Do themes within college students’ stories about how they were admitted to University differ based on ethnicity/race.
Creators: name: Westberg, Dulce
name: Piff, Paul
name: Dunlop, William
name: Brosnahan, Daniel
Publisher: name: Open Science Framework
Year: 2022
Subjects: subject: Personality and Social Contexts
subject: Social and Behavioral Sciences
subject: Psychology
subject: FOS: Psychology

description: Research Questions Past work indicates that Asian college students may be more likely to accept an identity conferred by Asian parents and family (i.e., identity foreclosure; Ying &amp; Lee, 1999). Indeed, Lian, Liu, Nguyen, and Song (2017) assert that Asian students may foreclose on certain career options and limit how they engage in relationships and campus activities to avoid displeasing one’s parents and live up to parents’ sacrifices and expectations. Likewise, lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender Asians may delay or foreclose their sexual identity development to allow family to save face and avoid losing support within their community (Lian et al., 2017). This aligns with the notion that Asian individuals may experience guilt or shame at not honoring one’s family and enacting parents’ wishes and dreams (i.e., filial piety; Schwartz et al., 2010). For these reasons, we predicted that the theme of foreclosure would be higher among Asian students. Filial piety is a form of communion that researchers most often associate with Asian group members (Schwartz et al., 2010). However, communion is also considered relevant among Latinx participants. For example, Schwartz and colleagues (2010) found that Latinx college students reported greater familialism, or obligation to one’s family. These findings suggest that communal concerns may be expressed more commonly among Asian and Latinx students. Thus, we predicted that the theme of communion would be higher among Asian and Latinx participants in comparison to White participants. We will investigate the following research questions: (1) Is the theme of foreclosure in college students’ stories about how they were admitted to University is higher among Asian students in comparison to Latinx and White students? (2) Is communion higher among Asian and Latinx students in comparison to White participants? Hypotheses: (1) The theme of foreclosure will be higher among Asian American students in comparison to Latinx, and White students. (2) The theme of communion will be higher among Asian American and Latinx students in comparison to White participants. Covariates: We will determine whether mean differences in narrative themes exist after controlling for the length of the narrative as well as participants’ age and gender. Sampling Plan We will use existing data collected at the University of California Irvine (UCI) to investigate our hypotheses. 964 UCI students participated in an online survey exploring “how your experiences as a student shape your well-being”. In this survey, students were prompted to respond to the following prompt: Admission to the University of California Irvine is highly competitive, and many people that apply are ultimately turned away. In this study, we are interested in events and factors that, you believe, led to your admission to UCI. Below, please describe each of these events, in chronological order. In addition, please describe how these events are related The authors read through each response to determine that participants provided an appropriate response. Participants that did not provide a response of at least 50 words were not considered. This process resulted in a final sample of 273 UCI students (Mage = 20.48, SD = 3.94; 193 female). Six students identified as Black/African American, 63 as Chicano/Mexican American, 43 as Chinese/Chinese American, 8 as East Indian/Pakistani, 23 as Filipino/Filipino-American, 8 as Japanese/Japanese American, 10 as Korean, 15 as Latino/Other Spanish-American, 1 as Polynesian, 8 as Thai/Other Asian, 33 as Vietnamese, and 50 as White/Caucasian. To allow for mean comparisons across ethnic-racial groups, we will combine the Chicano/Mexican American and Latino/Other Spanish-American participants into a group of 78 Latinx participants. We will also combine Chinese/Chinese American, East Indian/Pakistani, Filipino/Filipino-American, Japanese/Japanese-American, Korean, Thai/Other Asian, and Vietnamese individuals into one group of 110 Asian participants. We will compare across Asian, Latinx, and White participants due to the constraints of our sample size. Analysis Plan Foreclosure was coded on a 3-point scale where 0 = no foreclosure and 2 = high foreclosure. Communion was coded on a 5-point scale where higher values indicated greater emphasis placed on how social connections and other people were integral to one’s acceptance to University. We will use the output from a categorical regression to determine whether mean differences in foreclosure exist based on ethnicity/race. Specifically, we will determine whether mean levels of (1) foreclosure are higher among Asian participants in comparison to Latinx and White participants and (2) communion are higher among Asian and Latinx participants is higher in comparison to White participants.