Page 68 - Movers, Shapers, and Everything in Between: Influencers of the International Student Experience

Chapter 3
perspective helps explain the positive correlation between university reputation and student experience. For example, it could be that universities with more prestigious reputations have more resources to offer to students—i.e., more faculty and smaller class sizes—which then leads to higher satisfaction. Research indicates that students gravitate toward highly ranked institutions at least in part due to a perceived resource advantage (Brewer, Gates, & Goldman, 2001; Volkwein & Sweitzer, 2006). Indeed, it could be an abundance of resources that allows that university to enjoy a high reputation in the first place, as many rankings/league tables take this into account in the methodology.
Proportion of International Students
Results suggest that in instances where the proportion of international students decreases, satisfaction of international students increases. Universities must consider the factors that may mediate the relationship between proportion of international students and satisfaction, such as friendships with domestic students (Ward & Kennedy, 1993b) and sense of belonging, defined as “the feeling of being a member of one or more communities at university and feeling support for being present at the university” (Tinto, 1975), which is a key part of sojourner adjustment (Severiens & Wolff, 2008; Rienties et al., 2012). The COVID-19 pandemic may affect this apparent relationship, as it has given rise to increased online learning options (Tandy 2020), social distancing measures (Scott, 2020; Kim & Maloney, 2020), xenophobia (Brewis, Wutich, & Mahdavi, 2020; Human Rights Watch, 2020) and stigmatization (Yellow Horse & Leong, 2020)—all of which may ostensibly lead to decreased in-person interaction with peers.
66
Stage of Study
First year students were found to have higher mean satisfaction with their experience than students in their middle and last years. This could indicate a potential honeymoon effect, in which students’ perceptions of their experience start out positive and become increasingly critical as time passes. Previous research has shown that international students’ attitudes toward domestic students began as positive and