Page 61 - Movers, Shapers, and Everything in Between: Influencers of the International Student Experience

teaching, personal development, assessment and feedback, learning resources and academic support” (Alnawas, 2015).
The study uses a quantitative approach to explore the above research questions, drawing on the 2017 International Student Barometer8 (ISB) dataset, filtered to contain only institutions based in the UK and only undergraduate, degree-seeking international students studying full-time, on-site, who answered the sections related to this study’s research questions. Of the total student responses received in the United Kingdom in 2017 (N=35,410), applying these parameters resulted in a subset of 11,652 responses. Individual student responses and university characteristics are contained within each university; therefore, a nested model was used in analyses (Field, 2013). Twenty- five of the universities were located in England, five in Scotland, and one each in Wales and Northern Ireland. Likewise, the bulk of responses came from international students studying in England (82%), followed by Scotland (12%), Wales (5%), and Northern Ireland (1%). Demographic information on the study sample as well as the wider population of international students in the UK is presented in Table 3.1.
In addition to overall satisfaction, the ISB tracks satisfaction levels of international students across specific areas of key importance, including the learning and living experiences. Students are asked to indicate their satisfaction with a particular element of their experience on a 4-point Likert-style scale (1= very dissatisfied, 4= very satisfied) 9.
8 The ISB is a survey launched in 2005 by the International Graduate Insight Group Ltd. (i-graduate) that encompasses nearly 3 million student responses across all student types, levels and years of study including more than 30 countries and 200 institutions.
9 Overall Satisfaction was measured by student’s answer to the question: “Overall, how satisfied are you with all aspects of your experience at <University Name>?” Learning Satisfaction was measured by student’s answer to the question: “Overall, how satisfied are you with the LEARNING EXPERIENCE at this stage in the year?” Living Satisfaction was measured by student’s answer to the question: “Overall, how satisfied are you with the LIVING EXPERIENCE at this stage in the year?” Answer choices to each of these questions were: Very dissatisfied, Dissatisfied, Satisfied, and Very satisfied.
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Factors Impacting Satisfaction
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