Understanding First-Year College Students’ Perception of Academic Rigor and

Help-Seeking Behavior in College using BCSSE and NSSE

by

Shankharupa Chaudhuri

A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty of

Auburn University
in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy

Auburn, Alabama
May 5, 2018

Keywords: academic rigor, academic help-seeking, NSSE, BCSSE, confirmatory factor analysis,
structural equation modeling.

Copyright 2018 by Shankharupa Chaudhuri

Approved by

Paris S. Strom, Chair, Professor, Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology

Joni Lakin, Associate Professor, Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology
Jill D. Salisbury-Glennon, Associate Professor, Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology
Chih-hsuan Wang, Assistant Professor, Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology
 Abstract

The first-year students join college with several expectations in their mind about their

upcoming academic endeavors and their career. The first-year of college is the most crucial year

of a students’ college career. This dissertation explores first-year students’ perceptions/

expectation of academic rigor and academic help-seeking in college as measured by Beginners

College Survey of Student Engagement (BCSSE) and the National Survey of Student

Engagement (NSSE). In three separate studies, we first observed the difference in first-year

students’ expectation of college academic rigor before they joined college versus observed

academic rigor after a year in college, second is the difference in first-year students’ expected

academic help-seeking behavior before they joined college versus observed academic help-

seeking after a year in college and third a proposed model showing the effect of several factors

on expected academic rigor (ECrigor) and expected academic help-seeking (EAHS) along with

the finding the effect of ECrigor on EAHS.

The samples for the first two studies are all students who participated in both BCSSE and

corresponding NSSE surveys in years 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 counting to N=

2096. The sample for the third study consists of first-year students who participated in BCSSE

survey for the years 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 counting to N= 7540. The result of the first

study shows that students observed less academic rigor in college than they had expected before

joining college. Similarly, the result of the second study also showed the observed help-seeking

behavior to be less than what they had expected before joining college. Results of the third study

showed seven exogenous variables predicting expected college rigor and expected academic

ii
help-seeking. While high school rigor and advanced placement classes significantly predicted

expected college rigor; self-efficacy, social behavior, relations with faculty, academic

perseverance, and expected college rigor significantly predicted expected academic help-seeking.

In summary, the results of the first two studies are in alignment with previous literatures

that showed first-year students’ expectation of college does not match with their actual

experience. But here the variance is inverted for the academic rigor construct compared to

previous literatures. Usually, first-year students show difficulty in coping with college academic

rigor, but in this study, students reported to have experienced less academic rigor. Students also

reported less academic help-seeking which is understandable due to the fact that they perceived

less academic difficulty. Lastly, the proposed model in study three is a useful way to use BCSSE

data to look at the effect of various pre-college, personal, and in-college factors on expected

academic rigor and expected academic help-seeking during the first-year of college.

iii
 Acknowledgements

I highly acknowledge my profound gratitude to my advisor Dr. Paris Strom for his

guidance, support, encouragement, and help throughout the entire period of my graduate studies

at Auburn University. As a mentor, he not only helped me to figure out my research topic but

also helped me to overcome obstacles in my research and kept me motivated. I would like to

express my gratitude to the committee members Dr. Joni Lakin, Dr. Jill Salisbury Glennon and

Dr. Chih-hsuan Wang for their valuable comments and instructive suggestions towards my

dissertation and taking out time from their busy schedule to help me with my dissertation. My

sincere thanks to Dr. Iryna Johnson for her valuable suggestions as an outside reader. She was

also very helpful in providing me with the necessary data for the research.

A special thanks to Dr. Shiladitya Chaudhury, the then Associate Director of Biggio

Center for providing me with the graduate assistantship opportunity. I would also like to thank

my supervisors Mrs. Ernestine Morris Stinson and Ms. Quanza Hand of Biggio Center for the

supportive and flexible office environment. I would like to thank my Auburn friends who are

always there for me during high and lows of life; they are not less than a family.

I would like to express my gratitude to my family and husband for always being there to

be very supportive and encouraging till the end of my dissertation work. My husband’s persisting

encouragement and push helped me to complete my dissertation work. I would like to dedicate

my dissertation to my father who had been always been my academic teacher and mentor of my

iv
life’s philosophy. My love to my mother, brother, aunt and grandmother for their selfless love,

sacrifice and care. And above all thank you God for everything.

v
 Table of Contents

Abstract ......................................................................................................................................... ii

Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... iv

List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ x

List of Figures ............................................................................................................................. xii

List of Abbreviations ................................................................................................................. xiii

Chapter I: Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1

Statement of the Problem .................................................................................................. 2

Research on Academic Rigor............................................................................................ 4

Research on Academic Help-Seeking ............................................................................... 5

Research on Proposed Academic Rigor and Academic Help-Seeking Model ................. 7

Research Purpose and Research Questions....................................................................... 9

Significance of the Study ................................................................................................ 11

Limitations ...................................................................................................................... 12

Definition of Terms......................................................................................................... 13

Chapter II: Review of Literature ................................................................................................. 17

Newly Admitted First-Year Student Expectations ......................................................... 18

Importance of High School Experience .......................................................................... 19

Transition from High School to College ......................................................................... 20

Transition from High School Rigor to College Rigor .................................................... 21

vi
 Academic Rigor .............................................................................................................. 22

Academic Rigor: Faculty Perception .................................................................. 23

Academic Rigor: Student Perception .................................................................. 24

Students’ Expectation versus Experience of Academic Rigor in College ...................... 25

BCSSE and NSSE Defined ................................................................................. 26

Academic Help-Seeking ................................................................................................. 28

Students’ Expectations versus Experience of Academic Help-Seeking in College ....... 30

Factors Influencing Student Perception of Academic Rigor .......................................... 31

Factors Influencing Student Perception of Academic Help-Seeking ............................. 33

Self-Regulated Learning, Academic Self-Efficacy, and Help-Seeking .............. 34

The Role of Self-Efficacy Beliefs ....................................................................... 35

The Role of Task Value Beliefs .......................................................................... 35

The Role of Goal Orientation ............................................................................. 36

Threat to Academic Help-Seeking ...................................................................... 37

Research Hypothesis ....................................................................................................... 38

Summary ......................................................................................................................... 40

Chapter III: Methods ................................................................................................................... 42

Statement of the Problem ................................................................................................ 45

Study Context.................................................................................................................. 46

Review of Previous Research on Academic Rigor and Academic Help-Seeking .......... 47

Research Questions ......................................................................................................... 49

Research Model and Research Hypotheses .................................................................... 49

Objective One and Objective Two ...................................................................... 49

vii
 Proposed Hypothesis Academic Rigor and Help-Seeking...................... 50

Objective Three ................................................................................................... 50

Proposed Hypothesis ............................................................................... 51

Sampling ......................................................................................................................... 52

Instrumentation ............................................................................................................... 53

Data Analysis .................................................................................................................. 55

Variables ......................................................................................................................... 56

Chapter IV: Results ..................................................................................................................... 59

Descriptive Statistics ....................................................................................................... 60

Research Question 1 ....................................................................................................... 62

Research Question 2 ....................................................................................................... 69

Research Question 3 ....................................................................................................... 73

Data Analysis .................................................................................................................. 76

Confirmatory Factor Analysis......................................................................................... 80

Structural Equation Modeling ......................................................................................... 88

Hypotheses Testing Results ................................................................................ 97

Summary ......................................................................................................................... 99

Chapter V: Summary, Implications, and Conclusions .............................................................. 100

Summary of the Studies ................................................................................................ 100

Summary of Results ...................................................................................................... 101

Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 105

Limitations .................................................................................................................... 106

Future Studies ............................................................................................................... 107

viii
References ................................................................................................................................. 109

Appendix A: IRB Approal Letter from Auburn University...................................................... 126

ix
 List of Tables

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics..................................................................................................... 61

Table 2. Sample Representativeness Statistics ........................................................................... 62

Table 3. Reliability Statistics Academic Rigor .......................................................................... 63

Table 4. Item-Total Statistics Academic Rigor........................................................................... 65

Table 5. Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Rigor .................................................... 67

Table 6. Reliability Statistics Academic Help-Seeking .............................................................. 69

Table 7. Item Total Statistics Academic Help-Seeking .............................................................. 70

Table 8. Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Help-Seeking........................................ 71

Table 9. Measurement Items ....................................................................................................... 76

Table 10. Assessment of Normality (Group Number 1) ............................................................. 78

Table 11. Mean and Standard Deviation of the Measurement Constructs and Items ................. 79

Table 12. Measurement Items After Items Deletion ................................................................... 80

Table 13. Factor Loadings/Standardized Regression Weights Coefficients ............................... 82

Table 14. Unstandardized Parameter Estimates of the 40 Measurement Model ........................ 83

Table 15. Fit Indices of Initial CFA ............................................................................................ 84

Table 16. Fit Indices of Modified CFA ...................................................................................... 88

Table 17. Fit Indices of Hypothesized Model ............................................................................. 90

Table 18. The Estimation for Regression Weights Suggesting First Modification .................... 91

Table 19. The Estimation for Regression Weights Suggesting Final Modification ................... 93

Table 20. Fit Indices of Modified SEM ...................................................................................... 95

x
Table 21. The Estimation for Regression Weights after Final Modification .............................. 96

Table 22. Hypotheses Path Testing Results ................................................................................ 98

xi
 List of Figures

Figure 1. Hypothesized relationship between academic rigor and help-seeking .......................... 7

Figure 2. Faculty model of academic rigor showing overlap between meaningful content, active
learning, higher-order thinking, and expectations ....................................................... 24
Figure 3. Student modes of academic rigor showing element of academic rigor as proposed by
the students................................................................................................................... 25
Figure 4. Hypothesized relationship between academic rigor and help-seeking ........................ 40

Figure 5. Proposed model of relationship of academic rigor and help-seeking along with the
factors ........................................................................................................................... 51
Figure 6. Hypothesized relationship of academic rigor and help-seeking .................................. 74

Figure 7. The hypothesized seven factor CFA model................................................................. 81

Figure 8. Final CFA Model ......................................................................................................... 86

Figure 9. Hypothesized structural model .................................................................................... 89

Figure 10. Final structural model ................................................................................................ 94

xii
 List of Abbreviations

ACT American College Testing

AMOS Analysis of Moment Structures

Apcl Advanced Placement Classes

BCSSE Beginning College Student Survey of Expectations

Bfirstgen First-generation Student

CFA Confirmatory Factor Analysis

CMIN Relative Chi-Square

DF Degrees of Freedom

FR Faculty Relation

Fypardeg Parental Education

HBCU Historically Black Colleges & Universities

Hgrade High School Grade

HSrigor High School Rigor

IFI Incremental Fit Index

NCES National Center of Education Statistics

NSSE National Survey of Student Engagement

NFI Normed Fit Index P

P P value

Per Academic Perseverance

RMSEA Root Mean Square of Error Estimation

xiii
SB Social Behavior

SEM Structural Equation Modeling

SF Self-Efficacy

SRMR Standardized Root Mean Residua

TLI Tucker Lewis Index

χ² Chi square

xiv
 Chapter I: Introduction

Change can be unsettling, and in most cases, the human brain does not react well to

uncertainty. The trek from high school to college is a significant change in a student’s life. With

thousands of students going through this change every year, there is a need for carefully studying

the factors that affect the performance of the students and their academic prosperity. Looking at

the statistical figure of student enrollment in colleges every year, we see that the National Center

for Education Statistics [NCES] (2016) data shows that there is a constant increase in student

enrollment in colleges until 2010/11. Though after 2010/11 there was a little stagnation in the

enrollment figures which hovered around a little more than 20 million. For example, in 2013 fall,

college enrollment was 20.4 million, falling 3 percent lower than the record enrollment in fall

2010. However, there is an anticipation that this statistic will change from fall 2018 through fall

2024 with the prediction to see an unprecedented number of college enrollments (NCES, 2016).

It is indeed an encouraging trend that there is rise in the college attendance rate. However, it

is also crucial to examine the preparedness of the students. Students making their journey from

high school to college add different viewpoints, attitudes, estimations, beliefs, and character, to a

college environment. The first year of college is a crucial time for every student as this marks the

transition for them from one type of institution to another. As per Tinto (1982, 1987), high

school to college transition can place significant demands on young adults. During this time, it is

very much required to provide the students with the necessary support so that the transition can

be as smooth a journey for them as possible. Thus, this quantitative study explored first-year

students’ experiences in regard to academic rigor and help-seeking behavior in college. Data

1
from the Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement (BCSSE) and the National Survey of

Student Engagement (NSSE) collected from an southeastern University in the United States were

compared to identify the difference between the anticipated vs. observed academic rigor and

help-seeking behavior of the students. Also, based on the data from the BCSSE survey, another

objective of this dissertation is to find any relation of academic rigor in affecting students’ help-

seeking behavior along with studying the relation of various factors from the literature found to

be predicting the two constructs of academic rigor and help-seeking.

Statement of the Problem

The first-year of college is a very vital time for the students. For the first year students,

starting the first year of college is like starting a new life in an unknown world, the success of

which possibly will affect their academic prosperity in the future. Adjusting immediately to an

unfamiliar environment following a successful high school career is hard for many young adults,

as Woosly (2003) stated: “The move from high school to college can present a major challenge

to students trying to make the transition” (p. 201). As the students step into their first year of

college, they start to face many challenges, simultaneously there opens numerous doors to

opportunities as well. These challenges range from managing school work to arranging for food

to survive. For many of the students, it is the very first time that they start living on their own

away from the family. Although the opportunity to stay away from home and be independent

seems enticing at the beginning, this newfound independence also brings new responsibilities.

Now the students are required to manage their day to day household work and academic

responsibilities on their own with no family support. They are required to master the skills of

time management, prioritization, staying healthy, acclimating to the academic expectation and

new social responsibilities, self-initiative, self-regulation, etc. All these struggles to survive the

2
first year of college may result in psychological symptoms, underperformance, alcoholism,

college dropouts, etc. (Tinto, 1982, 1987). In such a situation, one of the critical responsibilities

of the educators of an institution is to provide students’ academic needs with academic support

and motivation, for a smooth first-year experience. As it says, “the success of an institution and

the success of its students are inseparable” (Levitz & Noel, 2000, p. 1), ascertaining student

success will assure the success of the institution.

The success or failure of the student can have a significant impact on their first-year college

adjustment (Meyer, Spencer, & French, 2009). Some students constructively manage this

transition and adapt to college life in a newly discovered way, and others can be seen struggling

to efficiently meet the demands of their new roles and thus feel overwhelmed (Estrada, Dupoux,

& Wolman, 2006). Likewise, Tinto (1993) said: “while many students soon adjust, others have

great difficulty in separating themselves from past associations and/or in adjusting to the

academic and social life of the college” (p. 163). The difference in standards and expectations

between the college and high school environments is another reason as to why many students are

ill prepared for these changes (Venezia, Kirst, & Antonio, 2003). This failure in understanding

the varied expectations in these two settings can cause a negative impact on academic motivation

and achievement for the first-year students.

Statistics show an increase in the number of young individuals enrolling in college.

However, before we begin to celebrate the rising number of student enrollments in colleges, we

must also analyze how many of these confident, motivated young individuals are likely to thrive

in higher education. “What college is like” - in most cases, first-year college students’ actual

experiences and perceived expectations do not align with each other (Meyer et al. 2009; Smith &

Wertlieb, 2005). The researchers interested in post-secondary instruction have repeatedly

3
emphasized the importance of the first-year experience for college students. The high school

environments are entirely different from college, plus the difference in the course structure, and

academic expectations situate the students in a whole new position which might not be easy for

them to recognize and adjust. Thus, there is a need to understand the transition of the first-year

students by analyzing factors influencing their first-year experience. Among the several factors

influencing the first-year college experience, in this dissertation, we will emphasize on academic

rigor and help-seeking behavior.

Research on Academic Rigor

Usually, before we start anything new, we all have a perceived picture of the future in mind.

Likewise, students also form a perception about college life, which is built upon and dependent

on several factors like their family background, socio-economic background, precollege

environment/experiences also called high school experiences, their exposure to the outer world,

etc. (Hossler, Schmit, & Vesper, 1999; Meyer et al. 2009). Among the different expectations and

perceptions about the college life that students develop before joining college, the most common

are academic, social, and personal expectations. The academic expectation is the most crucial

among these expectations as their academic success or failure depends on it.

The academic expectations in college can also be referred as academic rigor expectation.

Academic rigor as defined by Winston, Vahala, Nichols, and Gillis (1994) is a learning

environment that is intellectually challenging and demanding. Several aspects have been stated

by researchers as significant factors in determining academic rigor expectation in the first year of

college. Among the several factors influencing students’ perception of academic rigor in college,

research by Meyer et al. (2009) mentioned that the information received from close interpersonal

sources influence the expectations or perceptions of the first-year college students about college

4
academic rigor or rigor of the courses in college. Along with interpersonal relationships, the role

of media was also cited in forming perceptions about college rigor by Meyer et al. (2009). The

other factors cited are students informal interactions with faculty members (Halawah, 2006),

interpersonal connections made with peers (Enochs & Roland, 2006) and perceptions formulated

about college from media (Martens, Page, Mowry, Damann, Taylor, & Cimini, 2006) are further

discussed in Chapter two. Meyer et al. (2009) suggest that intervention in students' perceptions

of academic rigor is critical to their success in the first semester. Thus the first theme appearing

in this research is that of understanding students’ prediction of academic rigor when they start

college vs. their experience after completing the first year of college.

Research on Academic Help Seeking

Continuing to the theme of academic rigor from above, research by researchers Meyer et al.

(2009), reported that the first year students’ perception of the rigor of college academics and the

actual experiences of college rigor during the first semester was incongruent. This incongruence

between their expectation and reality can have an adverse effect on their academic outcome and

can result in poor academic performance or even college dropout. To tackle this incongruence,

intervention in the form of advice or help is needed. The initial interactions (positive or negative)

a first-year student has, like the interaction with faculty, interaction with peers, involvement in

campus activities, etc. within the college environment helps in shaping the transition and

consequently determines student attrition or student success.

Recognizing the need of help to sustain the academic rigor in the first year of college, the

next theme of this investigation is about understanding students’ academic help-seeking behavior

at the start of college vs. after completing the first year in college. The field of research on

college and university students is quite diverse as there are many different perspectives.

5
Understanding students’ behavioral patterns is a hard task as there are no set rules and various

factors to regulate it. Help-seeking being a behavioral model depends on factors such as

achievement goals, task focused goals, relative ability, and perceptions of competence or self-

efficacy (Ryan & Pintrich, 1997).

Research indicates that help-seeking is a “method” to cognitively, behaviorally, and

emotionally engage learners and can be labeled as an important form of behavioral self-

regulation (Pintrich & Zusho, 2002). Thus, we can say that students with positive help-seeking

behavior can also be called as self-regulated learners. Schunk & Zimmerman (1994) in defining

self-regulated learners said that they are always well organized and they use different strategies

like cognitive, behavioral, and motivational strategies to guide and enhance their learning

process toward completing academic tasks. For example, moving from small to large classes is

among the most dramatic contextual changes for many college students. In such a setup it is

expected that students will encounter a situation in which they need aid or advice (help) to

continue an academic task. Here the use of self-regulated learning comes handy; a student must

be aware of needing help (metacognition), must decide to seek help (motivation) and must

implement strategies for engaging another person's help (Nelson Le-Gall, 1981; Newman, 1994).

Thus students who can regulate their learning by seeking help are expected to be successful in

academic life. But it is also often seen that students who need help choose not to seek help (Ryan

& Pintrich, 1997). For first-year students, it is more obvious as they are still trying to deal with

the changes in life which may further lead to students continuing unsuccessfully in the academic

course, delayed graduation or even dropout. Thus the second theme here is to understand the first

year students’ perception of help-seeking and their actual behavior in college is an essential

measure for educators to determine student success.

6
Research on Proposed Academic Rigor and Academic Help Seeking Model

The third theme of this dissertation is to reestablish the factors that effects student’s

perception of the constructs of academic rigor and help seeking using the BCSSE survey data

from a southeastern university. Also, to propose a relation between expected academic rigor and

expected help-seeking behavior of the first-year students by proposing a model shown in Figure

1.

Figure 1. Hypothesized relationship between academic rigor and help-seeking.

Prior literatures has shown several precollege factors in causing influence on first-year

college students’ academic success. The factors that are observed in prior literature relating to

academic success are AP and honors courses (Adelman, 2006; Mayer, 2008; Wyatt, Wiley,

Camara, & Proestler, 2012), students’ high school performance like grade, high school academic

rigor (Adelman, 2006; Kuh, 2007; Wyatt et al., 2012), and ACT/SAT score (Kobrin, Patterson,

Shaw, Mattern, & Barbuti, 2008; Porchea, Allen, Robbins, & Phelps, 2010). Citing about the

effect of pre-college factors, as researchers (Adelman, 2006; Wyatt et al., 2012) stated,

precollege environment such as high school experiences or high school academic performance
7
can predict the success of these students in college. Again, research also suggests that “academic

intensity or academic rigor of students’ high school curriculum is positively related to several

college outcomes including the avoidance of remediation and graduation attainment” (Wyatt et

al., 2012, p.6).

It can be noticed that all the above mentioned pre-college factors are predictors of college

academic success and as academic success is influenced by how well students’ manage college

academic rigor, these factors can also be the predictor of the students’ perception of academic

rigor. The formation of the perception academic rigor among students is a very difficult construct

to measure thus there are not much prior lit about it, the only literature found is by Meyer et al.

(2009) which mentioned parental education and role of media as factors affecting the perception

of students’ in expecting about college rigor.

Help seeking is a very well-studied construct, and the factors affecting students’

academic help seeking behavior is already established in many studies. Prior literature has

characterized help-seeking behavior into several types like “instrumental help-seeking,”

“executive help-seeking,” “adaptive help-seeking” (Karabenick & Knapp, 1991; Nelson-Le Gall,

1985, 1987). As per literature, whether students’ ask for help or not may depend upon

relationship with faculty, relationship with peer, social behavior, being a self-regulated learner,

self-efficacy belief and gender type (Butler, 1998; Karabenick, 2003; Karabenick & Knapp,

1991; Nelson-Le Gall, 1985; Newman, 2002). Thus for theme three, all the predictor factors of

academic rigor will be studied to check how well these factors affect the formation of

expectation of academic rigor and also all the factors influencing students’ help-seeking behavior

will be studied again to see whether these predictor factors from BCSSE survey is in consistence

with prior researches.

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Research Purpose and Research Questions

Central to this dissertation is the focus on the student-end, who experiences the biggest

transition of their life and copes to adopt with the changes in higher education settings. The

BCSSE collects data about students’ high school academic and co-curricular experiences and

their expectation of the first year of college, NSSE then collects data after one year of college to

understand first-year students’ college engagement. Linking BCSSE data with NSSE data, the try

is to shape our understanding of students’ perception of academic rigor when they join a college

and then align it with experience after the first year. Secondly, to understand students’ attitude

towards help-seeking behavior when joining college verses their actual behavior after the first

year of college. Thirdly using the BCSSE data, the try is to find how academic rigor affects

students’ help-seeking behavior along with check the influence of the factors influencing

expectation of academic rigor and help-seeking behavior.

The purpose of this study was to identify the gap in first-year students’ anticipated vs.

observed academic rigor and their behavior regarding anticipated vs. actual academic help asked

during their first year of college. This study investigates changes in academic rigor beliefs and

help seeking attitudes of the first year students by comparing the data obtained from the BCSSE

and NSSE. In addition it also explores the factors that might influence the first-year students’

expectation of academic rigor and help seeking behavior in college, also predicting effect of

academic rigor on help seeking behavior. Several theories and models guided this study; like

Draeger, del Prado Hill, & Mahler (2015)’s model of Student Conception of Academic Rigor,

Self-Regulated Learning theory, and Bandura’s (1995) self-efficacy theory. The following are

the research questions:

9
1. What are the differences in first year college students’ anticipated versus

observed academic rigor after a year of college?

2. What are the differences in first year college students’ anticipated versus

observed help seeking after a year of college?

3. To what extent variables like high school type, high-school grade, ACT/SAT score,

parental education, AP/Honors classes and the factor of high school academic rigor

influences the first year students’ to predict upcoming academic rigor in college. Also

how students’ academic help-seeking behavior in college is influenced by self-

efficacy, perseverance, faculty influence, peers influence, social behavior, in addition

to finding the relationship of college academic rigor and academic help seeking if

any.

The research hypothesis based on the research questions are:

• H1: High school academic rigor (HSrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H2: High school grade (hgrades) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H3: SAT/ACT score (sat_act) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H4: Advanced Placement classes completed (hapcl) has a significant positive effect

on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H5: Honor classes completed (hhonor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

10
 • H6: Being a first generation student (bfirstgen) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H7: Parental education (fypardegr) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H8: Self-efficacy (SF) has a significant positive effect on the Expected college

academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H9: Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H10: Self efficacy beliefs (SF) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H11: Perseverance (Per) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic

help seeking (EAHS)

• H12: Relation with Faculty (FR) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H13: Social Behavior (SB) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic

help seeking (EAHS)

Significance of the Study

There are many studies that examined the data collected through the instrument of

BCSSE and NSSE. But there are not many studies that have made a comparative study of the

common variable present in the two instruments. The BCSSE has useful information on

precollege experiences and expectations for the first year of college and NSSE has useful

information on college students learning processes and engagement. Closely studying the two

instruments, it can be seen that both the instruments’ can be utilized together to compare students

11
expectation vs. achievement data. Academic rigor has a close association with student success,

and help-seeking behavior is also a student behavioral component. In other words, we can say

that both are related to students’ academic achievement, success, outcomes. Secondly using

BCSSE data the try is to find the association of predictors of academic rigor and the predictor of

academic help seeking in predicting the relationship of the two constructs.

This study is significant as there is no quantitative study that explored the difference of

students’ expected vs. observed experience/ behavior in regards to academic rigor and help

seeking. Secondly investigating the predictor factors influencing the formation of expected

academic rigor among first-year students are an extensively studied which is very unique. Also

no prior studies have shown any association on academic rigor and help seeking behavior which

is proposed here.

This study will contribute to the knowledge of how results from the BCSSE and NSSE

instrument can be used as a tool for the institutional staffs, faculties, advisors to understand the

gap between expectation and reality so that the students can be better helped to meet their goal of

academic success. This study is based on student population at an institutional level of a

Southeastern University. Academic rigor and academic help seeking behavior, both being

educational issues, if intervened properly at the beginning of their first semester can significantly

contribute to their positive student attitude and success rates.

Limitations of the Study

This study has two major limitations. The first limitation is that the two surveys used in this

study do not have same data size. The BCSSE survey being administered with the other joining

formalities for the entire freshman entering the institution has 90% completion rate, whereas

NSSE survey is emailed to students, so the percentage of students’ response is very low. So

12
when we are getting almost 90% of the students joining the first year completing the BCSSE

survey, NSSE survey completion rate is less 50%. Thus, data for the comparative study will have

limited in number data. Secondly, the data studied for this research involve only one university

making the findings from this research hard to generalize across the country.

Definition of Terms

The definitions of the terms used in this study are as follows:

• Self-Efficacy (SF): “Self-Efficacy is the belief in one’s capabilities to organize and

execute the courses of action required to manage prospective situation” (Bandura,

1995, p 2).

• Precollege experiences: Precollege experiences expose high school students to the

literacy, arts, concepts, careers, and cultural identity of American higher education

(Biggs, Schomberg, & Brown, 1977). Due to such exposure, a high school student’s

perceived abilities in educational activities develops via other individuals and

experiences, and predispose him/her to certain outcomes and future educational

engagement (Hurtado, Engberg, Ponjuan, & Landreman, 2002). For the purpose of

this study, precollege experiences refer to the combination of college choice,

academic preparation, past patterns of motivation and well-being, and college

aptitude (Kuh, Gonyea, & Williams, 2005).

• At-risk: At-risk students are students who are academically underprepared and

supported and are in danger of failure or dropping out (Vivian, 2005). For this study,

an at-risk student was defined as a student who has earned a GPA below what is

acceptable for good standing at the institution in this study. The GPA measurement

designated as at-risk for this study was a GPA below 2.0.

13
• Academic performance: Academic performance was defined as the cumulative total

GPA measure after the student’s first academic year.

• High School Grade (hgrades): High school grade was defined as the cumulative total

GPA measure after the studentcompletes from high school.

• Student success: Student success was defined as the cumulative total GPA measure

after the first academic year which places a student in good standing at the institution

in this study. The GPA measurement designated as good standing at the institution for

this study is 2.0 or above.

• First-year college student: A first-year college student is a high school graduate

attending college for the first time. For the purpose of this study, surveys

administered during freshmen orientation and include individuals from many

backgrounds who are on campus for the first time since high school graduation self-

identified in response to administration of the BCSSE.

• Retention: A student is retained when they return to an institution year after year

(Roberts & Styron, 2010). The term retention was used in this study to describe the

phenomena of a student with continued enrollment beyond their first year of college.

Students who were not enrolled after their first semester were not included in this

study, as they were not retained for one full academic year.

• Academic year: In this study, an academic year was defined as the period between a

student’s first fall semesters of enrollment through the end of the consecutive spring

semester. GPA and earned hours were collected for students retained through their

first year of enrollment and compared to BCSSE survey items.

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• Parental Education (fypardegr): In this study, first generation student status was

determined using parental degree attainment (BCSSE variable). Students who did not

have at least one parent with a 4-year college degree were classified as a first-

generation student.

• First Generation Student (bfirstgen): A first generation student is one whose parents

or guardian have not attended college. They are usually the first from the family to

attend a four year college to get a college degree.

• High School Academic Rigor (HSrigor): The extent of workload and amount of

challenges faced in courses while in high school.

• Expected College Academic Rigor (ECrigor): The expectation of the extent of

workload and amount of challenging coursework in college.

• Social Behavior of the first-year student (SB): Amount of interaction the first-year

students have with peers and other people in the university.

• Faculty Relation of the first-year student (FR): Amount of interaction the first-year

students have with the faculties.

• Academic Perseverance (Per): The tenacity, persistence and effort students show

while feeling challenged in a coursework.

• Advanced Placement classes (hapcl): Advanced Placement (AP) offers college-level

curricula and examinations to high school a student which is created by the College

Board.

• Honor classes (hhonor): These are higher level classes which cover more material

than general classes and provide academically challenging assignments, coursework

and learning opportunities.

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• SAT/ACT: SAT is Scholastic Aptitude Test and ACT is American College Test.

These are standardized test to determine a high school student’s preparation for

college-level work and to forecast a high school student’s ability to perform in

college.

• BCSSE: Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement.

• NSSE: National Survey of Student Engagement

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 Chapter II: Literature Review

The purpose of this study is to investigate first-year college students’ experience in

regards to academic rigor and help-seeking behavior with the help of data collected from BCSSE

and NSSE instruments. For academic sustenance of the students, the first part of this dissertation

aims to study differences in the first-year students’ prediction/ perception/ anticipation verses

their actual/ observed understanding of academic rigor and help-seeking behaviors after a year of

college experience by comparing the BCSSE and NSSE data. The second part focuses on

studying the factors that affect the formation of students’ perception of academic rigor and help

seeking along with finding the effect of academic rigor on help seeking.

This chapter provides reviews of literature relevant to the factors on which student

conception of academic rigor and help seeking depends. The factors studied are pre-college

experiences, start-of-college attitudes, and expectations, first-year experiences in regards to

academic quality, faculty-student relation, relationships with peers, institutional support, etc.

Previous theorized model about students’ understanding of academic rigor and theories about

students help seeking behavior are discussed to investigate the various themes of this study.

These theories are Model of Student Conception of Academic Rigor by Draeger, del Prado Hill

& Mahler (2013), Draeger et al. (2015), Self-Regulated Learning theory and theory of Self-

efficacy.

A brief overview is presented about the student expectation and importance of high

school experience and about life transition from high school to college. Then the chapter

discusses what academic rigor means along with discussion about the development of a student’s

17
perceptions of college academic rigor. The chapter also discusses prior literature on student’s

help-seeking/ help-receiving behavior in higher education. The following review of literature is a

summary of works pertaining to the systematic, thematic, and theoretical backgrounds presented

by other researchers on the topic of academic rigor, help-seeking/receiving behavior in relation

to Student Perception Model proposed by Draeger et al. (2013, 2015), Self-Efficacy theory, and

Self-Regulated Learning (SRL) theory. The review of the literature concludes with a discussion

of the investigated variables.

Newly Admitted First-Year Expectations

One of the recurring themes in this dissertation is newly admitted first-year students’

expectations in college. Here we will be studying about expectation about academic rigor in

college and expected help seeking behavior in college. So what is expectation in general?

According to Olson, Roese, and Zanna (1996), expectations can be defined as the result of the

interaction of our experiences with our anticipated environment. Universally human beings have

the trait to have expectations for about everything in their life regardless of whether it is very

new or very familiar situation. We form expectations about a familiar situation from our past

experience in that particular situation, whereas expectations about a new situation are dependent

on several related factors. Expectation about first-year of college is one of such new life events

where we consider several related factors. For example a student who is good in academics in

high school will expect to do good academically in college, or a student who is shy in high

school will expect not be make much friends in college, etc. These two examples are two of the

several factors that build up students expectations about college. Expectations are not solely

dependent on direct experience; expectations can also be formed based on information received

from others. For example, if a student has a family member attending college or one who had

18
attended college, there is a high possibility that the experiences shared by such a person can help

to develop an idea about college life. Other types of indirect sources that can possibly shape our

expectation are admissions materials received from college, campus visits, high school

counselors, and others. Collectively all this information leads us to have expectations during our

first-year of college and further these expectations influences our upcoming choices as the first-

year of college progresses (Cole, Kennedy & Ben-Avie, 2009).

Importance of High School Experience

The topic of academic rigor studied in this dissertation is directly or indirectly influenced

by students’ high school experiences along with other factors like personal characteristics, family

background, socio-economic standing, etc. However, high school experience remains the most

important factor to predict first-year college students’ academic behavior in college. Students’

conception of college academic rigor has a very consistent connection with their high school

standards and fundamentals. Astin and Lee (2003) reported that 61 percent of the variance in

time spent studying in college can be predicted by the factors like hours spent studying in high

school, academic ability, leadership ability, and developing a meaningful philosophy of life. The

relation of high school academic achievement and precollege behaviors with students’ behaviors

while in college, their college academic performance, and their experiences in college have been

expressed by Cole et al. (2009) in their research.

Studies have shown the components of experience, engagement, and academic

achievement in high school as significant predictors of student college success (Cole et al.,

2009). The examples of high school experiences as predictors are- the prediction of poor

academic skills assumed based on inadequate education the students had received in poor high

schools (Schnee , 2008), prediction of student success in relation to performance in AP classes or

19
honors level courses in high school (Adelman, 2006; Geiser & Santelices, 2004; Mayer, 2008;

Wyatt et al., 2012), higher academic standards in the nation’s high schools as advocate of

increase in the college graduation rate (Wyatt et al., 2012). Also, research shows high school

grade as a significant contributor to college-going perceptions and forecasting success (Adelman,

2006; Astin & Oseguera, 2005). Thus, a consistent standard across schools, is crucial in

“understanding the relationship between the student experience in high school and subsequent

success in college” (Palmer, 2000, p. 100). Besides these, the importance of school-college

connections is reinforced by many states in their school reform policies, for instance, the states

of Oregon and Georgia have adopted policies adopted to have a K-16 seamless education system

(Palmer, 2000).

Transition from High School to College

“The sociology of life transition” is a crucial subject for sociologists. Similarly, for

educationists, a key event in students’ academic life is the life transition when they move from

high school to college. Thus, Fromme, Corbin, and Kruse (2008) stated that “the transition from

high school to college is an important developmental milestone that holds the potential for

personal growth and behavioral change” (p. 1497). However, as per Holmstrom, Karp, and Gray

(2002), perhaps the most dislocating change for the economically comfortable students is to

leave home for college. Hence the challenge for the freshman students’ is to balance academic,

social, and personal expectations. Consequently, the students must adapt simultaneously to

college academic rigor and new social responsibilities for success in college life (Holmstrom et

al., 2002).

Students joining college have limited knowledge about what to expect from college.

Their knowledge is built on a variety of high school academic experiences, their exposure to

20
college information, and family’s socioeconomic and educational influences. Grounded in this

varied experiences it is expected that they will adapt to the new situation, otherwise “failure to

understand the different expectations in the two settings can impact academic motivation and

achievement” (Kern, Fagley, & Miller, 1998, p.154). A report from Bridge Project, a project

aimed at studying high school- college transition in six states, stated that there are very little

evident of association between k-12 and postsecondary institutes (Kirst, 1998; Kirst & Venesia,

2001). The disjuncture between the two systems impedes successful transition and thus

diminishes student success (Kirst & Venesia, 2001). The result is leaving an abyss for students to

negotiate on their own as the two systems operate singularly without considering students

interest (Smith & Wertlieb, 2005).

Transition from High School Rigor to College Rigor

Astin and Oseguera (2005) stated that high school grades are more reliable than

standardized test results (e.g., the ACT and SAT) at predicting success which is reiterate by

Adelman, (2006) in saying that high school grades are considered as a large contributor to

college-going perceptions. However, in another research by Adelman & Taylor (2002) showed

that high school outcomes (grade-point average, ranking, awards, curriculum, etc.) do not always

guarantee a smooth transition to the first year of college from secondary education institutions.

This gap in high school outcome and academic success is often the cause of the struggle the first

year students’ face to meet faculty expectations.

College faculty often feel that the first year students are ill prepared for college rigor and

statistics shows that about 40 percent of the recent graduates had a skill gap to meet the demand

of college (Archieve 2014). The state and local educational systems do not consistently report

high school graduates’ college attendance and retention rates or evaluate the quality of college

21
preparation programs (Venezia et al., 2003), making it difficult to recognize struggle to cope

with the change in school to college rigor. There exist several college and career ready (CCR)

policies; however, there is a very limited improvement in aligning the standards of the high

school course rigor to match that with the college course rigor. Though the schools aim at

developing school curriculum to match state or national standards, the standards do not always

align to college curriculum and professor expectations (Linn, 2000). The reason is there is

always a difference of view between high school teachers and college professors regarding

college preparation (Kirst & Bracco, 2004). Moreover, the lack of data about K-12 to college

transition makes it difficult to suggest any changes in course content, in improving the learning

standards in high school, thus it was difficult to prepare students better for the transition to

college (Smith & Wertlieb, 2005).

Academic Rigor

Remember the three Rs in education? Reading, writing and arithmetic, these three core

competencies of educational foundation of a student are now joined by a fourth one, called rigor.

Research by Jacobs and Colvin (2009) suggests that faculties across the country define academic

rigor differently. To quote a few from his study, Jerry D. Weast, superintendent of the

Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland said, “Academic rigor quite simply means

giving students a curriculum that will prepare them to succeed in college or the world of work”

(Jacobs & Colvin, 2009. p.2). William Schmidt, Professor in the College of Education at

Michigan State University, defined academic rigor as “A curriculum that exemplifies academic

rigor is focused, coherent, and appropriately challenging” (Jacobs & Colvin, 2009, p.3).

According to Barbara Blackburn, who teaches at the University of North Carolina, "academic

rigor is determined not just by what is taught, but how it is taught and how it is assessed” (Jacobs

22
& Colvin, 2009, p.3). Regarding the number of books students should be required to read,

president-elect of the National Council of Teachers of English and author of With Rigor for All,

Carol Jago, said: “more is more.” She further said, “In academically rigorous classrooms,

students read at least one book every two to three weeks – ideally more” (Jacobs & Colvin, 2009,

p.1).

To sum up the above ideas, educators defined academic rigor as an arrangement of

standards that will develop students into active learner and a thinker rather than merely being

passive listener, they will be challenged to think, perform, and grow to a level that they were not

at previously, students will be able to demonstrate not only content mastery but can apply skills

and think critically (Braxton 1993; Draeger et al., 2013; Jacobs & Colvin, 2009; Nordvall &

Braxton, 1996; Payne, Kleine, Purcell, & Carter, 2005). A rigorous academic structure will be

such that the course standard will calibrate the students in a way that they are forced to grow

without getting overwhelmed in the process.

Faculty perception. Many educators associate academic rigor with difficulty, rigid

thinking, and harshness. “Too often, rigor becomes ‘Let’s give more homework” (Jacobs &

Colvin, 2009). However, in a research by Draeger et al. (2013), representing faculty perception

of academic rigor, shows that the faculty members unanimously described the goal of academic

rigor is to involve students in learning meaningful course content actively with higher-order

thinking at the appropriate level of expectation.

The model of academic rigor as shown below (Figure 2) that has been suggested by the

faculty member “includes active learning, meaningful content, higher-order thinking, and

appropriate expectations” (Draeger, et al., 2013, p. 278). This model proposed by Draeger, et al.,

2013, involves overlapping the elements of active learning, meaningful content, higher-order

23
thinking, and appropriate faculty expectations along the variety of contexts (e.g., assignments,

course, a course of study, or institution). The elements referred in this model are coherent with

the elements of the definition of academic rigor presented by the educators.

Figure 2. Faculty Model of academic rigor showing overlap between meaningful content, active
learning, higher-order thinking, and expectations (Draeger et al., 2013, p. 224).

Student Perception. In the earlier mentioned of model of faculty conception of academic

rigor that Draeger et al. developed in 2013, higher order thinking was identified as an important

element of academic rigor. Even literature on academic rigor has referred higher order thinking

as a significant constituent of academic rigor (Jacobs & Colvin, 2009; Nordvall & Braxton,

1996; Payne et al., 2005). However, interesting to note (Figure 3) that in the three student models

developed by Draeger et al. (2015), the higher-order thinking element is absent. The reason as

explained by the authors is that may be the “students were either unfamiliar with these skills or

did not see them as central to a rigorous academic environment” (p. 222).

24
Figure 3. Student Models of academic rigor showing element of academic rigor as proposed by
the students (Draeger et al. 2015)

To sum up the finding of the student conception model of academic rigor in college by

Draeger et al. (2015), the elements of academic rigor that have been identified are tough grading,

workload (amount of reading and writing), the level of difficulty and student interest. Based on

the student responses, the researchers here grouped student models of academic rigor into three.

First model is a web of connection of the elements of academic rigor such as tough grading,

workload (amount of reading and writing), the level of difficulty and student interest, second has

‘hub and spoke’ arrangement of the same elements with grading as the hub in connection with

the elements workload (amount of reading and writing), the level of difficulty and student

interest and third model has interest in the center with other elements surrounding it.

Students’ Expectation versus Experience of Academic Rigor in College

The previous findings on academic rigor presented the definition of academic rigor where

the elements of active learning, higher-order thinking, challenging curriculum, demonstration of

meaningful content were mentioned (Jacobs & Colvin, 2009; Nordvall & Braxton, 1996, Payne

et al., 2005). Research on faculty perception of academic rigor in college analyzing the NSSE

data by Draeger et al. (2013) echoed the same elements as necessary constituent of academic

25
rigor. Another study by Draeger et al., in 2015 developed models of student conception of

academic rigor based on NSSE data where the elements of academic rigor presented are tough

grading, workload (amount of reading and writing), and the level of difficulty and student

interest. Since this dissertation aims at utilizing NSSE and BCSSE (highly related to NSSE) data

to study the constructs of academic rigor and help seeking, academic rigor models development

by Draeger et al. (2013, 2015) inspired the theoretical base of the academic rigor study in this

dissertation.

The above mentioned works of Draeger et al. (2013, 2015) showed models based on

faculty and student conception of academic rigor. Both the faculty model and student model in

those studies were developed using a part of the NSSE subscales of level of academic challenge.

The successful use of the NSSE subscale of level of academic challenge to predict models of

academic rigor validate the utilization of this scale in the academic rigor part of this dissertation.

Though, Draeger et al. (2013, 2015) used NSSE data along with interview data in both of their

studies. But as the key focus of this dissertation is to make a quantitative comparison of

academic rigor utilization both BCSSE and NSSE data, thus personal interview data is not

collected here. There is another previous study by Payne et al. (2005) that investigated student

and faculty perception of academic challenge based on early administration of NSSE. However,

the study by Payne et al. (2005) proposed modification of the NSSE items on academic challenge

and student engagement which was but it was back in 2005. After that there were modifications

of the NSSE items to align it more with the BCSSE items, and new updated NSSE was

introduced in 2013 (Fosnacht & Gonyea, 2012) to make the NSSE benchmark more valid.

BCSSE and NSSE Defined. BCSSE and NSSE instruments are widely used surveys in

higher education institutions to study students’ expectations and engagement in college. When

26
Kuh created NSSE in 2000, the idea was to provide high-quality, actionable data that institutions

can use to improve the undergraduate experience. The NSSE was developed as an instrument

designed to measure student engagement along with measuring the degree to which institutions

are providing students with an effective learning environment (Kuh et al. 2001; Kuh 2001).

Complimenting to NSSE, BCSSE survey was developed by the Center for Postsecondary

Research at Indiana University to help institutions to collect pre-college data of the first-year

students joining college and data of students’ expectations about college before joining college.

According to Crisp et al. (2009), students mostly do not have realistic expectations about college,

so knowing students’ expectation can help educators to focus on developing expectations that are

more appropriate for them and thus can be meet (Miller, Bender & Schuh, 2005). Thus BCSSE

data about entering college students’ expectations about college academics during the first

college year can help the institution to better respond to those expectations. The BCSSE

administration generally takes place prior to the start of fall classes which is designed to be

paired with a NSSE administration at the end of the first college of year. This alignment of

BCSSE and NSSE surveys is useful in providing an in-depth understanding of first-year student

engagement on campus.

The first part of the dissertation tries to find out the transformation, if any, in student

conceptions of academic rigor when they join college and after a year of college. Thus the first

research question is: What are the differences in first-year college students’ anticipated versus

observed academic rigor after a year of college? Previous qualitative research by Meyer et al.

(2009) showed the transformation of perception of first-year student about college academic

rigor, showing discord between expectation and experience. However, there is no quantitative

study that measured the transformation, if any, in student conception of academic rigor when

27
they join college and after a year of college. Besides there is no study that compared items of

BCSSE and NSSE to measure the change in expected academic rigor versus academic rigor

experienced.

The NSSE benchmarks are based on 42 items survey that are designed to measure the

most important aspects of the student experience covering five key areas, which are then

combined into subscales: Level of academic challenge, Active and collaborative learning,

Student-faculty interaction, Enriching educational experiences, and Supportive Campus

Environment (Kuh, 2003). BCCSE contains six sets of items as indicators of a students’ high

school academic background, their college expectations, and attitudes toward their academic

work in the first year of college (Cole et al., 2009). The sets are High School Academic

Engagement, Expected First-Year Engagement, Academic Persistence, Expected Academic

Difficulty, Academic Preparation, and Importance of Campus Environment. Grounded on the

research by Draeger et al. in 2013 and 2015 where NSSE items were used to propose academic

rigor models, here also academic rigor items are identified from NSSE. The BCSSE being highly

aligned with NSSE, similar rigor items are identified from BCSSE as well. To find the change in

students’ perception if any in regards to academic rigor and challenge expected in college as

reported in BCSSE to observed academic rigor and challenge from NSSE, the research

hypothesis was proposed in this dissertation. In alignment with previous qualitative finding by

Meyer et al. (2009), the current hypothesis is: H1: There will be difference in students expected

vs. observed academic rigor in college.

Academic Help-Seeking

The transition from high school to college situates student in an unsettling situation be it

in their social life or academic life. As reported by Karabenick and Knapp (1991), the difference

28
of academic rigor from high school to college makes the students feel that they are inadequately

skilled in mastering the increasingly complex academic demands of the college education.

Inevitably, in such a situation a student may encounter doubt or difficulty in their course work

and may need assistance. This view has been echoed by Karabenick & Knapp (1988) in their

study where almost all of the college students conveyed their desire to use help with their courses

or study skills during a typical term.

Early studies considered help seeking as a degrading activity stating that it shows

deficiency in development, self-reliance, and even incompetence. However, later studies showed

help seeking in a positive light as necessary and beneficiary activity (Nelson-LeGall, 1985).

There are several aspects of help-seeking, but here we are mainly focused on the academic help

seeking aspect. The distinction between the two types of help-seeking “executive” or

dependency oriented help seeking and “instrumental” or mastery oriented help seeking is

effective in understanding college students’ help-seeking characteristics. Nelson-LeGall (1981,

1985) proposed the following the distinction between instrumental and executive help-seeking

goals. When a student’s intention is that someone else will attain goal for his or her behalf, it is

called executive help seeking. But what educators aim is for the instrumental help seeking, where

a student attains the goal on its own with minimum assistance or help from others (Karabenick &

Knapp, 1991). That is why mastery-oriented help seeking is considered as an achievement

behavior (e.g., Ames, 1983; Nelson-LeGall, 1981; Nelson-LeGall, Gumerman, & Scott-Jones,

1983), an example is when a student encounter academic difficulties he seeks help by asking for

a hint for problem-solving to improve his ability to achieve the goal.

29
Students’ Expectation versus Experience of Academic Help Seeking in College

Several studies are there measuring student engagement behavior in college but none of

the studies ever studied the change in students’ expectation of academic help seeking in college.

Again coming to the topic of high school-college disconnect, a number of college students

enrolled can be seen remedial classes. This is a clear reflection of disparity in academic

expectations. The inconsistency in expected academic rigor and actual academic rigor or the

academic difficulty faced by the students can be overcome by seeking help. When in difficulty,

the adaptive behavior of students is to use others as a resource to receive the necessary help and

continue the learning process (Nelson-LeGall, 1985, 1990). Researches on student help seeking

in learning acknowledge the adaptive role of help seeking for ages (Ames, 1983; Nelson-LeGall,

1981, 1985; Newman, 1994; Schunk & Zimmerman, 1994). But many a times students never

seek the requisite help to overcome what are often manageable academic challenges. These

students who are non-adaptive to their academic requirements can be seen unsuccessful in their

course and dropping out of courses or program (Newman, 1994).

In this part of the dissertation we will be looking at the whether students show any

change in their help seeking behavior as reported by them before joining college and after one

year of college. The difference in student help seeking behavior will be studies here using the

BCSSE and NSSE data. The NSSE items were previously used in a study by Palmer (2015) in

examining poor help-seeking behavior among Black men at Historically Black Colleges and

Universities (HBCU). Thus items related to help seeking were identified from NSSE and similar

items were identified from BCSSE. These items were used to study the hypothesis: H2: There

will be difference in students expected vs. observed academic help seeking behavior in college.

30
Factors Influencing Student Perception of Academic Rigor

When we are considering students’ perception of academic rigor, we cannot come to

assumptions easily as their perceptions are still in a growing stage. Comparing that to faculty

perceptions is not practical as faculties’ ideas are already grounded on solid experience and

understanding. The expectations of the student conception of academic rigor in the first year of

college are likely to be varied depending on the students’ academic background, family

background, and socio-economical background. Evidently, a student who will be joining a

college will build his perception of rigor based on his previous experience. Therefore, to

understand a student’s perception about academic rigor in college we have to consider several

factors.

Students who are moving from high school to college, be it a four-year institution or a

community college, comes across difference in the level of academic standard as the standards of

the higher secondary level, be it performance, content coverage, or challenge of the material

comes nowhere close to the threshold demands of either four-year or community colleges.

Draeger et al. (2015) while emphasizing the importance of high school experience in forming

academic rigor said that when the first year students come to college if the entry standard of

academic rigor is significantly elevated from their K-12 standard, it might be difficult for some

student to sustain in their academic career. Thus the academic quality and intensity of one’s high

school curriculum is an essential element of postsecondary success (Alderman, 2006).

Considering the above arguments, we can say that high school experience has a major influence

in outlining the concept of academic rigor in a student’s mind.

Other influences as suggested by research are parental education level (Hertel, 2002).

Emphasizing about parental influence of academic rigor, Hertel (2002) said that college educated

31
parents are "able to pass knowledge about the college culture on to their-children” (p. 4)

compared to those parents who are not college educated. When it comes to student’s success,

"students whose parents are not college-educated may not receive sufficient familial support for

attending college" (p. 1). Also, information received from close interpersonal sources, and

media which plays a major role in forming perceptions about expected college rigor (Meyer et

al., 2009). By interpersonal sources the researchers meant information received from peers,

guardians, high school teachers. Students’ builds their perception of academic rigor from the

information received from close interpersonal sources (Meyer et al., 2009) and this pre-college

relationship significantly contributes to their success and perception about college.

Along with the factors that literature show as having influence in building students’

perception of rigor, other factors that might influence are ACT/SAT score, grade in high school,

high school academic rigor, high school type. Although literature does not have any direct

association of all these added factors with building students’ perception of college rigor but they

are predictors of college success. Considering academic success in college is influenced by how

well students’ manage college academic rigor, factors predicting academic success can also be

the predictor of students’ perception of academic rigor. Research suggests that students’

precollege experiences are good indicators of college success (Adelman, 2006; Wyatt et al.,

2012). For example AP and honors courses shows significant effect on academic success

(Adelman, 2006; Mayer, 2008) as statistics shows “students with no AP participation had a mean

FYGPA of 2.85, compared to 3.10 for those participating in a single AP course and 2.93 for the

overall sample” (Wyatt et al., 2012, p. 18). Students’ high school performance (grade, advanced

math courses taken), high school academic rigor or measuring the intensity of academic rigor the

student experienced in high school attended has significant effect on college success (Adelman,

32
2006; Kuh, 2007; Wyatt et al., 2012). The themes that emerged from research by Reid & Moore

III (2008) stated the same “the preparation during high school helped with college success” (p.

240). Also ACT/SAT score is recognized to be significant indicator of college success (Porchea

et al., 2010) as stated by Kobrin et al. (2008) that “SAT is to measure a student’s potential for

academic success in college” (p. 1).

Summarizing the above literature, the factors that are identified as affecting academic

rigor are parental education, high school academic rigor, high school GPA, ACT/SAT score, AP

and honor classes taken, relation with high school faculty, peers and media. In this dissertation

we will look at the influence of parental education, high school academic rigor, high school

GPA, ACT/SAT score, AP and honor classes taken on expected academic rigor (Figure 4) by

analyzing the data collected using BCSSE.

Factors Influencing Student Perception of Academic Help-Seeking

Newman (2002), in describing a typical student behavior, stated that when a student faces

difficulty in the academic task, they will either actively engage, sit passively, give up

prematurely, or continue unsuccessfully. Help seeking is considered as an important learning

strategy that is linked to students’ achievement goals and academic performance (Karabenick &

Newman, 2013). Several models of the help-seeking process have been proposed, but Roll,

Aleven, McLaren, and Koedinger (2011) stated that self-regulatory skill as the key to knowing

when and how to seek help during learning (Nelson-LeGall, 1981; Newman, 1994; Pintrich,

2000). Based on this the conceptual framework this part of the dissertation is grounded on Self-

Regulated Learning Theory.

The importance of SRL for student knowledge and achievement has gained increased

recognition in the last decade. According to Zimmerman (1994) a self-regulated learners are

33
students who are metacognitively, motivationally, and behaviorally involved in their learning. In

presenting the relation between self-regulated learning and motivation, Zimmerman (1990) said,

“self –regulated learning requires more than cognitive skill; it requires a will or motivational

component as well” (pg. 11). There is a close relationship of motivation and SRL (Zimmerman

& Schunk, 2008); regarding the motivational process, the self-regulated learners report high self-

efficacy, self-attributions and intrinsic task interest (Schunk & Gunn, 1986; Zimmerman, 1985).

The self-efficacy beliefs of self-regulated learners make them highly motivated students, and

thus they show greater progress in a task, will put forth increased effort to learn thus will attain a

higher level of master and will persist to learn more on their own (Schunk & Zimmerman, 2008).

Self-regulated learning, academic self-efficacy, and help-seeking. Should I need help?

This is a question that students might have asked themselves many times in academic life. It is

inevitable in an academic setting the students will encounter situations in which they need aid or

advice to continue an academic task. One specific characteristic of a self-regulated learner in

such a situation is their ability to use others as a resource to cope with ambiguity and difficulty in

the learning process (Newman, 1991, 1994; Zimmerman & Martinez-Pons, 1988). The three

general types of motivational beliefs in self-regulated learning that has been proposed by Pintrich

(1999) are:

'(a) self-efficacy beliefs (that refers to ability to judge one's capabilities to do the

academic task), (b) task value beliefs (that is the belief about whether the task is

importance, valuable, and how much interest one have in the task), and (c) goal

orientations (that is, whether the students’ the focus is on mastering the task, or they just

to focus on grades or extrinsic reasons for doing the task, or relative ability in relation to

social comparisons with other students)' (p. 462).

34
 The role of self-efficacy beliefs. When students judge whether they need to ask for help

is actually judging their own capabilities. Bandura’s (1997) definition of self-efficacy refers to

people’s judgment of their capabilities to organize and successfully complete a task. Academic

self-efficacy is referred as a feature that helps students to better judge about their capability and

ability to complete their schoolwork successfully (Pintrich & Schunk. 1996; Schunk, 1991). The

significant correlation between self-efficacy and help seeking manifest in help-seeking behavior

in student (Williams & Takaku, 2011). Various research (e.g., Bouffard, Bouchard, Goulet,

Denoncourt, & Couture, 2005; Pajares, 2003, 2006; Pajares & Usher, 2008; Usher & Pajares,

2008; Zimmerman & Bandura, 1994) shows help seeking and self-efficacy belief to be a

predictor of academic success. A student with high self-efficacy in time of academic need will

show high help-seeking behavior vs. a student with low self-efficacy (Linnenbrink & Pintrich,

2003; Nelson & Ketelhut, 2008; Paulsen & Feldman, 2005; Pintrich & Zusho, 2007; Tan et al.,

2008), thus will be more successful academically.

There are other examples where the students' with high self-efficacy avoid seeking help

even in need (Madni, 2008; Ryan, Pintrich & Midgley, 2001) because of threat to ego

(Karabenick, 2003). However, as per Ryan, Gheen & Midgley, (1998) it is also factual that,

students with low self-efficacy are less likely to seek help, as they do not want others to think

their need for help is because of their lack of ability whereas, students who have self-efficacy

about their ability will ask for academic help whenever needed to overcome difficulty.

The role of task value beliefs. According to Pintrich (1999), self-regulated learning and

task value beliefs are positively related. Task value is the perceived value of a particular task as

supposed by a student. Wigfield and Eccles (2000) suggested four components of task value on

student achievement that is the value of attainment or importance, intrinsic value, utility value or

35
usefulness and cost. Attainment value or importance of the task value is referred to the perceived

value of a particular task as identified by an individual. Intrinsic value refers to the general

attitudes or liking of an individual for a particular task. Utility value is an individual’s perception

of the usefulness of the task for them. And, cost referred to the perceived consequence of the

time spent, the effort given, alterative not pursued for a given task (Zimmerman & Schunk,

2008).

From task value perceptive, students who believe that their course work is interesting,

important, and useful will readily report the use of self-regulatory strategies (Pintrich, 1999). A

self-regulated learner who has perceived the value of a given task, in difficulty will look for help

to accomplish it. Butler and Neuman (1995) found individuals in a task-focused goal condition

requested more help than individuals in a relative ability goal condition. This is because

individuals with task-focused goals desire for mastery or adaptive achievement goal (Ryan &

Pintrich, 1997).

The role of goal orientation. Goal orientation or students' personal goals is studied in

most of the researches on achievement goal theory and help seeking. Research on college

students’ help-seeking and their perceived achievement goal strategy explains two general

patterns. The two types of goals are mastery goals and performance goals. According to what

shown in studies is that the mastery goal oriented students (focus here is on learning and self-

improvement) are more likely to engage in and adopt to instrumental/autonomous help-seeking,

in comparison to performance goals orientated students (concerns about ability and social

comparisons) who would either avoid seeking help or seek expedient help (Karabenick, 1998,

2003). Adult students who own mastery goal orientation is seen to persevere in the development

of competence (Ong, 2014).

36
 Of course from the above lit looking at the different types of help-seeking behavior self-

regulated learners are obviously will go for adaptive help seeking or instrumental help seeking as

they have personal motivational reasons to achieve goals (Newman, 2002). Research on student

help seeking in learning acknowledges the adaptive role of help seeking for ages (Ames, 1983;

Nelson-LeGall, 1981, 1985; Newman, 1990; Zimmerman & Schunk, 1998). When in difficulty,

the adaptive behavior of students is to use others as a resource to receive the necessary help and

continue the learning process (Nelson-LeGall, 1985, 1990). Generally educators emphasis in

how student ask help (just a hint) to learn independently, not just getting the answer.

Threat to academic help-seeking. Several studies have established the inverse relation

of the threat to self-esteem and help seeking (Arbreton, 1993; Karabenick & Knapp, 1991;

Newman, 1990; Newman & Goldin, 1990; Newman & Schwager, 1993; Ryan et al., 1998; Ryan

& Pintrich, 1997; Shapiro, 1983). Especially among college student threat is inversely related to

instrumental help seeking (Karabenick & Knapp, 1991). When there is an implication that the

individual cannot succeed without help, and perhaps not even with help, help seeking is assumed

as to lower self-esteem. They were also lower achievers who would resist obtaining the help they

needed, thereby decreasing their chances of success (Karabenick, 2004).

How teachers and peers respond is an essential determinant of whether students seek help

or not. Research says that a teacher’s involvement is the base to students’ belief about benefit

and cost of help seeking and this belief, in turn, affect their help-seeking behavior (Newman,

2010). In addition, peer influence is seen as an important to students’ help-seeking behavior

(Newman, 2010). There can sometimes be positive and sometimes negative effect of peer

involvement in help-seeking. The process of seeking help is inherently social, students who are

concerned about their social image and are optimistic about performance will readily ask for help

37
whereas students who unsure about their abilities will feel threatened to ask for help (Ryan &

Pintrich, 1997).

Another thing that works as a threat to help seeking is poor performance. According to

the finding by Karabenick and Knapp (1988), the rate of help seeking is low among poor

performing students. Poor performance brings in negative emotions and low expectancies

leading to withdrawal from task and avoiding help seeking (Ames, 1983). Also, failure after

assistance can be thought as evidence of low ability, thus can act as a deterrent to help seeking

(Karabenick & Knapp, 1988).

Research Hypothesis. Summarizing the above literature, the factors that are identified

affecting academic help seeking are self-efficacy, task-value, goal-orientation academic

perseverance, relation with peer and faculty, social behavior. In this dissertation we will look at

the influence of self-efficacy, academic perseverance, faculty relations and social behavior on

expected academic help seeking (Figure 4) by analyzing the data collected using BCSSE. In the

last part of this dissertation we are also interested in studying the association of academic rigor

with help seeking.

As already discussed above there are several factors that affect the formation of concept

of academic rigor in students. Similarly we also saw that help seeking characteristic in students

depends on many factors. All of these factors are identified from the literature which is also

discussed above. In accordance with the literature mentioned earlier this part of the dissertation

will try to find whether data from BCSSE measuring these factors also holds similar association

of the factors with the constructs. Additionally we will also look at the association of expected

academic rigor on expected help seeking. The factors for academic rigor that will be tested are

high school type, grades, ACT/SAT score, parental education, first-generation student, high

38
school academic rigor, AP and honor classes with an additional factor of self-efficacy which was

never associated before. And for help seeking the factors are self-efficacy, academic

perseverance, teacher’s influence, social behavior. Based on this the following hypothesis will be

tested based on the proposed model in Figure 4.

• H1: High school academic rigor (HSrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H2: High school grade (hgrades) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H3: SAT/ACT score (sat_act) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H4: Advanced Placement classes completed (hapcl) has a significant positive effect

on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H5: Honor classes completed (hhonor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H6: Being a first generation student (bfirstgen) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H7: Parental education (fypardegr) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H8: Self-efficacy (SF) has a significant positive effect on the Expected college

academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H9: Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected academic help seeking (EAHS)

39
 • H10: Self efficacy beliefs (SF) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H11: Perseverance (Per) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic

help seeking (EAHS)

• H12: Relation with Faculty (FR) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H13: Social Behavior (SB) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic

help seeking (EAHS)

Figure 4. Hypothesized relationship between academic rigor and help-seeking.

Summary

This chapter presented the conceptual foundation of why it is important to understand the

change in academic rigor and help seeking in college students. The significance of steady growth

during the transition time from school to college is explained by referring several studies. The

value of academic rigor and help seeking behavior during the first year of college is explained by

40
knowing previous studies on rigor and help seeking. The factors that influence these constructs

are also explained from prior studies. It is understood that there is need to explain the untouched

areas of academic rigor and help seeking. Hence, this dissertation aims to contribute by exploring

the perspective about academic rigor and help seeking that is still needed to be studies.

41
 Chapter III: Methods

Numerous studies are there providing insight into how college students are performing

and adjusting to college life. Managing college transition is an overwhelming process that every

student passes through. Morales (2012) referred several studies (e.g., Clark & Cundiff, 2011;

Hughes, 1987; Lang, 1986, 1992) to establish that initial college experience is significant in

determining the chances of timely graduation and success. There are various degrees of both

“social and academic integration” along with “self-efficacy,” “expectancy for success” and

“strong work drives” that correlate with eventual college success (Morales, 2012, p. 91). Thus

studying these variables affecting the initial college experience is a useful way to know which of

these variables correlate with college success and the lack of which leads to attrition.

As mentioned earlier, school to college transition is seen as a significant event in the

academic life of the students. Often we come across bulletin that exhibits the complex process of

school to college transition and the anxiety that the students go through. This transition many a

time brings personal and emotional troubles, psychological problem, anxiety, and low self-

esteem leading to depression (Gerdes & Mallinckodt, 1994). The complexity arising from these

changes hampers students’ academic standing, leading them to have a staggered academic profile

or even college dropout. It is likely that the students in the freshman cohort will not have

uniform characteristics. The problem is that the colleges treat all the first year students as a

homogeneous cohort (Duggan, 2010; Kuh, 2003; Tinto, 2003), with academic policies same for

all. With a wide variety of precollege experiences ranging from high school type, social

42
experiences, economic status, to personal attributes, and then being treated homogenously; the

inevitable result is the disparity in academic standing among the students.

Thus for the need to better understand and the importance of evaluating first year

experiences of the students, BCSSE was developed as a companion survey to NSSE. Where the

purpose of BCSSE is to measure entering first-year students’ pre-college experiences and their

expectations and attitudes before starting the first college year; NSSE’s purpose is to measure the

fulfillment of the students’ expectation and their actual experiences and to infer about the

effective educational practices and assessing the level of academic challenge (Kuh, 2009) in the

postsecondary settings. The results from these instruments when studied and compared together

can characterize students as who they are and what they expect to do in college, and their

subsequent experiences in college. The arrangement of the information can be used towards

enhancing student engagement and learning by knowing the design of their precollege

orientation and their socialization experiences (Kuh, 2005, 2009).

One of the major areas of concern is freshman class’s adaptability to college academic

rigor. The lack of college readiness among high school students who will soon be joining college

(Greene & Forster, 2003; Byrd & MacDonald, 2005; Conley, 2007), has been mentioned in

many previous studies. By college readiness, the concern here is how well the students joining

college are prepared for the college academic rigor, as college preparedness has strong

association with postsecondary GPA, in other words their academic success. There are various

studies that provide theories of and insights into the general perceptions of academic rigor and its

subsequent adjustment to students’ academic life in college. But few of them have tried to

understand academic rigor from a students’ perspective. And no study has demonstrated the

contrast in students’ expected academic rigor before they join college vs. their observed

43
academic rigor in college. Also except for one, there is no prior research about factors that

influence student perception of the academic rigor of college courses.

In continuation of school to college transition and academic challenge, another important

student behavior for academic success is how the students are coping with the academic

challenge they face in college. Do the first year students ask for academic help in need? The

existing research related to help seeking have focused more on establishing the theory of help

seeking behavior, assessing the factors that influence students’ academic help seeking behavior,

the factors that are detrimental to help seeking, etc., on a generic level and only few of them

focused on college students. And among these few studies involving college students’ help

seeking behavior, none of them have assessed the effect of transition in students’ life on their

help seeking behavior by comparing their self-reported probable help seeking behavior vs. their

observable/actual help seeking behavior in college. In addition, there are no literature that

demonstrates the relationship between academic rigor and students’ help seeking behavior. All

the previous studies on academic rigor and help seeking behavior had focused on each of these

constructs individually from defining the meaning of these constructs, to forming theories, to

assessing the factors affecting the individual constructs.

Thus the purpose of this study is to holistically examine first-year college students’

experiences in regard to academic rigor and academic help seeking. A qualitative study by

Meyer et al. (2009) showed that first year students’ perceptions (which is based on the influences

from their close personal relations and media) of college academics and academic rigor prior

to/after enrolling to college vs. actual experience after the completion of first year in college was

incongruent. The aim in this study is whether a quantitative analysis using BCSSE, NSSE data

can find any difference in students’ expected academic rigor versus observed academic rigor.

44
Further, from the expectation that college will have significant effect on students’ characteristic

build up, the aim here is to see the change in first year college students’ behavior pertaining to

help seeking when they join college and their actual help seeking behavior while in college. For

both the studies, quantitative approach is considered and the comparison will be based on

analyzing Beginners College Survey of Student Engagement and National Survey of Student

Engagement. The third quantitative study is to see how well the predictors of academic rigor and

help seeking align with each other, to find out the relationship of, if any, academic rigor and help

seeking behavior.

Statement of the Problem

Increase in the number of students enrolling for college degree is good but what has to be

ensured is that they successfully complete their degree. With the increase in number of students

joining college, there are a good number of students who remain unsuccessful in obtaining a

college degree. American Institutes for Research’s study on college student attrition reported that

in a post-secondary setting about one-third of students who enter college with expectation to earn

a degree leave without one (Johnson, 2012). Among others causes, the change in academic rigor

differing from school to college, students’ behavior in dealing with the change and subsequently

their behavior in regards to academic help seeking are decisive factors for college success.

The one-third of the college students leaving colleges not only damages their career/

future, it has economic setback as well as unfinished degrees are costly for states, students, and

institutions. Unfinished degree is not only a financial burden for the student or the family; in

addition it is a financial burden for state and federal taxpayers. As per the report Finishing the

First Lap of 2010 more than $9 billion was spend from taxpayers money for educating first-year

students who will not return the following year (Johnson, 2012). A positive development now is

45
that government, educators, stakeholders have realized the need of understanding, motivating,

engaging, nurture the students’ for a successful academic experience and the result is increasing

number of surveys trying to capture experiences of college students. With such an intention,

college students’ engagement surveys like NSSE and BCSSE was developed which is widely

used in four-year institutions for collecting students self-reported data on college experiences for

review. Institutional research team of the BCSSE, NSSE participating universities do yearly

report on standards of student experience, engagement in college. Individual student responses of

BCSSE and NSSE can help the educators to understand students’ background, their expectation,

their ability, their perception and their achievement, thus the faculties can better advise the

students. This study will look at the two constructs of academic rigor and academic help seeking

with an intention to see how BCSSE and NSSE data can be used in a way that the institutions

have not done before to predict student success. In other words, this will help institutions to

predict student academic output (i.e., GPA), help with student retention, and locate at-risk

students thus enhance their undergraduate experience and help them achieve success in college.

Study Context

There are studies that worked on academic rigor and academic help seeking behavior

before but rarely BCSSE and NSSE instruments are used in explaining these particular

constructs. There is increasing number of four-year institutions that are now voluntarily

participating in BCSSE and NSSE surveys which has an extensive research base. So in this

research the aim is to involve these instruments in diverse research ideas this time in regards to

academic rigor, help seeking behavior. This study sought to find out the differences between the

students’ prediction/ perception/ anticipation and their actual/ observed understanding of

academic rigor and help-seeking behaviors after a year of college. Then identify the significant

46
factors that affect the difference in their anticipated versus observed academic rigor and help

seeking. Also, finding the relationship between predictors of academic rigor and academic help

seeking and correlation between the two if any. While finding out this, the main purpose is to get

more out of BCSSE and NSSE surveys at a southeastern university to provide the institution with

an exhaustive cross-sectional study of the first year students’ experiences.

Review of Previous Research on Academic Rigor and Academic Help-Seeking

The construct of academic rigor in this research is built upon a model proposed by

Draeger et al. (2013; 2015) who used the NSSE scale to understand student conception of

academic rigor. Draeger et al. (2015) while proposing the student model used several items from

NSSE survey. In his model “the students defined rigor in terms of workload, level of

complexity, amount of time demanded by course materials, the level of thought required, and its

value outside the classroom” (Draeger et al., 2015, p. 219). In addition to items mentioned above

in defining the construct of academic rigor by the students, added item in this study will be

academic challenge.

Students’ perception of expected academic rigor in college depends on several

factors/predictors. The factors that are observed in prior literature are parental education as “most

experts in higher education agree that students' informal interactions with faculty members have

a positive relationship to personal growth as well as academic achievement" (Halawah, 2006, p.

670) and role of media (Meyer et al., 2009). With the exception of Meyer et al. (2009) no prior

literature studied what influences the students’ perception about academic rigor in college. There

are several researches that studied about academic success in college. As academic success is

influenced by how well students’ manage college academic rigor, the factors influencing

academic success in college will be studies here to see how well it predicts students’ perception

47
of academic rigor in college along with parental education. These factors are AP and honors

courses as such courses are indicators of the quality of the academic program the high schools

offered to their students and as Mayer (2008) held that such courses are indicators of college

readiness. Other factors which are good predictor are the students’ high school performance

(grade, advanced math courses taken), high school academic rigor (Kuh, 2007) and an added

factors that will be studied is high school type. ACT/SAT score is also a good predictor as

literature says “SAT is to measure a student’s potential for academic success in college” (Kobrin

et al., 2008, p. 1) and “Prior academic achievement is often measured by……..standardized test

scores (e.g., ACT or SAT scores)” (Porchea et al., 2010, p 753).

Students’ academic help seeking behavior is a very widely studied topic. The construct of

academic help seeking may be measured by evaluating whether the students’ are making the full

use of available aid in the university. For example, did the students intended to use or used the

learning support system available in the university, did the students intended to ask or asked for

help from faculties & peers, did the students ever involved in collaborative learning. Prior studies

on help seeking mentioned all these as active help seeking behavior (Karabenick, 2003;

Mäkitalo-Siegl, Kohnle & Fischer, 2011; Newman, 2002). Prior literature has typified help

seeking behavior into several types like “instrumental help seeking”, “executive help seeking”,

“adaptive help seeking” (Nelson-LeGall, 1985, 1987; Karabenick & Knapp, 1991). As per

literature, whether students’ ask for help or not may depend upon relationship with faculty,

relationship with peer, social behavior, being a self-regulated learner, self-efficacy belief and

gender type (Butler, 1998; Karabenick, 2003; Karabenick & Knapp, 1991; Nelson-LeGall, 1985;

Newman, 2002).

48
 There are items relating to academic help seeking and academic rigor both in BCSSE as

well as in NCCE surveys. And the factors affecting the perception buildup of these constructs

among students are also present in the BCSSE survey. But there are not many researches that

used these surveys in relation to help seeking and academic rigor. Thus this study focuses on this

unexplored area with an expectation that we will understand the factors mentioned above in new

light linked to both academic rigor and academic help seeking.

Research Questions:

• What are the differences in first year college students’ anticipated versus

observed academic rigor after first year of college?

• What are the differences in first year college students’ anticipated versus

observed help seeking after first year of college?

• To what extent variables like high school type, high-school grade, act/sat score,

parental education, AP/Honors classes and the factor of high school academic rigor

influences the first year students’ to predict upcoming academic rigor in college. Also

how students’ academic help-seeking behavior in college is influenced by self-

efficacy, perseverance, faculty influence, peers influence, social behavior, in addition

to finding the relationship of college academic rigor and academic help seeking if

any.

Research Model and Research Hypotheses

Objective one and objective two. For the comparative investigation of academic rigor

predicted versus observed and academic help seeking predicted vs. actually asked, it is required

to match the rigor and help seeking items from the BCSSE and NSSE surveys. This is possible as

49
six of the ten NSSE Engagement Indicators (EIs) have similar content on the BCSSE survey,

thus the items representing rigor and help seeking matching both the surveys are sorted out. In

order to provide a better understanding of academic rigor and help seeking among college

students based on self-reported student data from BCSSE and NSSE surveys, two separate

studies were proposed. The first study evaluates the differences if any reported using BCSSE and

NCCE items representing academic rigor and the study evaluates the differences if any reported

using BCSSE and NCCE items representing help seeking behavior.

Proposed hypothesis Academic Rigor and Help-Seeking

• There is no different comparing Academic Rigor items from the BSSE and NSSE

data.

• There is no different comparing Academic Help Seeking items from the BSSE and

NSSE data.

Objective three. The second study of this dissertation proposes a model to evaluate the

relation between academic rigor and help seeking, and the relation with the cognitive and non-

cognitive factors influencing students’ perception of academic rigor, help seeking as recognized

from prior literature using the BCSSE instrument. Here only the BCSSE survey is employed to

see which factors better predict the two constructs, whether the predictors are in alignment with

prior literature or not and whether there is any relation between the two constructs. The proposed

model is depicted in Figure 5.

50
Figure 5. Proposed Model of Relation of Academic rigor and Help-seeking along with the
Factors.
Proposed hypothesis.

• H1: High school academic rigor (HSrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H2: High school grade (hgrades) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H3: SAT/ACT score (sat_act) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H4: Advanced Placement classes completed (hapcl) has a significant positive

effect on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H5: Honor classes completed (hhonor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H6: Being a first generation student (bfirstgen) has a significant positive effect on

the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

51
 • H7: Parental education (fypardegr) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H8: Self-efficacy (SF) has a significant positive effect on the Expected college

academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H9: Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) has a significant positive effect on

the Expected academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H10: Self efficacy beliefs (SF) has a significant negative effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H11: Perseverance (Per) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H12: Relation with Faculty (FR) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

• H13: Social Behavior (SB) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help seeking (EAHS)

Sampling

This research attempts to examine the difference in expected behavior of the first year

students entering college and their actual behavior during their first year of college, the sample

for this study are all entering first year students and senior students participated in the BCSSE

and NSSE surveys for the year 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. For the second research

objective of evaluating the relation between the two constructs, the sample are all the first year

students participated in 2013 to 2016 BCSSE survey. All the participants are 18 years or older.

The data is obtained from Auburn University’s Office of Institutional Research (OIR) in Auburn,

52
Alabama for the years 2013 to 2017 that collects this significant data to assess the quality of

student engagement in college.

For study one and two, the total sample size is N= 2096. Data was analyzed for all the

students who have participated both in the BCSSE and NSSE for the first two studies. For the

comparative analysis in study one and two stratified random sampling method was used, as it

requires only those data that can be matched in both BCSSE and NSSE. The sampling procedure

for the relation study, i.e. study three, followed a random sampling in which each unit in the

population had an equal probability of being selected in the sample. The proposed sample

includes all first year students participated in BCSSE surveys from the years of 2013, 2014, 2015

and 2016 which counted for a huge sample size of 17,305. Bigger sample size is associated with

more statistical power making the study more reliable. Since in the year 2012 the format of

BCSSE and NSSE was updated, data from and after 2013 was used.

Instrumentation

The BCSSE and NSSE surveys are considered as key source of information for the

institutions and the faculties to comprehensively identify the student engagement behavior in

college. As many as 465 institutes participated in BCSSE in U.S. and Canada, and NSSE

participation is more than 1,500 in four-year colleges of U.S. and Canada. Auburn University is

one of those institutions who participated in both the programs. The administration of BCSSE

takes place prior to the start of fall classes. It is newly redesigned to be paired with the

administration NSSE that happens in the spring (Cole & Dong, 2013).

For this research, designing a new survey was not considered as one of the main

objectives of this research is to see how BCSSE and NSSE surveys can be used in mining

information related to academic rigor and help seeking. Also a newly designed survey requires

53
significant amount of time to be a valid and reliable survey and get it approved by IRB.

Secondly, there are a lot of surveys already in progress in the institution and as literature

suggests that over-surveying hampers response rate (Baruch & Holtom, 2008), thus for the

optimum utilization of institutional resources data from two existing surveys was used. One

advantage of using an existing data is of the general likelihood of it consisting of large sample

size and eliminating the risk of poor data collection. Therefore, the study employs quantitative

methods to analyze the BCSSE and NSSE data collected by Auburn University’s Office of

Institutional Research. The research design for this study involves data that were collected from

the first year cohort joining the university and students after the completion of first-year who

have participated in the 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 administration of the BCSSE and

NSSE.

The BCSSE measures the incoming first-year students' precollege academic, co-

curricular experiences, along with their expectations from the college. Data collected through

BCSSE include students’ recent ‘high school academic experiences in regards to writing and

reading rigor, hours studying, learning strategies, quantitative reasoning, highest math

completed, AP courses and dual enrollment; and expectations for first year of college comprises

expected of writing and reading rigor, expected hours studying, expected collaborative learning,

expected discussions with diverse others, student-faculty interaction, academic perseverance,

expected academic difficulty, expected academic help seeking, perceived academic

preparedness, importance of campus support. College data through BCSSE include college

expectations and attitudes, like expected academic engagement, perceived academic preparation,

expected grades, academic persistence, along with other characteristics. In the NSSE, there is a

54
total of 84 items that students had to respond to. The NSSE website reports that the survey

includes questionnaire that collects information in five categories:

(1) participation in dozens of educationally purposeful activities

(2) institutional requirements and the challenging nature of coursework,

(3) perceptions of the college environment,

(4) estimates of educational and personal growth since starting college, and

(5) background and demographic information.

Both in BCSSE and NSSE there are items with the categories mentioned above that characterize

the concerned latent constructs i.e. academic rigor and help seeking.

Since BCSSE and NSSE are self-reported data one of the concerns is about the accuracy

of the responses, though Cole and Gonyes (2009) found that overall validity of self-reported test

scores to be high. Validity of BCSSE items to measure student engagement is confirmed by Cole

and Dong (2013) by doing confirmatory factor analysis of the items. NSSE surveys are also

established to have good psychometric properties along with strong face and construct validity.

Pearson coefficient for test retest reliability of all the NSSE items is measured to be .83 which

shows fair amount of stability across student responses (Administering, N. S. S. E., & Portfolio,

2005).

Data Analysis

The quantitative analysis of the first two research questions involved the comparison of

the BCSSE items of expected academic rigor/help seeking in college versus NSSE items of

observed academic rigor/help seeking in college. 8 pairs of academic rigor items are to be

compared expected vs. observed from the BCSSE and NSSE data. Similarly, five pairs of

academic help seeking items are also being compared expected vs. observed from the BCSSE

55
and NSSE data. Paired sample t-test method will be used for the statistical analysis to know

whether there exists any difference in expected versus observed Academic Rigor/ Help Seeking

BCSSE and Academic Rigor/ Help Seeking NSSE. For the proposed study, items that are present

in both BCSSE and NSSE representing the separate constructs of Academic Rigor and Help

Seeking will be used. The quantitative analysis for second objective of measuring the relation of

academic rigor and help seeking and the effect of the cognitive and non-cognitive factors

predicting academic rigor, help seeking is proposed to be done with a complex structural

equation model. No previous research suggest any link between students’ perception of academic

rigor with their help seeking behavior in college but in this study the expectation is to find that

academic rigor will have an effect on students help seeking behavior. Also another expectation is

to find clusters of cognitive and non-cognitive factors that have substantially helps in forming

expectations about college experience which is here their perception of academic rigor and help

seeking.

Variables

The BCSSE and NSSE items and first year student admission items related to the below

variables are studied. They are:

• The AP Classes/Honors Classes: Indicator of students’ academic preparation.

• The SAT/ACT score: An indicator of academic ability.

• Gender: The influence of gender on difference in behavior in regards to academic

rigor and help seeking. As well, characteristics differ with gender.

• High School Type: Students’ academic experience differs with public school, private

school, home schooling, etc., thus can be good indicator in founding perception of

academic rigor.

56
• Parents’ Educational Level: It is an important indicator as it has effect on building

students’ perception of academic rigor.

• Current Grades: Indicator of progress students have made through college career.

• High School Rigor: High school rigor and Experienced Academic Engagement items

like High school challenge, hours spend for academic purpose during high school

days, reading, assignments, writing, collaborative learning, etc.

• Expected Academic Rigor in College from BCSSE: Expected Academic Difficulty

items like expected hours of study, assignments, reading, writing, Challenging course

work, collaborative learning, etc.

• Observed Academic Rigor in College from NSSE: Observed Academic Difficulty

items like hours of study, assignments done, reading, writing, Challenging course

work.

• Expected Help seeking: Help expected to be asked from faculties, peers, need of

institutional support for academic success.

• Observed Help seeking: Help asked from faculties, peers, need of institutional

support provided for academic success.

• Self-efficacy: Self-perception items from BCSSE will be used in study for identifying

Self-regulated Learners.

• Relationship with Faculty: Items from BSCCE explaining such relationship will be

used in the study of academic help seeking.

• Perseverance: Items from BCSSE explaining the students’ behavior or certainty that

they will persist in the face of academic adversity.

57
• Social Behavior: Items from BCSSE explaining the students’ social interaction ability

or capability.

58
 Chapter IV: Results

The purpose of the present study is to examine the first-year college students’

prediction/expectation of college academic rigor before they join college and their experience of

academic rigor in college. Also, this study examines the differences in first-year college

students’ self-reported anticipated help-seeking behaviors in college before they join the college

with actual self-reported help-seeking behavior in college. The last part of the study explores a

relationship pattern to find the influence of different factors on how first-year students expect

college academic rigor to be and the influence of different factors on their anticipated help-

seeking behavior in college.

The following research questions guide this study:

1. What are the differences in first-year college students’ anticipated versus observed

academic rigor after the first year of college?

2. What are the differences in first-year college students’ anticipated versus observed

help-seeking behavior after the first year of college?

3. To what extent do variables like high high-school grade, act/sat score, parental

education, AP/Honors classes and the factor of high school academic rigor influence

the first year students’ to predict upcoming academic rigor in college? Also, how are

students’ academic help-seeking behavior in college influenced by self-efficacy,

perseverance, faculty influence, peers influence, social behavior? Also, what

relationship exists, if any, between college academic rigor and academic help-

seeking?

59
Descriptive Statistics

Table 1 presents the descriptive characteristics of the sample of students used for research

question one and two. Descriptive statistics were conducted to determine the general

characteristics of the data. Combining the BCSSE and NSSE data for the years 2013-2014, 2014-

2015, 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 into a single data file, we get a sample size of N=2096. In

which the number of males is 721 (34%) and females are 1375 (66%) who completed both the

BCSSE and NSSE surveys. Of the 2096 people in the overall sample, 1521 (72.6 %) were from

public schools, 370 (17.7%) from private religious schools, 154 (7.3%) were from private

independent schools, and 48 (2.3%) were from home schools and 2 (.1 %) were GED. The

ethnicity statistic is White 1779 (84.88%), Black or African American 137 (6.54 %), Hispanic 62

(2.96%), Asian 59 (2.81%), Multiracial 25 (1.19%), International 14 (0.67%), American Indian

or Alaska Native 7 (.33%) and unknown 13 (0.62%). Most of the student participated are full-

time students 1892 (90.27 %) and the part-time student population is 204 (9.73%). To check the

representative of the sample used in this study, a comparative analysis was done with the

University demographic data (See Table2). The comparison does not show much difference of

the sample used in this study with the total population of first-year students enrolled in 2017 in

the Southeastern University from where the data was collected. The number of male participants

in the sample is 15% less than that in the population and number of female participant is 15%

more than that of the population. The percentage of ethnic representation in the sample compared

with the population shows only 1% to 2% difference. Thus it can be said that the sample used is

representative of the population of the university.

60
Table 1 Descriptive Statistics
Descriptive Statistics of the Sample (N=2096)
Variables Frequency Percentage (%)
Gender
Female 1375 66%
Male 721 34%
Ethnicity
American Indian or Alaska
7
Native 0.33%
Asian 59 2.81%
Black or African American 137 6.54%
Hispanic or Latino 62 2.96%
White 1779 84.88%
Foreign or Nonresident alien 14 0.67%
Two or more races/ethnicities 25 1.19%
Unknown 13 0.62%
High School
Type
Public Schools 1521 72.57%
Private Religious Schools 370 17.65%
Private Independent Schools 154 7.35%
Home Schools 48 2.29%
GED 2 0.10%
Academic
Major
No Major 767 36.59%
Arts & Humanities 122 5.82%
Biological Sciences,
Agriculture, & Natural 139 6.63%
Resources
Physical Sciences,
Mathematics, & Computer 63 3.01%
Science
Social Sciences 84 4.01%
Business 156 7.44%
Communications, Media &
37 1.77%
Public Relations
Education 56 2.67%
Engineering 387 18.46%
Health Professions 266 12.69%
Social Service Professions 7 0.33%
All Other 9 0.43%
Missing 3 0.14%

61
Table 2 Sample Representativeness Statistics

Comparison of the Sample Used and Auburn Demographic data

Total First-time First Year

Sample Used
Enrollment Data
Frequency Percentage Frequency Percentage Percentage
(N=2096) (%) (%) Difference
Variables
Gender N=6086
Female 1375 66% 3103 51% 15%
Male 721 34% 2983 49% -15%
Ethnicity N=4834
American
Indian or 7 16
Alaska Native 0.33% 0.33% 0%
Asian 59 2.81% 108 2.23% 1%
Black or
African 137 233
American 6.54% 4.82% 2%
Hispanic or 62 172
Latino 2.96% 3.56% -1%
White 1779 84.88% 4087 84.55% 0%
Foreign or
Nonresident 14 67
alien 0.67% 1.39% -1%
Two or more 25 147
races/ethnicities 1.19% 3.04% -2%
Unknown 13 0.62% 4 0.08% 1%

Research Question 1

• The difference in first-year college students’ anticipated versus observed academic rigor

after the first year of college

Data from the instruments of BCSSE and NSSE taken together can describe who students

are and what they expect to do in college as well as what they subsequently experience (Kuh

2005; Kuh et al., 2005; Kuh, Kinzie, Cruce, Shoup, & Gonyea, 2006). Thus to explore the

difference between first-year students’ perceived versus observed academic rigor in college, the

62
data that is used here are collected from the incoming freshmen for the Fall semesters of 2013 to

2016 who were surveyed using BCSSE and their corresponding participation in National Survey

of Student Engagement NSSE for the years 2014-2017, enrolled in a four-year institution in the

southeastern region of the United States. As this study involves comparison of students’

experiences before and after, BCSSE data for the years 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 and matching

student profile from the NSSE data for the years of 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 are only taken

into consideration.

Though the participation in the 2013 BCSSE survey was 3693, for the comparison study

we can only use 564 students who also completed the 2014 NSSE as this particular analysis

necessitate both BCSSE and NSSE participation, and this trend is similar for the years 2014-15,

2015-16, 2016-17 where the number of NSSE participation is much lower than BCSSE. Though

all the sophomores were requested to complete the NSSE survey, one reason for higher BCSSE

participation than NSSE might be that BCSSE was usually conducted as a necessary college

entering procedure.

Table 3 Reliability Statistics Academic Rigor

Reliability Statistics
Cronbach’s Cronbach’s Alpha based on
N of Items
Alpha Standardized Items
BCSSE .760 .766 8
NSSE .444 .471 8

Internal consistency reliability was calculated for the eight items measuring academic

rigor scale both for BCSSE and NSSE (See Table 3). The coefficient of reliability which ranges

from 0 to 1 measures internal consistency of the items. The rule of thumb is that a score of .5 or

less is unacceptable, .5 to .6 is poor .6 to .7 is questionable, .7 to .8 is acceptable, .8 to .9 is good,

and greater than .9 is excellent (George & Mallery, 2003). Cronbach’s alpha of the BCSSE

63
academic rigor scale of the data set analyzed here is .760, and NSSE scale is .444. The item

deleted the table (Table 2) do not show any suggested item deletion for the NSSE scale to

increase the Cronbach’s Alpha value. Reliability value of the NSSE scale of the data used here is

low though in the NSSE publisher’s website high reliability of the items was reported. It is also

noted that the reliability coefficient is in the acceptable range for BCSSE academic rigor scale

but is unacceptable for the NSSE academic rigor scale though items in both the scales are the

same. To find the difference between anticipated versus observed academic rigor in college,

eight items (see Table 4) measuring academic rigor has been selected that are both common in

BCSSE and NSSE.

64
Table 4 Item-Total Statistics Academic Rigor

Item-Total Statistics
Cronbach’s Cronbach’s
BCSSE Academic Rigor Items Alpha if NSSE Academic Rigor Items Alpha if
Item Deleted Item Deleted
During the coming school year, how many hours do you During the coming school year, about how many
expect to spend in a typical 7-day week doing each of .753 hours do you expect to spend in a typical 7-day week .403
the following? Preparing for class doing each of the following? Preparing for Class
During the coming school year, of the time you expect During the coming school year, of the time you
to spend preparing for class in a typical 7-day week, expect to spend preparing for a class in a typical 7-
.746 .445
about how many hours were on assigned reading? day week, about how many hours were on assigned
reading?
During the coming school year, about how often do you During the coming school year, about how often do
expect to do each of the following? Prepare two or more you expect to do each of the following? Prepare two
.745 .375
drafts of a paper or assignment before turning it in or more drafts of a paper or assignment before
turning it in.
During the coming school year, about how often do you During the coming school year, about how often do
expect to do each of the following? Come to class .754 you expect to do each of the following? Come to .431
without completing readings or assignments class without completing readings or assignments
During the coming school year, about how many papers, During the coming school year, about how many
reports, or other writing tasks of the following length do papers, reports, or other writing tasks of the
.704 .410
you expect to complete? Up to 5 pages following length do you expect to complete? Up to 5
pages
During the coming school year, about how many papers, During the coming school year, about how many
reports, or other writing tasks of the following length do papers, reports, or other writing tasks of the
.689 .375
you expect to complete? Between 6 and ten pages following length do you expect to complete?
Between 6 and ten pages
During the coming school year, about how many papers, During the coming school year, about how many
reports, or other writing tasks of the following length do papers, reports, or other writing tasks of the
.708 .423
you expect to complete? 11 pages or more following length do you expect to complete? 11
pages or more
How important is it to you that your institution provides To what extent have your courses challenged you to
each of the following? A challenging academic .766 do your best work? .418
experience

65
 The total sample size is N= 2096 of the BCSSE-NSSE combined data for the year 2013-

14, 2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17. To find the difference in expected versus observed academic

rigor Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test was employment. This test is equivalent to paired sample t-

test. The data used in this study violated the assumptions required for a paired sample t-test. Thus

this non-parametric statistical test was conducted. Tables 5 below include the result of

comparing the anticipated versus observed academic rigor items using Wilcoxon Signed Ranked

Test. Also, the effect size was calculated to signify the standardized difference between two the

means.

66
Table 5 Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Help-Seeking Academic Rigor

Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Rigor

Mean Effect
Items Ranks N Z Significance
Rank Size
Item1 Hours per week: Preparing for class (studying, reading, writing, doing Negative Ranks 656a 562.62 -6.178 <.001 -.1162
homework or lab work, analyzing data, rehearsing, and other academic activities) Positive Ranks 448b 537.68
- During the coming school year, about how many hours do you expect to spend Ties 310c
in a typical 7-day week doing each of the following? Preparing for class Total 1414
Item2 Of the time you spend preparing for class in a typical 7-day week, about Negative Ranks 915a 576.89 -20.778 <.001 -.3918
how many hours are on assigned reading? - During the coming school year, of Positive Ranks 197b 461.81
the time you expect to spend preparing for class in a typical 7-day week, about Ties 294c
how many hours were on assigned reading? Total 1406
Item3 Prepared two or more drafts of a paper or assignment before turning it in - Negative Ranks 1054a 752.48 -17.444 <.001 -2.701
During the coming school year, about how often do you expect to do each of the Positive Ranks 396b 653.69
following? Prepare two or more drafts of a paper or assignment before turning it Ties 636c
in Total 2086
Item4 Come to class without completing readings or assignments - During the Negative Ranks 1393a 729.51 -30.879 <.001 -.4788
coming school year, about how often do you expect to do each of the following? Positive Ranks 94b 744.98
Come to class without completing readings or assignments Ties 593c
Total 2080
Item5 Number of written papers or reports: Up to 5 pages - During the coming Negative Ranks 1037a 664.33 -19.948 <.001 -.3549
school year, about how many papers, reports, or other writing tasks of the Positive Ranks 262b 593.28
following length do you expect to complete? Up to 5 pages Ties 281c
Total 1580
Item6 Number of written papers or reports: Between 6 and 10 pages - During the Negative Ranks 1229a 707.58 -27.358 <.001 -.4867
coming school year, about how many papers, reports, or other writing tasks of Positive Ranks 145b 517.27
the following length do you expect to complete? Between 6 and 10 pages Ties 206c
Total 1580
Item7 Number of written papers or reports: 11 pages or more - During the Negative Ranks 1169a 668.08 -27.197 <.001 -.4843
coming school year, about how many papers, reports, or other writing tasks of Positive Ranks 129b
the following length do you expect to complete? 11 pages or more Ties 279c
Total 1577
Item8 To what extent have your courses challenged you to do your best work? - Negative Ranks 180a 491.48 -23.403 <.001 -.4213
How important is it to you that your institution provides each of the following? A Positive Ranks 1039b 630.53
challenging academic experience Ties 324c
Total 1543
* = significant at p < .05 a = Academic rigor pre > Academic rigor post
b = Academic rigor pre < Academic rigor post c = Academic rigor pre = Academic rigor post

67
 The results from the Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test indicates that there is significant

difference in anticipated vs. observed academic rigor as reported by the first-year student before

joining college and after a year of college. The academic rigor item pairs’ shows that observed

academic rigor is less than anticipated academic rigor except for the academic challenge item.

For example, comparing number of hours spent preparing for class (Item 1); we found that

students spent significantly less hours preparing for class than they expected to do prior to

entering college. The Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test revealed significantly difference in Item 1

measured pre and post z = -6.178, p = <.001 with a small effect size (r = -.1162). Similarly

comparing hours spent on assigned reading (Item 2) expected Vs. observed, shows that students

reported to spend significantly less time on assigned reading than they expected to do before

joining college, this difference has a large effect size [z = -20.78, p<.001, r =-. 39]. Item 3 shows

that students reported to prepare less number of drafts compared to what they anticipated before

and the effect size is medium [z = -17.44, p<.001, r = -.27]. Students stated to come to class

without completing readings or assignments (Item 4) more than they perceived before joining

college which also has a large effect size [z = -30.88, p<.001, r = -.4788]. This item has been

reversed coded to maintain consistency in the result interpretation. For Pair 5, Pair 6 and Pair 7

we see that students expected to complete more writing task than they actually did in college,

these differences also has a large effect size of z = -19.948, p<.001, r=-.354, z = -27.358,

p<.001, r = -.486 & z = -27.197, p<.001, r = -.484 respectively. The only exception is Pair 8

which also shows a significant difference but contrary to low academic rigor in college as

reported by the other seven items. The students experienced significantly more academic

challenge in their course work than they had expected it to be academically challenging before,

with a mean difference showing large effect size [z = -23.403, p<.001, r = -.421].

68
Research Question 2

• The differences in first year college students’ anticipated versus observed help-seeking

behavior after the first year of college.

To find the difference between the anticipated versus observed academic help-seeking in

college, items measuring help-seeking, those were common both in BCSSE and NSSE were

used. Internal consistency reliability was calculated to check the internal consistency of the 5

items measuring academic help-seeking scale for the years 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-

17 from the BCSSE and NSSE data. BCSSE data for the year 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and NSSE

data for the year 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 were combined, and Cronbach’s alpha of the

academic help-seeking scale was calculated. As stated earlier, the rule of thumb is that a score of

.5 or less is unacceptable, .5 to .6 is poor .6 to .7 is questionable, .7 to .8 is acceptable, .8 to .9 is

good, and greater than .9 is excellent (George & Mallery, 2003). Cronbach’s alpha of the BCSSE

and NSSE academic rigor scale are .708 and .654. Though BCSSE scale has acceptable

Cronbach’s Alpha value, the NSSE scale has reliability coefficient which is slightly lower than

the desired level of 7 (Table 6). Results also suggested that there were no changes needed to

improve the NSSE Cronbach’s Alpha (See Table 7).

Table 6 Reliability Statistics Academic Help-Seeking

Reliability Statistics
Cronbach’s Cronbach’s Alpha based on
N of Items
Alpha Standardized Items
BCSSE .708 .741 5
NSSE .654 .652 5

69
Table 7 Item-Total Statistics Academic Help-Seeking

Item-Total Statistics
Cronbach’s Cronbach’s
BCSSE Academic Rigor Alpha if NSSE Academic Rigor Alpha if
Items Item Items Item
Deleted Deleted
During the coming school During the coming school
year, about how often do you year, about how often do you
expect to do each of the expect to do each of the
.696 .609
following? Ask another student following? Ask another
to help you understand course student to help you
material understand course material
During the coming school During the coming school
year, about how often do you year, about how often do you
expect to do each of the expect to do each of the
following? Prepare for exams .679 following? Prepare for exams .546
by discussing or working by discussing or working
through course material with through course material with
other students other students
During the coming school During the coming school
year, about how often do you year, about how often do you
expect to do each of the expect to do each of the
.69 .585
following? Work with other following? Work with other
students on course projects or students on course projects or
assignments assignments
How important is it to you that How important is it to you
your institution provides each that your institution provides
of the following? Support to .602 each of the following? .618
help students succeed Support to help students
academically succeed academically
How important is it to you that How important is it to you
your institution provides each that your institution provides
.575 .644
of the following? Learning each of the following?
support services Learning support services

The total sample size is N= 2096 in the BCSSE-NSSE combined data for the year 2013-

2014, 2014-15, 2015-16, and 2016-17. Tables 8 below include the result of items compared to

show anticipated versus observed help-seeking behavior of college students using Wilcoxon

Signed Rank Test. The effect size is also calculated to signify the standardized difference

between the two means perceived versus experienced.

70
Table 8 Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Help-Seeking Academic Help-Seeking

Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test for Academic Help-Seeking

Mean Effect
Items Ranks N Z Significance
Rank Size
Negative
Item 1 Asked another student to help you understand course material - 643a 606.44 -2.296 .022 -.0358
Ranks
During the coming school year, about how often do you expect to do each
Positive Ranks 563b 600.14
of the following? Ask another student to help you understand course
Ties 850c
material
Total 2056
Negative
Item 2 Prepared for exams by discussing or working through course 898a 652.66 -15.452 <.001 -2.431
Ranks
material with other students - During the coming school year, about how
Positive Ranks 361b 573.64
often do you expect to do each of the following? Prepare for exams by
Ties 761c
discussing or working through course material with other students
Total 2020
Negative
Item 3 Worked with other students on course projects or assignments - 866a 631.22 -15.249 <.001 -.2411
Ranks
During the coming school year, about how often do you expect to do each
Positive Ranks 349b 550.38
of the following? Work with other students on course projects or
Ties 785c
assignments
Total 2000
Negative
1235a 629.5 -21.485 <.001 -.4019
Item 4 Institutional emphasis: Providing support to help students succeed Ranks
academically - How important is it to you that your institution provides Positive Ranks 172b 784.35
each of the following? Support to help students succeed academically Ties 130c
Total 1429
Negative
1127a 629.5 -21.485 <.001 -.4019
Item 5 Institutional emphasis: Using learning support services (tutoring Ranks
services, writing center, etc.) - How important is it to you that your Positive Ranks 172b 784.35
institution provides each of the following? Learning support services Ties 130c
Total 1429
* = significant at p < .05 a = Academic rigor pre > Academic rigor post
b = Academic rigor pre < Academic rigor post c = Academic rigor pre = Academic rigor post

71
 The result of the above analysis shows a significant difference in all the five items

measuring the academic help-seeking behavior of college going students. The self-reported data

shows that anticipated versus observed help-seeking behavior of the first-year students’ differs,

the students expected to to seek more academic help during the first year of college than they

did. Help asked from other student to understand course material, exam preparations with other

student while discussing the course material, assignment and project done with other student,

support of the college to succeed academically and to use learning support system in college, all

the help-seeking items shows significantly low observed help-seeking behavior among students

than what they anticipated before joining college. The Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test revealed

significantly difference in Item 1 where the students were asked how much help they asked from

other student to understand course material. The measured pre and post difference is z = -2.296,

p = <.022 with a small effect size (r = -.0358). Similarly comparing expected vs. observed

bevarior for exam preparations with other students while discussing the course material, shows

that the students reported to have done discussion less often than they expected to do before

joining college, this difference has a large effect size [z = -15.452, p<.001, r =-2.431]. Item 3

shows that students reported to work less with other students on course projects or assignments

compared to what they anticipated before and the effect size is medium [z = -15.249, p<.001, r =

-.2411]. For items 4 and 5 measuring students view of importance of the support of the college to

succeed academically and their view about the use institutional learning support system, have

declined pre vs. post with a large effect size [z = -21.485, p<.001, r=--.4019, z = -21.485, p<.001,

r = -.4019 respectively].

72
Research Question 3

• To what extent do variables like high-school grade, act/sat score, parental education,

AP/Honors classes and the factor of high school academic rigor influence the first year

students’ to predict upcoming academic rigor in college? Also, how are students’

academic help-seeking behavior in college influenced by self-efficacy, perseverance,

faculty influence, peers influence, social behavior? Also, what relationship exists, if any,

between college academic rigor and academic help-seeking?

The third part of this study aims to uncover the relationship or potential pattern between

expected academic rigor and expected academic help-seeking in college and to find if certain

factors influence how students’ perceive college academic rigor and influences their help-

seeking behavior in college. Factors used in this study were high-school grade (hgrade), act/sat

score (sat_act), parental education(fypardeg), high school academic rigor (HSrigor), AP/Honors

classes (apcl), first-generation student(bfirstgen), self-efficacy(SF), perseverance (Per), faculty

relation (FR), social behavior (SB). The proposed model is depicted in Figure 6.

73
Figure 6. Hypothesized relationship of academic rigor and help-seeking with high-school grade
(hgrade), act/sat score (sat_act), parental education(fypardeg), high school academic rigor
(HSrigor), Advanced Placement Classes (apcl), High School Honor Classes (hhonor), first-
generation student(bfirstgen), self-efficacy(SF), perseverance (Per), faculty relation (FR), social
behavior (SB).
Based on prior literature the following hypothesis will be tested:

• H1: High school academic rigor (HSrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H2: High school grade (hgrades) has a significant positive effect on the Expected college

academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H3: SAT/ACT score (sat_act) has a significant negative effect on the Expected college

academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H4: Advanced Placement classes completed (hapcl) has a significant positive effect on

the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H5: Honor classes completed (hhonor) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

74
 • H6: Being a first-generation student (bfirstgen) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H7: Parental education (fypardegr) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

college academic rigor (ECrigor)

• H8: Self-efficacy (SF) has a significant positive effect on the Expected college academic

rigor (ECrigor)

• H9: Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) has a significant positive effect on the

Expected academic help-seeking (EAHS)

• H10: Self-efficacy beliefs (SF) has a significant negative effect on the Expected academic

help-seeking (EAHS)

• H11: Perseverance (Per) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic help-

seeking (EAHS)

• H12: Relation with Faculty (FR) has a significant positive effect on the Expected

academic help-seeking (EAHS)

• H13: Social Behavior (SB) has a significant positive effect on the Expected academic

help-seeking (EAHS)

The hypothesized model is proposing a relationship of two latent endogenous variables of

Expected College Academic Rigor (ECrigor) with Expected Academic Help-seeking (EAHS)

along with looking at the effect of several exogenous variables SB, PER, SF, FR, and HSrigor on

the latent variables. Unlike Study one and two, Study three used only the BCSSE data capturing

expectation of the incoming first-year students. The NSSE data is not considered here as NSSE

survey gathers students’ experience in college whereas the hypothesized model is about students’

expectation.

75
 BCSSE data ranging from the year 2013 to 2016 were employed in this study which had

3692, 4497, 4719 and 4397 participants respectively. With participation of more than 97% of the

incoming first-year students, BCSSE survey is a very successful instrument to obtain students’

expectation about college. Among the several items in BCSSE survey, items related to the

hypothesized model were selected. In total 45 items were selected measuring seven latent

constructs naming HSrigor, ECrigor, EAHS, SF, Per, FR, SB and there are also six directly

measured variables which are also called manifest variable like hgrades, sat_act, hapcl, fypardegr

and bfirstgen. The participants gave their opinion to the latent construct on an eight, six and four

point Likert scale. The below Table 9 shows the counts of items in each latent construct.

Table 9

Measurement Items
Constructs Items
High School Rigor 9
Expected College Rigor 8
Expected Academic Help-Seeking 7
Student-Faculty Interaction 5
Academic Perseverance 5
Academic Self-Efficacy 7
Student-Peer Interaction 2
Student Social Behavior 4
Total 45

Data Analysis

The Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analysis was run following the

recommendation of Anderson and Gerbing’s (1988), suggesting a two-step approach. The first

step was to conduct a Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). We use CFA as it specifies the

relations of the observed variables to the underlying constructs testing the degree to which the

indicators represent the constructs. The second step was to run the SEM. Here SEM was run on

data that was created by combining 4 years BCSSE data ranging from 2013 to 2016. According

76
the popularized standards SEM’s sample size requirement was very comfortably fulfilled. In

2008, Hoe’s research suggested 10 participants for every construct estimated for a SEM study.

With 45 items the required sample size was 450, thus our final sample size of 7540 was way

above the required number.

The initial data set was a combination of BCSSE data for the years 2013, 2014, 2015 and

2016 consisting of 17,305 participants. But as SEM analysis requires complete data set with no

missing data, rows with missing points were removed bringing down the sample size to 7830.

The following assumptions of multivariate normality and linearity were evaluated. The

multivariate outliers were deleted by calculating the Mahalanobis Distance which further

reduced the sample size from 7830 to 7346. To check the normality assumption both univariate

and multivariate normality of data were conducted. The range of skewness and kurtosis of the

data ranged from -.923 to + 2.018 and from -.964 to + 3.956 respectively. Most of the data did

not exceed the range of 3 except HSrigor3 with kurtosis more than +3, these items will be

closely monitored during CFA and SEM. Otherwise the data for this study were considered as

meeting univariate normality assumptions. But the multivariate assumptions seems to be not

what suggested by Bentler (2005). The c.r. value of 71.582 is much above the suggested c.r value

of >5.00 and Kurtosis of 96.823 indicates a non-normally distributed data with the violation of

multivariate normality assumption (See Table 10). Then the multicollinearity assumption was

checked to validate that the data do not have multicollinearity issues. Collinearity statistic

suggests that there is no issue as none of the tolerance value is less than 0.01 with tolerance value

range being 0.307 to 0.89555 and VIF value is greater than 10 with the range being 1.118 to

3.258.

77
Table 10

Assessment of Normality (Group Number 1)

Variable min max skew c.r kurtosis c.r.
ECrigor8 1 6 -0.229 -8.016 0.115 2.012
ECrigor7 1 6 -0.397 -13.901 -0.112 -1.963
FR5 1 4 0.504 17.632 -0.491 -8.595
SB4 1 6 -0.922 -32.276 0.33 5.775
SB2 1 6 -0.843 -29.49 0.178 3.122
SB1 1 6 -0.577 -20.2 -0.329 -5.759
HSrigor8 1 4 -0.039 -1.373 -0.834 -14.595
HSrigor7 1 4 -0.128 -4.472 -0.939 -16.424
HSrigor6 1 4 0.209 7.308 -0.666 -11.656
HSrigor5 1 6 0.845 29.58 1.096 19.167
PER5 1 6 -0.645 -22.555 -0.121 -2.109
SF7 1 6 -0.698 -24.424 0.024 0.424
HSrigor9 1 7 -0.398 -13.936 -0.046 -0.798
PER4 1 6 -0.061 -2.146 -0.564 -9.87
PER3 1 6 -0.529 -18.512 -0.221 -3.863
PER2 1 6 -0.517 -18.095 -0.401 -7.01
PER1 1 6 -0.059 -2.054 -0.414 -7.239
FR4 1 4 0.349 12.215 -0.958 -16.752
FR2 1 4 0.446 15.601 -0.475 -8.303
FR1 1 4 0.358 12.528 -0.686 -12.008
SF6 1 6 -0.587 -20.524 -0.311 -5.436
SF5 1 6 -0.848 -29.661 0.251 4.399
SF4 1 6 -0.569 -19.901 -0.265 -4.638
SF3 1 6 -0.706 -24.715 0.026 0.448
SF2 1 6 -0.617 -21.574 -0.198 -3.466
SF1 1 6 -0.644 -22.517 -0.155 -2.716
ECrigor6 1 7 1.122 39.245 2.048 35.823
ECrigor5 1 7 0.627 21.943 0.623 10.899
ECrigor4 1 7 0.519 18.173 -0.284 -4.961
ECrigor3 1 4 -0.06 -2.114 -0.77 -13.478
ECrigor2 1 8 0.941 32.917 1.134 19.845
ECrigor1 1 8 0.408 14.28 -0.06 -1.057
EAHS6 1 6 -0.826 -28.911 -0.017 -0.305
EAHS5 1 6 -1.024 -35.822 0.549 9.605
EAHS4 1 6 -0.649 -22.725 -0.296 -5.171
EAHS3 1 4 -0.2 -6.988 -0.809 -14.152
EAHS2 1 4 -0.348 -12.191 -0.636 -11.134
EAHS1 1 4 0.107 3.748 -0.964 -16.866
HSrigor4 1 8 1.346 47.102 1.984 34.715
HSrigor3 1 4 2.018 70.6 3.956 69.218
HSrigor2 1 7 1.087 38.034 1.783 31.187
HSrigor1 1 7 0.732 25.613 -0.135 -2.359
Multivariate 96.823 71.582

78
 The relation of the expected college rigor and expected college help-seeking was measured

using seven constructs and 45 variables. The means and standard deviations of all of the

constructs and items are presented in Table 11. The mean scores of all the items ranged from

1.26 to 5.13 which show variation in the responses and the standard deviations of the scores

ranged from .539 to 1.333.

Table 11

Mean and Standard Deviation of the Measurement Constructs and Items

N=7349
Constructs and Items Mean SD Constructs and Items Mean SD
Expected College Rigor (ECrigor) High School Rigor (HSrigor)
ECrigor1 4.61 1.238 HSrigor1 3.55 1.548
ECrigor2 3.31 1.115 HSrigor2 1.81 .816
ECrigor3 2.86 .785 HSrigor3 1.24 .481
ECrigor4 4.26 1.311 HSrigor4 3.01 1.241
ECrigor5 3.39 1.070 HSrigor5 2.09 .841
ECrigor6 2.54 1.033 HSrigor6 2.36 .886
ECrigor7 4.59 1.030 HSrigor7 2.82 .887
ECrigor8 3.93 1.000 HSrigor8 2.75 .861
HSrigor9 4.91 1.294
Self-Efficacy (SF) Expected Academic Help-seeking (EAHS)
SF1 4.85 1.049 EAHS1 2.87 .745
SF2 4.75 1.103 EAHS2 3.20 .692
SF3 5.00 .936 EAHS3 3.08 .717
SF4 4.68 1.112 EAHS4 4.90 1.025
SF5 5.15 .884 EAHS5 5.11 1.005
SF6 4.73 1.105 EAHS6 5.00 1.040
SF7 4.94 .981 EAHS7 2.58 1.060
Faculty Relation (FR) Perseverance (PER)
FR1 2.67 .729 PER1 4.27 1.046
FR2 2.56 .742 PER2 4.69 1.098
FR3 2.74 1.201 PER3 4.78 .991
FR4 2.73 .764 PER4 4.13 1.101
FR5 2.53 .776 PER5 5.02 .893
Social Behavior (SB)
SB1 4.58 1.220
SB2 5.05 .972
SB3 3.87 1.244
SB4 5.12 .944

79
 Cronbach’s alpha reliability test was conducted to test the internal consistency of the

indicators of each of the eight constructs. The reliability statistics show the alpha coefficients for

all five scales are above .70 (ranges from .721 to .814), suggesting that the items have acceptable

to good internal consistency. High school rigor, Expected college rigor has a slightly lower

Cronbach’s Alpha of .676 and .673 respectively, but as per the recommendation by Nunnally,

1976; Aron & Aron, 1999 Cronbach’s alpha of 0.6 is sufficient to be acceptable value for

research purpose. And based on very low Cronbach Alpha value, the constructs of Student-Peer

Interaction was dropped along with dropping item 7 from EAHS scale, item 3 from FR scale, and

item 3 from SB scale.

Table 12

Measurement Items After Items Deletion

Constructs Items Items Retained Cronbach’s Alpha
High School Rigor (HSrigor) 9 9 .676
Expected College Rigor (ECrigor) 8 8 .673
Expected Academic Help-Seeking (EAHS) 7 6 .721
Student-Faculty Interaction (FR) 5 4 .834
Academic Perseverance (Per) 5 5 .743
Academic Self Efficacy (SF) 7 7 .819
Student Social Behavior (SB) 4 3 .774
Total 45 42

Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Next step is to conduct Confirmatory Factor Analysis to test the factorial structure of the

hypothesized six factor measurement model (Figure 7). The CFA was conducted using the data

with a sample size of 7540 participants. Forty measured items were allowed to load on seven

variables dropping three items as per the reliability table 12. Based on the above result of

multivariate normality, Bollen-Stine bootstrapping method was employed instead of Maximum

Likelihood Estimation.

80
Figure 7. The hypothesized seven factor CFA model

The initial confirmatory factor analysis show factor loading ranging from .96 to .20

(Table 11). Some of the item loadings are less than .30. The general rule of thumb according to

81
Tabachnick and Fidell (2007) is factor loading above 0.71 is excellent, 0.63 very good, 0.55

good, 0.45 fair, and 0.32 poor. But in educational research any factor that loads more than 0.3

can be considered to be retained. Moreover, it is also said that following the cut-off value is an

arbitrary decision, we can find one researcher including items above a cut-off of .30 while

another researcher may include items above a higher level (Distefano, Zhu & Mindrila, 2009).

Table 13

Factor Loadings/Standardized Regression Weights Coefficients

Item Factor Loading Item Factor Loading
HSrigor1 <--- HSrigor 0.42** ECrigor1 <--- ECrigor 0.26
HSrigor2 <--- HSrigor 0.54** ECrigor2 <--- ECrigor 0.30**
HSrigor3 <--- HSrigor 0.44** ECrigor3 <--- ECrigor 0.2
HSrigor4 <--- HSrigor 0.54** ECrigor4 <--- ECrigor 0.63**
HSrigor5 <--- HSrigor 0.35** ECrigor5 <--- ECrigor 0.95**
HSrigor6 <--- HSrigor 0.39** ECrigor6 <--- ECrigor 0.79**
HSrigor7 <--- HSrigor 0.49** ECrigor7 <--- ECrigor 0.14
HSrigor8 <--- HSrigor 0.47** ECrigor8 <--- ECrigor 0.07
HSrigor9 <--- HSrigor 0.46** EAHS1 <--- EAHS 0.51**
SF1 <--- SF 0.63** EAHS2 <--- EAHS 0.63**
SF2 <--- SF 0.64** EAHS3 <--- EAHS 0.58**
SF3 <--- SF 0.80** EAHS4 <--- EAHS 0.56**
SF4 <--- SF 0.63** EAHS5 <--- EAHS 0.51**
SF5 <--- SF 0.56** EAHS6 <--- EAHS 0.61**
SF6 <--- SF 0.52** FR1 <--- FR 0.77**
SF7 <--- SF 0.65** FR2 <--- FR 0.76**
PER1 <--- PER 0.57** FR4 <--- FR 0.73**
PER2 <--- PER 0.49** FR5 <--- FR 0.73**
PER3 <--- PER 0.66** SB1 <--- SB 0.50**
PER4 <--- PER 0.67** SB2 <--- SB 0.91**
PER5 <--- PER 0.68** SB4 <--- SB 0.89**
**Significant Item Loading

The unstandardized parameter estimates and the critical ratios for all forty two items were

also significant (See Table 14) indicating strong relationship of the items with their relative latent

constructs.

82
Table 14

Unstandardized Parameter Estimates of the 40 Measurement Model

Estimate Critical
Standard Error
Items Factors (Unstandardized Ratio P
of Estimates
Estimates) (C.R.)
HSrigor1 <--- HSrigor 1
HSrigor2 <--- HSrigor 0.667 0.025 26.732 ***
HSrigor3 <--- HSrigor 0.323 0.013 24.273 ***
HSrigor4 <--- HSrigor 1.022 0.038 26.829 ***
HSrigor5 <--- HSrigor 0.442 0.021 20.857 ***
HSrigor6 <--- HSrigor 0.53 0.023 22.669 ***
HSrigor7 <--- HSrigor 0.661 0.026 25.602 ***
HSrigor8 <--- HSrigor 0.617 0.025 25.091 ***
HSrigor9 <--- HSrigor 0.9 0.036 24.721 ***
EAHS1 <--- EAHS 1
EAHS2 <--- EAHS 1.138 0.031 36.53 ***
EAHS3 <--- EAHS 1.085 0.031 34.831 ***
EAHS4 <--- EAHS 1.508 0.044 34.259 ***
EAHS5 <--- EAHS 1.348 0.042 32.31 ***
EAHS6 <--- EAHS 1.649 0.046 35.789 ***
ECrigor1 <--- ECrigor 1
ECrigor2 <--- ECrigor 1.056 0.065 16.17 ***
ECrigor3 <--- ECrigor 0.502 0.039 13.024 ***
ECrigor4 <--- ECrigor 2.692 0.134 20.159 ***
ECrigor5 <--- ECrigor 3.349 0.161 20.77 ***
ECrigor6 <--- ECrigor 2.636 0.127 20.709 ***
ECrigor7 <--- ECrigor 0.445 0.044 10.091 ***
ECrigor8 <--- ECrigor 0.206 0.039 5.233 ***
SF1 <--- SF 1
SF2 <--- SF 1.062 0.024 44.576 ***
SF3 <--- SF 1.139 0.022 52.443 ***
SF4 <--- SF 1.064 0.024 44.338 ***
SF5 <--- SF 0.757 0.019 40.587 ***
SF6 <--- SF 0.866 0.023 37.682 ***
SF7 <--- SF 0.965 0.021 45.305 ***
FR1 <--- FR 1
FR2 <--- FR 1.004 0.016 61.125 ***
FR4 <--- FR 1 0.017 59.218 ***
FR5 <--- FR 1.02 0.017 59.449 ***
PER1 <--- PER 1
PER2 <--- PER 0.912 0.028 32.873 ***
PER3 <--- PER 1.092 0.027 39.809 ***
PER4 <--- PER 1.24 0.031 40.306 ***
PER5 <--- PER 1.014 0.025 40.495 ***
SB1 <--- SB 1
SB2 <--- SB 1.457 0.033 44.042 ***
SB4 <--- SB 1.387 0.031 44.095 ***
*** P <.001

83
 Following the recommendation of Weston and Gore (2006), model fit was assessed using

the combination of several fit indices from categories like absolute fit indices and incremental fit.

There are several fit indices to assess the model’s overall goodness of fit, but the most commonly

used fit indices of Chi Square statistics (CMIN), Root Mean Squared Error of Approximation

(RMSEA), Goodness-of-fit statistic (GFI), Adjusted goodness-of-fit statistic (AGFI),

Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Incremental Fit Index (IFI), Normed Fit Indices (NFI), Tucker

Lewis Index (TLI) are used here. The Results CFA are shown in Table 13.

Table 15

Fit Indices of Initial CFA

Absolute Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit
Measurement Model
32870.656, df=798,
Chi-Square not significant at p<0.05
p<.001
Relative Chi-Square (CMIN/DF) 2~5, <5 (Bentler,1990) 41.191
RMSEA (Root Mean Square of Error
<=0.06, (Joreskog &
Estimation) with 90% Confidence .074
Sorbom,1993)
Interval
SRMR (Standardized Root Mean
<=.80 (Teo, 2012) .830
Residual)
>=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom,
Goodness-of-fit index(GFI) .796
1981)
Adjusted goodness-of-fit statistic >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom,
.769
(AGFI), 1981)

Incremental Fit Indices

Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit
Measurement Model
>=.95 (Hu &Bentler,1999) or
CFI (Comparative Fit Index) .705
>=.90, (Browne & Cudeck, 1992)
IFI (Incremental fit index) >.90 (Bentler,1990) .705
>=.95 good, .90 to .95 acceptable
NFI (Normed Fit Index) .700
(Bentler,1990)
TLI (Tucker Lewis Index) >=.90 (Marsh, Hau & Wen,2004) .676

The fit indices of the initial CFA in Table 15 above show that none of the result satisfies

the level of fit: (χ² = 32870.656, df = 798, p<.001, CMIN/DF= 41.191, RMSEA = .074, SRMR =

.830, CFI= .705, IFI=.705, NFI= .700, TLI= .676, GFI= .796, AGFI=.769). Since the χ² statistic

84
is very sensitive to sample size, it is usual to get significant χ² value for a huge sample size of

7405 (Bentler & Bonnet, 1980; Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1993; Schlermelleh-Engel, Moosbrugger, &

Muller, 2003; Vandenberg 2006). The relative chi-square CMIN/DF value is also way above the

acceptance range. But Garson (2011) showed there are four ways in which the chi-square test

may be misleading, one of which is large sample size. In such a case it is better to check other fit

indices (ex., NFI, CFI, IFI, RMSEA, GFI, and AGFI). To reach the desired fit value of NFI, CFI,

IFI, RMSEA, GFI, and AGFI, several changes were made following the modification indices

table. Items ECrigor1, ECrigor3, ECrigor7 & ECrigor8 were deleted because of poor factor

loading of .24 and .20 respectively. The other items deleted were HSrigor1, HSrigor2, HSrigor4,

EAHS4, EAHS6, and SF5. The error variances associated with these other deleted items showed

high modification index value suggesting covariance with error term of the one item with a

different construct. Further modification in the CFA was to add correlation arrow to the error

variances within the same construct following the modification table. Then the CFA was run

again. One more item was deleted which was ECrigor5 as it was loading too significantly with

value 1.04 suggesting error. The third CFA run was the final model with thirty one items for the

seven constructs nine items less than the initial forty two items model.

85
Figure 8. Final CFA model

86
 The final CFA model shows standardized factor loading within the acceptance range of

.33 to .92 (Cohen et al., 1990) for all the constructs. After the modification, the fit indices

reaches the recommended level except for χ2 (See Table 16) which was not unusual. As

discussed earlier χ2 and Relative Chi-Square value which failed to reach the desired fit level will

be ignored as we have a large sample size. The remaining fit indices showed good fit to that of

the recommended range (RMSEA = 0.042, SRMR = .0497, CFI= .927, IFI=.927, NFI= .922,

TLI= .915, GFI= .951, AGFI=.939). This indicates that the CFA model fits the data. Though NFI

value of .95 is called good fit but .926 is still can be considered as acceptable fit as it falls within

the acceptable range of .90 to .95 (Bentler, 1990). RMSEA value shows very strong fit as well as

GFI. IFI, TLI, NFI, AGFI all were above the recommended level of 0.9.

87
Table 16

Fit Indices of Modified CFA

Absolute Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
5660.495, df=398,
Chi-Square not significant at p<0.05
p<.001
Relative Chi-Square (CMIN/DF) 2~5, <5 (Bentler,1990) 14.222
RMSEA (Root Mean Square of Error
Estimation) with 90% Confidence <=0.06, (Joreskog & Sorbom,1993) .042
Interval
SRMR (Standardized Root Mean
<=.80 (Teo, 2012) .046
Residual)
Goodness-of-fit index(GFI) >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .952
Adjusted goodness-of-fit >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .939
statistic (AGFI),
Incremental Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
>=.95 (Hu &Bentler,1999) or
CFI (Comparative Fit Index) .927
>=.90,(Browne & Cudeck, 1992)
IFI (Incremental fit index) >.90 (Bentler,1990) .927
>=.95 good, .90 to .95 acceptable
NFI (Normed Fit Index) .922
(Bentler,1990)
TLI (Tucker Lewis Index) >=.90 (Marsh, Hau & Wen,2004) .915

Structural Equation Modeling

Structural Equation Modeling was performed using AMOS 19 statistical package on

BCSSE data with a sample size of 7540 collected from undergraduates at a midsized

southeastern university in U.S. The next step in this data analysis process was to run the SEM

model consisting of seven latent constructs, 30 measured items and seven other exogenous

variables i.e. high school grade (hgrades), placement classes attended in high school (hpacl),

first-generation student (bfirstgen), SAT score (SAT_ACT), parental education level (fypardegr),

and honor classes attended at high school (hhonor) all of these were represented with casual

direction. The variable of hhonor has kurtosis of 10.258 and also because of the multivariate

88
normality violation shown previously, here also Bollen-Stine bootstrapping method was

employed. The SEM model and the relation are shown below (Figure 9).

Figure 9. Hypothesized structural model

The first step here was to first check the various fit indices from various categories like

Absolute fit indices; Incremental fit indices following Hair et al.’s (2006) recommendation. The

initial results indicated poor fit for the research model as: χ² = 22996.212, df= 601, p<.001,

CMIN/DF= 38.263, SRMR= .0774, CFI= .747, IFI= .747, NFI= .742, TLI= .720, RMSEA

=.071, GFI=.881, AGFI= .860. None of the fit indices met the recommended level of acceptable

fit (See Table 17).

89
Table 17

Fit Indices of Hypothesized Model

Absolute Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
22996.212, df=601,
Chi-Square not significant at p<0.05
p<.001
Relative Chi-Square (CMIN/DF) 2~5, <5 (Bentler,1990) 38.263
RMSEA (Root Mean Square of Error
.071 with HI .072
Estimation) with 90% Confidence <=0.06, (Joreskog & Sorbom,1993)
&LO.07
Interval
SRMR (Standardized Root Mean
<=.80 (Teo, 2012) .774
Residual)
Goodness-of-fit index(GFI) >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .881
Adjusted goodness-of-fit >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .860
statistic (AGFI),
Incremental Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
>=.95 (Hu &Bentler,1999) or
CFI (Comparative Fit Index) .747
>=.90,(Browne & Cudeck, 1992)
IFI (Incremental fit index) >.90 (Bentler,1990) .747
>=.95 good, .90 to .95 acceptable
NFI (Normed Fit Index) .742
(Bentler,1990)
TLI (Tucker Lewis Index) >=.90 (Marsh, Hau & Wen,2004) .720

To meet the suggested fit value the table of regression weights was checked. Table 18

shows that all paths are significant except one (i.e., bfirstgen to ECrigor), so bfirstgen to ECrigor

path was removed. The next step was to remove all the constructs showing poor regression

weight and also opposing the theory. For example hgrade should have positive effect on ECrigor

but here the regression weight is -.063. The other changes were made following the modification

indices like correlating the error variances as suggested in the modification indices table but

these can only be done if such changes are warranted theoretically (Schreiber, Nora, Stage,

Barlow, & King, 2006). So only the items with error variances from the same construct were

correlated.

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Table 18

The Estimation for Regression Weights Suggesting First Modification

Items Constructs Estimate S.E. C.R. P Std. Regression Wgt.
ECrigor <--- HSrigor 0.213 0.023 9.424 *** 0.207
ECrigor <--- SF 0.047 0.01 4.565 *** 0.075
ECrigor <--- sat_act 0 0 -6.3 *** -0.094
ECrigor <--- hapcl 0.023 0.004 5.528 *** 0.082
ECrigor <--- hhonor -0.011 0.006 -1.98 0.048 -0.029
ECrigor <--- hgrades -0.003 0.002 -1.357 0.175 -0.02
ECrigor <--- bfirstgen -0.02 0.013 -1.554 0.12 -0.023
ECrigor <--- fypardegr 0.009 0.004 2.487 0.013 0.036
EAHS <--- ECrigor 0.029 0.009 3.309 *** 0.045
EAHS <--- SF -0.06 0.007 -9.033 *** -0.147
EAHS <--- SB 0.268 0.012 22.688 *** 0.626
EAHS <--- PER 0.13 0.009 14.339 *** 0.305
EAHS <--- FR 0.106 0.008 13.796 *** 0.232
EAHS1 <--- EAHS 1 0.357
EAHS2 <--- EAHS 1.108 0.038 29.017 *** 0.426
EAHS3 <--- EAHS 1.036 0.04 26.032 *** 0.385
EAHS5 <--- EAHS 2.359 0.091 25.881 *** 0.624
ECrigor4 <--- ECrigor 1.786 0.083 21.493 *** 0.557
ECrigor6 <--- ECrigor 1.83 0.096 19.05 *** 0.725
SF1 <--- SF 1 0.622
SF2 <--- SF 1.025 0.021 48.225 *** 0.607
SF3 <--- SF 1.14 0.025 45.904 *** 0.795
SF4 <--- SF 1.056 0.031 34.188 *** 0.619
SF6 <--- SF 0.82 0.024 33.755 *** 0.484
FR1 <--- FR 1 0.798
FR2 <--- FR 0.931 0.016 57.805 *** 0.73
FR4 <--- FR 0.897 0.025 35.931 *** 0.683
PER1 <--- PER 1 0.597
PER2 <--- PER 0.727 0.027 27.197 *** 0.413
PER3 <--- PER 1.081 0.026 41.277 *** 0.68
PER4 <--- PER 1.188 0.029 40.955 *** 0.673
SF7 <--- SF 0.997 0.023 42.817 *** 0.664
PER5 <--- PER 0.908 0.023 39.544 *** 0.634
HSrigor6 <--- HSrigor 1 0.449
HSrigor7 <--- HSrigor 1.367 0.067 20.27 *** 0.613
HSrigor8 <--- HSrigor 1.124 0.059 18.93 *** 0.519
SB1 <--- SB 1 0.509
SB2 <--- SB 1.414 0.031 45.376 *** 0.903
SB4 <--- SB 1.367 0.03 45.363 *** 0.899
FR5 <--- FR 0.988 0.026 37.388 *** 0.741
HSrigor9 <--- HSrigor 1.495 0.071 21.155 *** 0.459
ECrigor2 <--- ECrigor 1 0.367
EAHS6 <--- EAHS 2.868 0.107 26.863 *** 0.734
HSrigor5 <--- HSrigor 0.702 0.04 17.703 *** 0.332
*** P <.001

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 The revised SEM model was checked again after incorporating the changes. The revised

model shows one insignificant path see Table 19, path between ECrigor and fypardegr was

removed and the model was run again.

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Table 19

The Estimation for Regression Weights Suggesting Final Modification

Std.
Items Constructs Estimate S.E. C.R. P Regression
Wgt
ECrigor <--- HSrigor 0.23 0.023 9.952 *** 0.226
ECrigor <--- SF 0.037 0.01 3.619 *** 0.06
ECrigor <--- hapcl 0.013 0.004 3.123 0.002 0.046
ECrigor <--- fypardegr 0.002 0.004 0.44 0.66 0.006
EAHS <--- ECrigor 0.027 0.009 2.983 0.003 0.041
EAHS <--- SF -0.06 0.007 -9.04 *** -0.146
EAHS <--- SB 0.268 0.012 22.69 *** 0.626
EAHS <--- PER 0.13 0.009 14.348 *** 0.305
EAHS <--- FR 0.106 0.008 13.815 *** 0.232
EAHS1 <--- EAHS 1 0.357
EAHS2 <--- EAHS 1.108 0.038 29.019 *** 0.426
EAHS3 <--- EAHS 1.036 0.04 26.034 *** 0.385
EAHS5 <--- EAHS 2.36 0.091 25.885 *** 0.625
ECrigor4 <--- ECrigor 1.867 0.089 20.893 *** 0.576
ECrigor6 <--- ECrigor 1.798 0.096 18.822 *** 0.704
SF1 <--- SF 1 0.622
SF2 <--- SF 1.025 0.021 48.23 *** 0.607
SF3 <--- SF 1.14 0.025 45.896 *** 0.795
SF4 <--- SF 1.057 0.031 34.186 *** 0.62
SF6 <--- SF 0.82 0.024 33.756 *** 0.484
FR1 <--- FR 1 0.798
FR2 <--- FR 0.931 0.016 57.808 *** 0.73
FR4 <--- FR 0.897 0.025 35.942 *** 0.683
PER1 <--- PER 1 0.597
PER2 <--- PER 0.727 0.027 27.198 *** 0.413
PER3 <--- PER 1.081 0.026 41.277 *** 0.68
PER4 <--- PER 1.188 0.029 40.953 *** 0.673
SF7 <--- SF 0.997 0.023 42.812 *** 0.664
PER5 <--- PER 0.908 0.023 39.543 *** 0.634
HSrigor6 <--- HSrigor 1 0.449
HSrigor7 <--- HSrigor 1.362 0.067 20.358 *** 0.61
HSrigor8 <--- HSrigor 1.121 0.059 19.013 *** 0.517
SB1 <--- SB 1 0.509
SB2 <--- SB 1.414 0.031 45.379 *** 0.903
SB4 <--- SB 1.367 0.03 45.365 *** 0.899
FR5 <--- FR 0.988 0.026 37.4 *** 0.741
HSrigor9 <--- HSrigor 1.496 0.071 21.163 *** 0.46
ECrigor2 <--- ECrigor 1 0.363
EAHS6 <--- EAHS 2.869 0.107 26.865 *** 0.734
HSrigor5 <--- HSrigor 0.707 0.04 17.778 *** 0.334
*** P <.001

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The final SEM model after the final modification is below Figure 10.

Figure 10. Final Structural Model

The final SEM model looks explanatory of the relationship among the constructs. After

the second modification, the fit indices of the SEM showed that the model met the acceptable

cut-off values (except for χ²) (χ² = 6623.483, df= 433, p<001, CMIN/DF= 15.297, SRMR=

.0694, CFI= .915, IFI= .915, NFI= .910, TLI= .903, RMSEA =.044,GFI=.943, AGFI= .931).

Though CFI of .95 is desirable but 0.917 is also acceptable considering that all the other fit

indices are above .9. RMSEA is showing good fit as it is less than .05. All these results suggest

that the structural model fits the data fairly well. The fit indices value to test the models is

depicted in Table 20.

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Table 20

Fit Indices of Modified SEM

Absolute Fit Indices
Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
6623.483, df=433,
Chi-Square not significant at p<0.05
p<.001
Relative Chi-Square (CMIN/DF) 2~5, <5 (Bentler,1990) 15.297
RMSEA (Root Mean Square of
0.043 with HI .045
Error Estimation) with 90% <=0.06, (Joreskog & Sorbom,1993)
& LO .044
Confidence Interval
SRMR (Standardized Root Mean
<=.80 (Teo, 2012) .067
Residual)
Goodness-of-fit index (GFI) >=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .943
Adjusted goodness-of-fit statistic
>=.90 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1981) .931
(AGFI)

Incremental Fit Indices

Proposed
Recommended Level of Fit Measurement
Model
>=.95 (Hu &Bentler,1999) or
CFI (Comparative Fit Index) .915
>=.90,(Browne & Cudeck, 1992)
IFI (Incremental fit index) >.90 (Bentler,1990) .915
>=.95 good, .90 to .95 acceptable
NFI (Normed Fit Index) .910
(Bentler,1990)
TLI (Tucker Lewis Index) >=.90 (Marsh, Hau & Wen,2004) .903

Overall, we can say that the model had successfully predicted the complex relation

between some school factors like hapcl, high school rigor on expected college rigor (endogenous

variable) and relation of college and behavioral factors on expected help-seeking in college

(endogenous variable) along with depicting the relation between these two endogenous variable.

The estimation for regression weights of the final re-specified model (final model) is depicted in

Table 21.

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Table 21

The Estimation for Regression Weights After Final Modification

Std.
Items Constructs Estimate S.E. C.R. P Regression
Wgt
ECrigor <--- HSrigor 0.201 0.022 9.141 *** 0.19
ECrigor <--- SF 0.034 0.009 3.595 *** 0.06
ECrigor <--- Hapcl 0.01 0.004 2.564 0.01 0.05
EAHS <--- ECrigor 0.025 0.009 2.681 0.007 0.06
EAHS <--- SF -0.057 0.006 -8.989 *** -0.16
EAHS <--- SB 0.235 0.01 22.729 *** 0.55
EAHS <--- PER 0.125 0.009 14.227 *** 0.27
EAHS <--- FR 0.1 0.007 13.542 *** 0.56
EAHS1 <--- EAHS 1 0.38
EAHS2 <--- EAHS 1.111 0.039 28.68 *** 0.46
EAHS3 <--- EAHS 1.039 0.04 25.765 *** 0.43
EAHS5 <--- EAHS 2.408 0.094 25.639 *** 0.47
ECrigor4 <--- ECrigor 1.973 0.097 20.296 *** 0.58
ECrigor6 <--- ECrigor 1.965 0.111 17.752 *** 0.71
SF1 <--- SF 1 0.62
SF2 <--- SF 1.025 0.021 48.209 *** 0.6
SF3 <--- SF 1.14 0.025 45.889 *** 0.79
SF4 <--- SF 1.058 0.031 34.2 *** 0.62
SF6 <--- SF 0.82 0.024 33.767 *** 0.49
FR1 <--- FR 1 0.77
FR2 <--- FR 0.931 0.016 57.777 *** 0.71
FR4 <--- FR 0.896 0.025 35.844 *** 0.71
PER1 <--- PER 1 0.52
PER2 <--- PER 0.727 0.027 27.203 *** 0.55
PER3 <--- PER 1.081 0.026 41.267 *** 0.6
PER4 <--- PER 1.188 0.029 40.951 *** 0.68
SF7 <--- SF 0.998 0.023 42.814 *** 0.66
PER5 <--- PER 0.908 0.023 39.539 *** 0.68
HSrigor6 <--- HSrigor 1 0.44
HSrigor7 <--- HSrigor 1.383 0.07 19.842 *** 0.67
HSrigor8 <--- HSrigor 1.135 0.061 18.543 *** 0.56
SB1 <--- SB 1 0.5
SB2 <--- SB 1.185 0.026 45.76 *** 0.92
SB4 <--- SB 1.254 0.027 47.188 *** 0.88
FR5 <--- FR 0.988 0.026 37.305 *** 0.75
HSrigor9 <--- HSrigor 1.549 0.074 21.016 *** 0.42
ECrigor2 <--- ECrigor 1 0.35
ECrigor <--- HSrigor 0.201 0.022 9.141 *** 0.19
ECrigor <--- SF 0.034 0.009 3.595 *** 0.06
ECrigor <--- Hapcl 0.01 0.004 2.564 0.01 0.05
*** P <.001

The above table shows that all the paths have significant relation with the constructs.

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 Hypotheses testing results. The SEM results depicts that some of the pre-school factors

have effect on a student’s expectation of college rigor. High school rigor and hapcl, these two

preschool factors are shown to have significant effect on ECrigor. Therefore hypotheses H1, H4

were supported by the analysis. The other pre-school factors do not show any significant effect

on ECrigor, hypothesis H2, H3, H4, H6, H7 however show no significant effect of ECrigor, so

these hypothesis were rejected. Second latent variable i.e. EAHS was found to be significantly

affected by SF, SB, PER, FR. Thus, all the proposed hypotheses (H9, H10, H11 and H12)

regarding effects of SF, SB, PER, FR on EAHS were supported. SF was found to be negatively

affects EAHS. A student with high self-efficacy is less likely to seek academic help. The next

hypothesis of H8 where we were looking at the relation of the two endogenous variables was

found significant. The below Table 22 shows the results of the hypotheses tests including the

regression weights of each of the 12 significant paths.

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Table 22

Hypotheses Path Testing Results

Hypotheses Support Path Regression
Weight
H1: High school academic rigor (HSrigor) has a significant positive ECrigor<---
effect on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) Yes Hsrigor 0.19**
H2: High school grade (hgrades) has a significant positive effect on
the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) No
H3: SAT/ACT score (sat_act) has a significant negative effect on
the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) No
H4: Advanced Placement classes completed (hapcl) has a significant ECrigor<---
positive effect on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) Yes hapcl 0.05**
H5: Honor classes competed (hhonor) has a significant positive
effect on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) No
H6: Being a first-generation student (bfirstgen) has a significant
positive effect on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) No
H7: Parental education (fypardegr) has a significant positive effect
on the Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) No
H8: Self-efficacy (SF) has a significant positive effect on the ECrigor<---
Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) Yes SF 0.06**
H9: Expected college academic rigor (ECrigor) has a significant EAHS<---
positive effect on the Expected academic help-seeking (EAHS) Yes ECrigor 0.06**
H10: Self Efficacy (SF) has a significant negative effect on the EAHS<---
Expected academic rigor (ECrigor) Yes SF -0.16**
H11: Perseverance (Per) has a significant positive effect on the EAHS<---
Expected academic help-seeking (EAHS) Yes Per 0.27***
H12: Relation with Faculty (FR) has a significant positive effect on EAHS<---
the Expected academic help-seeking (EAHS) Yes FR 0.56***
H13: Social Behavior (SB) has a significant positive effect on the EAHS<---
Expected academic help-seeking (EAHS) Yes SB 0.55***
*P<.05, **P<.001

The above table depicts the regression weights representing the respective determinant’s

direct effect on the respective endogenous variable. Our endogenous variables are ECrigor and

EAHS. The direct effect of HSrigor, hapcl and SF on ECrigor are .19, .06 and .06 respectively,

meaning one full standard deviation increase in HSrigor would increase ECrigor by .19 standard

deviations keeping the other variables hapcl and SF constant. According to Cohen (1988) these

regression weights with significant paths are considered to be small to medium. The three

variables together counts for R2 of .05 which means that the HSigor, hapcl and SF jointly

accounted for only 5% of the variance in ECrigor. Though the result shows significant path but

this is not a strong relations with 5% variable. The second endogenous variable EAHS was

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established to be very significantly determined by five variables SF (β = -.163, p <.05), FR (β =

.557, p <.001), per (β = .267, p< .001), SB (β = .554, p< .001) and ECrigor (β = .06, p< .05).

Here the path strength is considered to be medium to large with the only exception of ECrigor

and the resulting R2 is .72, which means that the SF, FR, Per, SB and ECrigor jointly accounted

for 72% of the variance in EAHS.

Summary

Literatures suggest that BCSSE and NSSE surveys had been used in the past covering

varied topic on college students. But in no previous study it has been used to do a comparative

analysis of rigor and help-seeking pre and post of first-year students joining college. This

dissertation successfully shows the change in first-year college students’ perceptions and attitude

regarding academic rigor and help-seeking before they join college and after a year in college.

Also a model predicting relation of expected academic rigor and expected help-seeking is shown

in this dissertation.

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 Chapter V: Summary, Implications, and Conclusions

This study was designed to assess first-year college students’ perception of academic

rigor and help-seeking behavior in college. With quantitative analyses of the BCSSE and NSSE

data, the purpose of this study is to have a comprehensive understanding of the attitude and

behavior of the entering freshmen cohorts concerning. Also along with the study of the

discrepancy in perceived vs. actual academic rigor and help-seeking, the third part of this

dissertation aims to evaluate a more complex model showing how several school factors can

influence first-year students’ outlook about expected academic rigor in college and, in turn, how

academic rigor affects expected academic help-seeking.

Summary of the Studies

With the intent to better understand first-year students’ college experiences, three

separate hypotheses were presented with three different research questions. The sample used for

this study consisted of first-year students who participated in the BCSSE survey, and the students

participated in NSSE survey after their first year. The BCSSE and NSSE surveys are widely used

in universities, capturing students’ college experience. So, the idea here was to expand its use in

studying topics like academic rigor and help-seeking. Further, there were not many studies that

made a comparative study of the common variables present in the two instruments.

Study one was built on the qualitative research by Meyer et al. (2009) showing

incongruence in first-year students’ perceptions of the rigor of college academics and the actual

experiences of college during the first semester. The present study was a quantitative study, and

here the goals were to use BCSSE and NSSE data to see whether we get the same picture as

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portrayed in the research by Meyer et al. (2009). Study two was the same comparison study

about students’ help-seeking behavior. This study desired to explore the difference in anticipated

help-seeking vs. observed help-seeking response by the first-year students by matching the help-

seeking items from BCSSE and NSSE surveys.

The third part of this dissertation was focused on the association of expected academic

rigor with expected help-seeking in the presence of several factors. These factors have been

identified from the literature such as AP and honors courses (Adelman, 2006; Mayer, 2008), high

school academic rigor (Adelman, 2006; Kuh, 2007; Wyatt et al., 2012), ACT/SAT scores

(Porchea et al., 2010), parental education (Hertel, 2002; Meyer et al. 2009), high school type,

high school grade (GPA), gender having influence on expected academic rigor in college.

Similarly factors like self-efficacy (Linnenbrink & Pintrich, 2003; Nelson & Ketelhut, 2008;

Paulsen & Feldman, 2005; Pintrich & Zusho, 2007; Tan et al., 2008), teacher’s influence

(Newman, 2010), social behavior as seen from peer relation (Newman, 2010; Ryan & Pintrich,

1997), perseverance (Newman, 2002) were expected to influence expected academic help-

seeking in college.

The collected data was analyzed using different of statistical procedures relevant to the

research questions which is explained in the previous chapter. Findings of this study were

reported in chapter four. In this chapter, we will look at how the results can be summarized along

with discussing the findings and its implications, then we will discuss about the

recommendations for future research in this field.

Summary of the Results

To examine the first research question which finds the differences in first-year college

students’ anticipated versus observed academic rigor after the first year of college, paired sample

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t-test was employed. Items concerning academic rigor were selected from BCSSE and NSSE,

and only the items common in both were used. There were eight academic rigor items that were

found common to both. These items collected students’ responses on the degree of academic

rigor in college like number of hours they expect to spend/actually spent studying for class and

reading, number of draft they expect to prepare/actually prepared before submitting an

assignment, amount of writing assignment they expect to do/actually did consisting more than

five or 10 or more than 11 pages, also number of times they expect to come/actually came to

class unprepared and last, their expected/actual academic challenge in college.

Results indicated that there is a significant difference in anticipated vs. observed

academic rigor as reported by the first-year student before joining college and after a year of

college. The academic rigor item pairs show that observed academic rigor is less than anticipated

academic rigor except for the academic challenge item. It is interesting to see that students

reported spending significantly fewer hours preparing for class and on assigned reading. Students

also reported preparing fewer drafts of assignment and completed fewer of writing assignment

than they expected to do before joining college. Similarly, students reporting coming to class

without completing readings or assignments, but they were more academically challenged in

their course work than they had expected it to be.

Considering the above results, we can say that there is similarity to results from the

literature where students’ prediction about college and actual experience is incongruent (Meyer

et al., 2009; Smith & Wertlieb, 2005). This quantitative analysis utilizing BCSSE and NSSE

surveys echoes the results of the qualitative analysis by Meyer et al. (2009), showing that initial

perceptions of first-year students about academic rigor were higher than their actual experience.

With very limited research on this particular topic, the reason as to why the students found actual

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academic rigor to be less than expected rigor is difficult to explain. Few literatures also suggests

conflicting theory that the first-year students find it difficult to cope with college academic rigor

and many of them had to take remedial courses being not adequately prepared for the rigors of

college (Education Trust, 2001). One rationale that can be draw from the results of this study is

that the students may have overestimated about college academic rigor. Second, since freshman

year courses are mostly of an introductory level, students might not yet found it academically

rigorous enough.

To analyze the second research question, studying the differences in first-year college

students’ anticipated versus observed help-seeking behavior after the first year of college, the

same method was employed as that of the first research question, including the Wilcoxon Signed

Ranked Test. The analysis of the self-reported data about help seeing shows that anticipated vs.

observed help-seeking behavior of the first-year students’ differs. The students reported that they

expected to seek more academic help during the first year of college than they actually did.

Items demonstrating help asked from another student to understand course material, exam

preparations with another student while discussing the course material, assignment and project

done with another student, using support of the college to succeed academically and using

learning support system in college, all showed significantly lower observed help-seeking

behavior among students than what they had anticipated before joining college.

It is interesting that no previous research had shown how the help-seeking behavior

among first-year students differ when they were asked to report about their anticipated help-

seeking behavior before they join college vs. actual help asked in the first year of college. Hence

this result is an important piece of information about the how student attitude change. There

might be several reasons for the decline in academic help asked by student in college. Firstly,

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maybe the students’ were competent enough to manage the academic workload by them and

might not have felt the need to ask for academic help. We can consider this as a strong reason

considering the results from study one that students’ experience of academic rigor in college

found to be less than what they had expected before joining college. Other factors like perceived

competence (social competence and cognitive competence) and achievement goals can also be

the cause of decline in help-seeking in college among students (Ryan & Pintrich, 1997). Ryan

and Pintrich (1997) discussed that students’ were more likely to feel threatened asking for help

from their peers when they are unsure of their cognitively and socially ability, and more likely to

avoid seeking help. Also, students’ achievement goals like task focus goals, extrinsic goals, and

relative ability can be causes toward less help-seeking attitude in students. Like students taken

this survey may have fewer tasks focused goals or extrinsic goal or more relative ability which

thus resulted in a less conductive atmosphere for help-seeking.

Study three analyzed a model based on prior literature showing the relation of different

factors on expected academic rigor and help-seeking and their mutual connection. The proposed

model can be divided in two parts Expected College Rigor (ECrigor) and its related pre-college

factors like HSrigor, high school grade, SAT score, parental education, first-generation student,

self-efficacy, advanced placement and honors classes; the other part is Expected Academic Help-

seeking (EAHS) and its predictor factors like self-efficacy, social behavior, student-faculty

interaction, perseverance. These two parts are then joined together predicting a positive effect of

expected rigor on expected help-seeking.

The result of the present research contributes to the understanding of the relation of pre-

college factors on expected college rigor. Though the prediction based on literature was that

factors like high school rigor, high school grade, SAT score, parental education, first-generation

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student, self-efficacy, advanced placement and honors classes will have a direct effect on

expected academic rigor, the BCSSE data studied in this context did not confirm the effect of all

the predictor variables. The results here show only small effects of HSrigor, AP courses and self-

efficacy. These variables had a very small positive effect on expected college rigor with only 5%

of the total variance predicted by these three variables.

Another understanding from the results was about the effect of expected college rigor,

self-efficacy, social behavior, student-faculty interaction and perseverance on expected help-

seeking. These factors were seen to predict 73% of the variance in expected academic help-

seeking. Self-efficacy was shown to have a negative relation with help-seeking, meaning high

self-efficacy results to decline in help-seeking. Whereas social behavior, perseverance and

expected faculty interaction had a positive effect on help-seeking, (i.e., an increase in these

variables would result in increased help-seeking behavior among students). Although small,

expected college rigor also has a positive effect on expected help-seeking.

Conclusion

The results from these studies have important implications for administrators, faculty,

and other stakeholders interested in student experience, engagement, and success in college. The

findings in study one and two could lead administrators and faculties to consider as for why first-

year students’ reported finding less academic rigor in college than what they have expected and

also the reason for their declining help-seeking attitude in college. One concern is if the students’

misjudge academic rigor in their first year, they might not be prepared to face academic

challenges in the coming years. For example, Item 4 of the academic rigor scale showed that

students’ reported coming to class unprepared more often than they thought they would. This is a

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problematic behavior to get used to for the first-year students. The more they get used to rigor

the more they will thrive academically in the coming college years.

Declining help-seeking attitude reported in the results is also a matter of concern as the

next level of education will certainly be tougher, and when they are out of the habit of asking for

help or working with peers on projects, it will be arduous for them to manage academic work in

their sophomore and later years. Administrators and faculty members should explore the causes

for such negative attitudes like whether it is because of poor peer relations, poor faculty

interactions or it is because of poor social skill of the student. Help-seeking being a social

interaction (Ryan & Pintrich, 1997), administrators must look for those practices that can foster

positive help-seeking among college students, like increasing amount of collaborative

assignment and group projects in class.

Study three contributes to our understanding of the influence of academic rigor on help-

seeking. If a homework is challenging, students are expected to look for help from faculty, peers

and institutional learning centers. Based on this and from a literature, the expectation was with

more academic rigor there will be more help-seeking. The path from expected rigor to help-

seeking shows significant effect in the model, but it is not a very strong relationship.

Limitations

This dissertation has several limitations. One of the important limitations is that the data

used in this dissertation is self-reported data. With self-reported data, the concern is how honest

and accurate the information provided by the responders as self-reported research is often tagged

with response bias (Van de Mortel, 2008). Second, the data is collected from a single institution.

Therefore, interpretation and generalization of the results to overall population should be done

with caution. But since the sample size is huge we can still generalize the results. Third, for study

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one and two matching BCSSE and NSSE data was needed and as the response rate was low in

NSSE, so only the matching BCSSE data was used. This raises a question of convenient

sampling making the generalization of the results more difficult.

The Cronbach’s alpha value for reliability analysis of the NSSE scale was reported to be

high by the publisher of the survey, but the Cronbach’s alpha value of the academic rigor item

from NSSE in our data is not good. Thus one of the limitations of this study is the reliability

issue of the NSSE items in study one. I addressed this by analyzing individual item rather than

scales scores.

Future Studies

1. This study can be done on a more representative sample which could yield more

comprehensive results. The sample used in this study comprises only Auburn

University students, a future study could repeat this procedure on a more

representative sample consisting other state or national universities.

2. A similar study like study one can be repeated comparing students from different

departments and majors. This would be helpful to understand whether students from

particular department or major are finding their courses less rigorous. Thus faculties

and administration can plan to design courses that will enhance the academic

experience.

3. Study three can be done using NSSE data and consider other factors that might affect

academic rigor and help-seeking during the college years.

4. This study is heavily based on data from BCSSE and NSSE instruments collected

from the Office of Institutional Research. Further research can be done adding

107
 supplementary surveys along with these surveys extending the items on rigor and

help-seeking.

5. This study was a quantitative research study; however further studies employing

mixed-methods could be utilized to further contribute to the literature.

6. There must be further research on student experiences as they move through all the

levels of their college year. As Graunke and Woosley (2005) argue that college

sophomores face specific and unique challenges; additional studies will be helpful in

understanding the challenges students face as they progress through their academic

career.

108
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 Appendix A:

IRB Approal Letter from Auburn University

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 The Auburn University Institutional
Review Board has approved this
Document for use from
_______________to_______________
06/13/2017 06/12/2020
Protocol # ______________________
17-145 EX 1706
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