When first-year students begin college they are thrown into a new environment where they are expected to simultaneously perform academically, form new relationships, and become independent. Many students struggle with this transition; experiences of stress, anxiety, and depression are common. For the majority of residential college students this is their first time living away from their family homes. The wealth of digital communication technologies available today allows students to stay in touch with their families at a frequency that was not historically possible. I examined the relationship between students’ college adjustment and frequent family communication. I recruited new college students to participate in a longitudinal study during their first year on campus. I built and deployed a custom mobile application to collect communication log data directly from participants’ phones during three one-week data collection periods, one during each quarter of the academic year. Participants then completed personalized surveys to provide contextual information to augment the logged data and participated in follow-up interviews. Results indicated that participants’ college adjustment increased at the start of their time on campus then remained relatively stable throughout the remainder of their first year, while the challenging situations that they faced evolved. Further, participants frequently communicated with their families, often in routine and regular ways, which can be considered as family rituals. The findings did not provide a conclusive answer to the question of how frequent family communication is related to students’ college adjustment. Conversation analysis showed that students were receiving social support from their families, suggesting a potential buffering effect.

Creator

• Smith, Madeline E

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-jj13-j923

Subject

• Computer science
• Communication

Language

• en

Alternate Identifier

• http://dissertations.umi.com/northwestern:15524
• etdadmin_upload_814670

Date created

• 2021-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright