International Students' Use of Social Network Sites For
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INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ USE OF SOCIAL NETWORK SITES FOR COLLEGE CHOICE ACTIVITIES AND DECISION MAKING Natalia Rekhter Submitted to the faculty of the University Graduate School in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in the School of Education Indiana University June 2017 Accepted by the Graduate Faculty, Indiana University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Doctoral Dissertation Committee _______________________________________________________________ Committee Chairperson, Robin Hughes, Ph.D. _______________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Donald Hossler, Ph.D. _______________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Gary Pike, Ph.D. _______________________________________________________________ Committee Member, James Scheurich, Ph.D. _______________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Eric Wright, Ph.D. Date of Defense March 9, 2017 ii I dedicate this dissertation to my husband, Mark Rekhter, M.D., Ph.D. Thank you for always encouraging me to persist, believing in me, listening to my endless self-doubts, always finding words of reassurance, and for being by my side all the way. I also dedicate this dissertation to my sons Ilya and Misha, who inspired me by their own successes, intelligence, and dedication. iii Acknowledgements I was able to complete this dissertation research only because of the encouragement, guidance, support and care of my dissertation research advisor Dr. Donald Hossler. Dr. Hossler, thank you for your infinite patience, for challenging my views, for always inspiring me to do better and reach higher, for your suggestions, your guidance, your feedback and your trust in me. An opportunity to work with you and learn from you made a profound impact on me as a person and as a researcher. I also would like to thank Dr. Robin Hughes, my committee Chair, and members of my dissertation committee Dr. Gary Pike, Dr. James Scheurich, and Dr. Eric Wright for serving on my dissertation committee, for your critique and encouragement, for your suggestions, advices, your time dedication, and for believing in me. Thank you faculty of the Indiana University School of Education, who I have not mentioned above: Dr. Nancy Van Note Chism, Dr. Megan Palmer, and Dr. Andrea Watson for sharing your knowledge, your enthusiasm toward higher education, and for providing me with tools to conduct dissertation research. Thank you my colleague from Russian State University for Humanities, Dr. Marina Kaul, for all your assistance with the data collection. My study participants! Thank you for finding time in your busy schedules to meet with me, for sharing your stories, for your analytical views and openness. Your generosity and your thoughtfulness may help other international students to reach their goals. I am also grateful to my friends for their support and for always telling me that I can do it. And I did. iv Natalia Rekhter INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS USE OF SOCIAL NETWORK SITES FOR COLLEGE CHOICE ACTIVITIES AND DECISION MAKING What are the effective ways to attract international students to your campus? One approach is to learn how foreign students obtain information that impacts their college choice decision. This need determined the goal of this study to explore the Social Network Site (SNS) component of a foreign student’s college decision-making process. This qualitative study was conducted among undergraduate students from Russia State University for Humanities (RSUH). Participant selection was made through a questionnaire aimed to identify students who were in different stages of making a decision regarding transferring to a HEI abroad. The data analysis procedure was informed by the work of Creswell (2002) and Glaser and Strauss (1967). Participants reported that language (Russian) and convenience were among the highest motivating factors for membership in specific SNS. The benefits of SNS included opportunities for instantaneous connections with individuals of similar interests; unbiased and multidimensional views presented by SNS members. Respondents searched SNSs for information about majors, culture norms abroad, cost of education, and careers after graduation. They were applying SNS-specific criteria, such as the number of SNS’ “likes”, followers, and the ratio of followers to following, to evaluate HEIs’ worthiness. One of the emerging study findings was that participants with no connections abroad relied exclusively on SNSs for their college choice decisions. These individuals acknowledged that without SNSs they would not consider an opportunity to transfer to an HEI abroad, as they had no channels for obtaining such information. For participants with connections abroad, the v advice of their international contacts played a major role in their college choice and SNSs played a supportive role. Limitations related to the use of SNS included dearth of current research, minimal control over content posted by third parties, time constraints related to mastering SNS features and maintaining a meaningful content. Recommendations for overcoming these obstacles and strengthening HEI professionals’ connections with international students include developing fluency and expertise in different features of various SNSs or hiring individuals with proven expertise in SNS; creating consistent and meaningful content on various SNS platforms, and conducting more research about the use of SNS by international students. _______________________________________________________________________ Committee Chairperson, Robin Hughes, Ph.D. _______________________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Donald Hossler, Ph.D. ________________________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Gary Pike, Ph.D. ________________________________________________________________________ Committee Member, James Scheurich, Ph.D. ________________________________________________________________________ Committee Member, Eric Wright, Ph.D. vi Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1 Background ............................................................................................................................... 1 Problem Statement.................................................................................................................... 3 Purpose of Study, Goal of Study, and Research Questions................................................... 5 Organization of the Dissertation.............................................................................................. 6 Chapter 2: Literature Review ...................................................................................................... 8 Disclosure ................................................................................................................................... 8 Part I. College Choice Model ................................................................................................... 8 Part II. International Students ............................................................................................. 12 Part III. Transfer Students from Russia.............................................................................. 15 Part IV. Social Network Sites: Introduction ....................................................................... 19 History of social network sites and connections with higher education. ....................... 21 Part V. SNSs: Opportunities for Students’ Recruitment: History of SNS Use for Admission Practices ................................................................................................................ 26 SNS opportunities and benefits.......................................................................................... 28 Part VI. SNSs: Concerns and Barriers ................................................................................ 32 Part VII. Prevalence of SNSs in World Regions ................................................................. 36 SNSs and diversity of IPR within different regions. ........................................................ 38 Use of Social Network Sites in Russia ................................................................................... 41 Chapter Summary .................................................................................................................. 44 Chapter 3: Methodology............................................................................................................. 45 Research Design ...................................................................................................................... 47 Pilot Study................................................................................................................................ 48 Analysis and Results ............................................................................................................... 51 Current Study.......................................................................................................................... 54 Data Analysis ........................................................................................................................... 57 Summary .................................................................................................................................