The Journal of College & University Student Housing Vol. 47 No. 1 - 78

Samuel Wonson * Lori L. Moore * Pauline Wade * Dustin K. Grabsch * Kasey Martinez * Andrea M. Ogilvie

the male representation in the sample was
less than that in the population, leading to a
slight overrepresentation of females. A similar
phenomenon was seen when looking at firstgeneration status. A majority of participants
(76.34%) were legacy students (not firstgeneration college students), meaning they
were slightly overrepresented in the sample
by 2.80%. When exploring representation by
race, discrepancies were observed between the
counts of White and Asian respondents, with a
roughly 3% difference between the population
and sample. The various numbers for years
at the institution illustrated discrepancies as
large as 6% in first-year respondents and as
small as less than 1% in third-year respondents. However, the largest overrepresentation
occurred when looking at LLC participants,
with 6% more participants in the sample frequency than in the population. This means
that non-LLC participants were underrepresented in the sample.
These insights are important to keep in
mind when interpreting the results of the
study. Additionally, this comparison of the
study population to the college population
could be a useful activity for aiding college
administrators, faculty, and LLC program administrators in understanding their student
body and knowing which students participate
in their engineering-based LLCs. Of course,
there may be lurking variables not included in
the study, such as socioeconomic status or required live-on policies, that may affect students
who decide to live on campus or participate in
an LLC.

Professional Identity Analysis
When exploring the results of the professional
identity scale in regard to gender, no statistical
78

difference was seen in the means across the
various constructs. The largest difference in
the observed means was 0.07, while the smallest difference was 0.01. Because of the similar
mean scores within professional identity subscales, it is reasonable to assume that men and
women are relatively consistent in their professional identity development.
Similar to gender revealing no statistical or practical significance difference on the
professional identity constructs, no difference
was shown related to the variable of first-generation status. This result may indicate that
being a first-generation college student does
not impact a student's semblance of professional identity negatively. For housing professionals who desire to develop their students'
professional identity, this finding suggests that
there may be no need to differentiate students
by first-generation status or by gender. For instance, an engineering LLC may offer professional identity development programs for all
of their students rather than implementing
demographic-specific programming.
These insights may also have an effect on
future engineering education research. When
designing future studies, researchers may
work to confirm the result that first-generation
college student status does not affect professional identity in a pronounced way and may
consider adding variables such as those related
to socioeconomic status. Using this as a pivot
point can identify groups that are underrepresented within engineering programs.
In terms of the means of the professional
identity constructs by racial group, international students scored the highest mean in all of the
subscales, except in self-efficacy, where White
students scored the highest (M = 3.85), and in

THE JOURNAL OF COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY STUDENT HOUSING

Journal of College & University Student Housing Vol. 47 No. 1

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Journal of College & University Student Housing Vol. 47 No. 1