Determining the Causal Effects and Moderating Role of Social Comparison Among Hispanic Undergraduate Students at a Minority Serving University

Authors

Anisa Halperin
Juliana Arguello
Alena Raya
Isabella Castellanos

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

2024

Abstract

People naturally compare themselves to one another across a variety of personal, academic, and career settings. Regarding academics, social comparison research involving Hispanic students focuses heavily on white majority-serving universities. However, these findings may not apply to Hispanic majority universities, where Hispanic students are part of an in group. When accessible social comparators are in-group members, social comparison may look different. In our experiment, undergraduate student participants listed how their academic achievements were similar/or different from a target. We manipulated 2 (Gender: man, woman) x 2 (In-Group/Out-Group: White, Hispanic) x 2 (Direction of comparison: upward, downward) x 2 (Type of comparison: identification or contrast) X 2 (Personal comparison orientation: upward identification, downward assimilation). Experimental results will demonstrate how social comparison processes affect Hispanic undergraduate student outcomes. Moreover, this study may pinpoint the role of social comparison in determining the outcomes based on one’s own typical social comparison strategy.

Comments

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Recommended Citation

Halperin, Anisa; Arguello, Juliana; Raya, Alena; and Castellanos, Isabella, "Determining the Causal Effects and Moderating Role of Social Comparison Among Hispanic Undergraduate Students at a Minority Serving University" (2024). Student Research Symposium 2024. 38.
https://digitalcommons.tamusa.edu/srs_2024/38