The Stability and Change of Friendship on College-Going Orientation: Examination of Disadvantaged Students

• In Event: 32.082 - Roundtable Session 11
  In Roundtable Session: 32.082-21 - How Social Contexts Constrain and Promote Educational Opportunities

Abstract

Drawing from social capital and social disorganization theory, this study examined the development of friendship and how it affects the change of college aspiration and decision of when to enroll college among disadvantaged students. Using longitudinal data from the College Ambition Project in a rural and a urban school, we find urban students have lower informal social connections compared to rural students in low performance school. The stability of friendship is an important context for reformulating college aspiration in an urban school, but not in a rural school. Rural students change college plan in the context of making more new friends. These results indicate, the stability and change of friendship facilitate different resources in the formation of adolescents' college-going orientation.

Authors

• I-Chien Chen, Michigan State University

• Barbara Schneider, Michigan State University

• Yi Wei, Peking University