Lewis and colleagues define academic belonging as “...the extent to which individuals feel like a valued, accepted, and legitimate member in their academic domain” and go on to state, “Belonging has long been recognized as an innate human need and an important driver of physical and psychological well-being" (Lewis, Stout, Pollock, Finkelstein, & Ito, 2016).
Academic belonging is a logical extension of the general sense of belonging (to a group or community). In Maslow’s widely accepted hierarchy of human needs, a sense of belonging is ranked third in order of importance, behind basic physiological needs (air, water, food) and safety needs (Maslow, 1943). For college students, a sense of belonging refers to perceived social support and connectedness, and a sense of fitting into the larger college community. This community includes the student’s departmental and classroom communities.
A student who feels a sense of belonging feels cared about, accepted, respected and valued by others on campus. Maslow argued that if an individual’s needs are not met, their physical and mental health may be negatively affected. Academic communities within an institution, e.g., MIT subjects, learning communities (FLCs) and departments with their associated faculty-student, staff-student, and student-student interactions are critical in the development and support of students’ academic belonging.
Tinto’s early work on the impact of learning communities underscores the importance of shared experiences and responsibilities, of belonging to an academic community on student success in college (Tinto, 1997; 2003). Numerous subsequent studies spanning the K-20 spectrum have reported a connection between a student’s sense of belonging to a community or set of communities, and the student’s achievement motivation, expectations to achieve, as well as actual academic achievement. Highlights from some of these studies are described below.
Hurtado and colleagues found that a sense of belonging is positively associated with: the ability to manage academic adjustment; grades; self-rated change in the ability to conduct research; and with perceptions of the relevance of coursework in the first year of college. They found that Underrepresented Minority (URM) science students with higher high-school GPAs and degree aspirations tended to be less confident in their ability to adjust academically to the 1st year of college than their non-URM peers. The authors hypothesize that these students have heightened expectations of themselves and perceptions of their peers’ abilities and thus feel less satisfied with their own academic adjustment (Hurtado et al., 2007).
At the research institution (MIT is classified in this category), major belonging was associated with feeling positive about the learning experiences in major classes and was associated with behavioral engagement. In addition, the researchers found a correlation between students’ sense of belonging to the university overall and emotional engagement. Emotional engagement has been defined in terms of both perceived positive and negative emotional responses to academic experiences. These emotional responses can range from feelings of interest and enjoyment to anxiety/worry and discouragement (Hurtado et al., 2007).
Wilson et al. studied 403 sophomores, 633 juniors, and 471 seniors in STEM majors from five different institutions with distinct Carnegie classifications: a large, public flagship Research institution, a small private/faith-based college, an HBCU (Historically Black College/University), a teaching institution, a women’s college. These five institutions were selected to capture a diverse range of undergraduate experiences across different institution types that vary significantly by size (enrollments), variety of STEM majors, institutional culture, and diversity of undergraduates on campus (Wilson et al., 2015).
The researchers found that a sense of belonging in a course was most consistently linked to engagement in STEM coursework across the five schools while university belonging was linked least consistently. Specifically, a greater sense of belonging in a class was linked to higher levels of reported participation at all five schools and less negative emotional engagement at four of the five schools (Wilson et al., 2015).
A study of 238 first-year college students found that “students’ sense of efficacy for succeeding in class and their perception of the value of tasks required in class were quite strongly associated with their sense of belonging.” (Freeman, Anderman, & Jensen, 2007 p. 216). In addition, they identified specific instructor characteristics that were associated with college students’ sense of class belonging. These characteristics included: encouragement of student participation and interaction, instructor organization, and instructor warmth and openness.
Zumbrunn et al. found that students’ perceptions of a supportive classroom/course environment predicted students’ belonging beliefs, which were, in turn predictors of students’ motivation, engagement, and achievement in the course (Zumbrunn, McKim, Buhs, & Hawley, 2014).