Disrupting Academic Gatekeeping: Impostor Phenomenon and First-Generation Student Success

• In Event: Sociology of Education Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 12. Underserved and First-Generation College Student Experiences

Abstract

This paper reconceptualizes impostor phenomenon among first-generation college students as a structurally produced experience rather than an individual psychological deficit. While existing scholarship frequently frames impostor feelings as issues of confidence, resilience, or self-efficacy, this analysis situates those experiences within institutional systems that privilege dominant forms of cultural capital. Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital and habitus, as well as Tinto’s model of student integration, the paper argues that higher education functions as a gatekeeping structure in which implicit norms regarding academic language, professionalism, and faculty engagement advantage students already familiar with institutional expectations.

First-generation students often navigate these environments without inherited academic capital, producing misalignment that is internalized as personal inadequacy. Rather than reflecting individual insecurity, impostor feelings may represent rational responses to opaque institutional design. By reframing impostor phenomenon as institutional gatekeeping, this paper shifts responsibility from student adaptation to structural accountability. In alignment with the 2026 ASA theme, “Disrupting the Status Quo,” this analysis demonstrates how sociological theory can illuminate mechanisms of inequality and inform more equitable approaches to higher education.

Authors

• Stephanie L. Compton, Grambling State University

• Jadyn Bradley, University of Louisiana at Monroe