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Success and Self-Conception: the Impact of Academic Grades on the Student Role Identities of Black Andwhite Adolescents

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Success and Self-Conception: the Impact of Academic Grades on the Student Role Identities of Black Andwhite Adolescents DOCUMENT RESUME ED 055 140 UD 011 846 AUTHOR Murray, Ellen; Wellman, Barry TITLE Success and Self-Conception:The Impact of Academic Grades on the Student RoleIdentities of Black and White Adolescents. SPONS AGENCY Canada Council, Ottawa(Ontario).; Harvard Univ., Cambridge, Mass. Lab. of SocialRelations.; National Science Foundation, Washington,D.C.; Office of Education (DHEW), Washington, D.C. PUB DATE Jun 71 NOTE 30p.; Paper presented at theannual meeting of the American SociologicalAssociation, Denver, Colo., August 1971 EDRS PRICE MF-$0.65 HC-$3.29 DESCRIPTORS *Academic Achievement;*Adolescents; *Negro Students; Racial Attitudes; RacialDifferences; *Self Concept; Social Background; *Student Role ABSTRACT In this study the extent towhich variation In academic success is related tovariation in adolescentidentification with "student role" is examined.Particular attention is paid tohow this relationship varies amongadolescents of different races,social background levels, and schoolracial experiences. The data were collected from a 1966 survey ofninth-graders conducted in eight schools of varying racial mixturesin Pittsburgh. Self-concepts were measured by computer-based contentanalysis of "Who Am I?" responses. The authors conclude that levelof scholastic achievement is positively related to frequencyof identification with thestudent role. (Author/JW)-- SUCCESS AND SELF-CONCEPTION: THE IMPACT OF ACADEMIC GRADES ON THE STUDENT ROLE IDENTITIES OF BLACK ANDWHITE ADOLESCENTS Ellen Murray Barry Wellman Department of Sociology University of Toronto June, 1971 U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION & WELFARE OFFICE OF EDUCATION THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRO- DUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROM THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIG. INATING IT. POINTS OF VIEW OR OPIN- IONS STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDU- CATION POSITION OR POLICY. Paper to be presented at the annual meetingof the American Sociological Association; Denver, Colorado; August,1971. An examination of the extent towhich variation in academic success is related tovariation in the propensity of different subgroups of adolescents toidentify themselves in terms of occupying a "studentrole". Particular attention is paid to how this relationshipvaries among adolescents of different races, social backgroundlevels and social racial experiences. The data analyzed come from a1966 survey of ninth- graders conducted in eight scho^is ofvarying racial mixtures in Pittsburgh. Self-conceptions are measured by computer- based content analysis of "Who Am r?" responses. Level of scholastic achievement ispositively related to frequency of identificationwith the student role, although the majority of low achievers do soidentify Lhemselves. The lower rate of identification of blackswith the student role cannot be solely attributed toloaer levels of academic achieve- ment among blacks. Roughly similar rates of identificationfor high-achieving students of both racescon*.inue to appear when different social background groups anddifferent social racial compositions are considered. Low-quality performance is not associated with such uniform rates ofidentification; blacks of lower social background level seem to:)e more vulnerable to the negative feedback of bad gradesthan are high social back- ground level blacks or whites ingeneral. Blacks who are high achievers are not much influenced in theiridentifications with the student role by school racialcompositioa, but neither are the very poor students - it is thoseblacks with mediocre achieve- ment records who respondmost to the racial compositionof the school. -1 Success and Self-Conception1 A fundamental tenet of modernsociology is that indi- viduals acquire their definitionsof situations - including their definitions of themselves -through direct and indirect 2 interaction with others. In practice, the 1, there have been numerous difficulties inanalyzing exaciy what defini- tions have been acquired throuEllwhich interactions. What causes disparate self-conceptions,for example, to be adopted by individuals? One plausible factor is thatif others communicate to one that he is a successin the perfor- mance of a particularrole, he will be likely to adopt aself- conception which incorporates thatrole (see Fettig-cew, 1967). Different people may have differentcriteria of "success" or respond to it differently, however. In this paper, we shall examine the extent to which one explicit,relatively unambi- guous and rlearly communicatedindicator of success - the grades which adolescents have receivedin school - are re- lated to variation in the propensityof different subgroups of adolescents to identifythemselves as occlpying a "student role."3 We see a student role identity as apotentially salient compondent of adolescents' packagagesof "social ident-if ," the social categories, groups androles to which an individual sees himself as belonging.4 We shall be especially concernedwith how relationships vary among adolescentsof different races, social background levels, and schoolracial experiences. In so doing, we shall be going beyongdiscussing only the extent to 5 which blacks have become disengagedwith school. We shall look to see the extent to which thisdisengagement, as expressed in student role identification, isaffected by the blacks' academic success. We shall be attempting to see howvariations in self-conception are affected bythe structure of society. -2 It is usually assumed chat anindividcAal attempts to develop as favorable aself-conception as possible. We might then expect that success in arole would lead one to incor- porate it into one'sself-conception, whereas strong indicationsof poor performance in arole would often lead toexclusion of this role from a self-conception. Little research has been done to substantiate this proposition, however,and here we wish to test it and to develop otherpropositions suggesting factorswhich might modify the effect qualityof role performance has on iden- tification with that role. Some relevant prior research Those social scientists whohave specifically investigated the relationship between academicachievement an'i self-conception have tended to look at theother side of the phenomenon inwhich we are interested: the effect of self-conceptions onrole per- formance. Favorable self-conceptions havebeen iound to be posi- tively related to school achievement(see Reeder, 1955; Coopersmith, 1957; Videbeck, 1960; Coleman, etal., 1966). Brookover (1962 found that a more role-specifictv ' ..oncept of academicachievement" -is associated strongly wi.oh academic success, and Epps(1969) indicates _hat in black zhildre- this particular firm of selL:'-conceptionis the most strongly relar,1 to school grades of a -_lumberof personality variables. Under- achie-;,-ers have ben sh-Iwn to havegenerally more negative attituch_s towards themselves as s-tudents andtowards school (Barrett, 1957; Chabasol, 1959). We Aave thus accumulated aconsiderable body of evf_dence that academic self-conceptionand academic performanc are rclated to eacn other. PsychologistF have also inwestigatedthe effect of success and failure on self-evaluatiomsunder experime.ntally-man.Lpula- table Laboratory conditions. Findings in this area are ambiguous. but sorr e.investigat,-)rs have found thatindividuals will tend to 6 alter their self-evaluationsafter a success or failure. As -3 might be expected, successes usually upgradeself-evaluations and failures downgrade, although successes are morelikely than failures to change self-evaluations. In this paper, we shall be consideringthe effect of achievement on self-conception, and notthe effect of self- conception on achievement, for a number of reasons. First, we believe that there aresignificant theoretical grounds for asking how one's behavior affectsone's perception. (We bracket the point that grades are really someoneelse's percption of one's behavior). Second, the matter of temporal pririty affects our analytic scheme: in the data to be dis- cussed in this paper, the adolescentstudents knew their (eighth grade) grades before they were askedin the ninth grade to report on theirself-conceptions. However, as we are using a symmetrical measure of association, gamma,the reader is free to interpret our findings in theother direction. Some Propositions The research reviewed above gives some support tothe fundamental proposition to be tested here, thatquality of role performance (i.e. school grades) isrelated to the in- clusion or exclusion of a role (i.e.student) in one's self- conception.7 We expect that success will be more strongly related than failure to such identifications. Furthermore, if the assertions of some social scientiststhat black students tend to be less concerned than whiteswith school because they are less successful studentsis true, then the difference in commitment to school (as indicated byidentification wtth the student role) should disappear whenscholastic performance is controlled. The effects of quality of role performance onidentification with a role should not be simple inmanifestation, however. A number of considerations must be taken into accountbefore one discusses these effects: -4 Is the criterion by which performance in a role is evaluated specific and well-known? Relatively fuzzy stan- dards of success may allow one much leeway in according prominence to role in one's self-conception. The role of student in North American culture is one that has relatively precise criteria - grades - the meaning of which are known to most of its incumbents and their significantothers.
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