I review the psychological literature relevant to understanding and mitigating women's lower fit and inclusion in STEM. Person-level explanations concerning women's abilities, interests, and self-efficacy are insufficient for explaining these persistent gaps. Rather, women's relatively lower interest in male-dominated STEM careers such as computer science and engineering is likely to be constrained by gender stereotypes. These gender stereotypes erode women's ability to experience self-concept fit, goal fit, and/or social fit. Such effects occur independently of intentional interpersonal biases and discrimination, and yet they create systemic barriers to women's attraction to, integration in, and advancement in STEM. Dismantling these systemic barriers requires a multifaceted approach to changing organizational and educational cultures at the institutional, interpersonal, and individual level.

Unpacking Motivational Culture: Diverging Emphasis on Communality and Agency Across STEM Domains

The current research examined whether life sciences vs. engineering/physical sciences vary in the visibility and value of communality and agency. Overall, we find an emphasis on agency in engineering/physical sciences and a greater balance between communality and agency in the life sciences. We examine motivational culture as represented in environmental structures (Study 1), in signals sent and received in academic displays (Studies 2A-B), and in individual-level motives and cognitions (Studies 3-4). Study 1 analyzed archival course data to find that courses (N=11,222) in engineering/physical sciences included fewer collaborative assignments than courses in life sciences. Study 2A's content analysis documented that bulletin boards (N=68) in engineering/physical sciences academic buildings conveyed less communal purpose, and Study 2B found that participants (N=44) perceived greater communal purpose when viewing novel bulletin boards experimentally manipulated to include the cues identified in Study 2A. In Studies 3 (N=326) and 4 (N=110), engineering/physical science majors reported a strong agentic focus, compared to life science majors' more balanced focus. Further, the strong agentic focus of engineering/physical science students waned over time. This investigation of motivational cultures highlights the daily practices and institutional contexts that can shape individual-level motives and cognition related to engagement in STEM, both within and across different STEM pathways.

In the Face of Opportunities: Facial Structures of Scientists Shape Expectations of STEM Environments

Impressions of role leaders provide information about anticipated opportunities in a role, and these perceptions can influence attitudes about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) pathways. Specifically, the facial structures of role leaders influenced perceived affordances of working with that person, such as the availability of communal and agentic opportunities (e.g., mentorship; achievement). STEM faculty with trustworthy (relative to dominant) faces were seen as valuing communal goals (Studies 1-3), and in turn, perceived as affording both communal and agentic opportunities in their research groups (Studies 2-3b). These heightened goal opportunities aligned with perceptions that trustworthy-faced advisors would enact more group-supportive behaviors (Study 2). Consequently, students anticipated fairer treatment and reported greater interest in labs directed by trustworthy- than dominant-faced leaders (Studies 3a-4a), even when images were accompanied by explicit information about leaders' collaborative behavior (Study 4b). The faces of leaders can thus function as the "face" of that role and the surrounding culture.

"Where will I belong more?": The role of belonging comparisons between STEM fields in high school girls' STEM interest

In trying to understand women’s underrepresentation in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics), most existing research focuses on one STEM-field or collapses across all STEM-fields. However, these fields differ vastly in female representation: women tend to be most strongly underrepresented in technological and computer science university majors and to a lesser extent in mathematics and chemistry, while they are less underrepresented in biological sciences. To understand this variability, we examine how girls in the process of making higher education choices compare different STEM-fields to each other. We draw upon dimensional comparison theory, which argues that educational motivation involves intra-individual comparisons of achievement across school subjects. However, previous research has shown that a focus on achievement in STEM is not enough, anticipated belonging in a STEM-field plays a pivotal role in interest in pursuing that field. Consistent with this, we examined participants’ comparisons of anticipated belonging across STEM-fields. A sample of 343 high school girls in STEM-focused university tracks completed a survey on their anticipated belonging and interest in pursuing different STEM majors. Latent Profile Analysis resulted in 3 profiles, showing different belonging comparison patterns across STEM-fields. Examining these comparisons—both within and across profiles—showed how girls felt pushed away from certain STEM-fields and pulled toward others. The findings suggest that for interest in pursuing specific STEM-fields it is not just about the level of anticipated belonging within that STEM-field, but just as much about the level of anticipated belonging in comparison to another STEM-field.

To Pursue or Not to Pursue STEM? Faculty Behavior Enhances Student Involvement in STEM Roles by Signaling Role-Specific Support

Four studies examine the faculty–student relationship as a mechanism through which students ascertain their place in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Studies 1 and 2 use experimental methods to demonstrate STEM faculty who behave communally, relative to independently, increase undergraduates’ belonging and interest in STEM roles through anticipation of greater role-specific support (i.e., support that emphasizes guiding students through structures and activities of field-specific roles). Study 3 then examined the consequences of role-specific support for undergraduates’ belonging and interest in STEM. Students anticipated more belonging and interest in STEM roles when faculty provided high levels of role-specific support. Finally, STEM doctoral students’ perception of role-specific support from faculty related to their belonging and future identification in STEM fields (Study 4). Taken together, these studies demonstrate the importance of students’ construals of role-specific support from faculty, and how faculty behavior signals role-specific support, with benefits for student involvement in STEM.

My Fair Lady? Inferring Organizational Trust From the Mere Presence of Women in Leadership Roles

The history of male dominance in organizational hierarchy can leave a residue of mistrust in which women in particular do not expect fair treatment. The mere presence of a female leader relative to a male leader led perceivers to anticipate fairer treatment in that organization (Study 1) and greater projected salary and status (Study 2). This mere presence effect occurred uniquely through communal and not agentic affordances; these patterns emerged especially or only for women. Female leaders cued organizational trust in both male- and female-dominated industries (Study 3) and when they occupied different levels of the organizational hierarchy (Study 4). When information about organizational communal affordances is directly communicated, both female and male leaders signal trust (Study 5). The processes and practices of male-dominated organizational culture can leave a residue of mistrust, but viewing women in leadership is one beacon illuminating paths forward and upward.

A customized belonging intervention improves retention of socially disadvantaged students at a broad-access university

Broad-access institutions play a democratizing role in American society, opening doors to many who might not otherwise pursue college. Yet these institutions struggle with persistence and completion. Do feelings of nonbelonging play a role, particularly for students from groups historically disadvantaged in higher education? Is belonging relevant to students' persistence-even when they form the numerical majority, as at many broad-access institutions? We evaluated a randomized intervention aimed at bolstering first-year students' sense of belonging at a broad-access university (N = 1,063). The intervention increased the likelihood that racial-ethnic minority and first-generation students maintained continuous enrollment over the next two academic years relative to multiple control groups. This two-year gain in persistence was mediated by greater feelings of social and academic fit one-year post-intervention. Results suggest that efforts to address belonging concerns at broad-access, majority-minority institutions can improve core academic outcomes for historically disadvantaged students at institutions designed to increase college accessibility.