Examining the Relationship Between Students’ Perceived Sense of Campus Community and Satisfaction with School Life

• Published in: The College student affairs journal 2019, Vol.37 (1), p.28-38
• Main Authors: Noel-Elkins, Amelia, Forrester, Scott, Elkins, Daniel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Campuses; College Environment; College Students; Life Satisfaction; Predictor Variables; Psychological Patterns; School Culture; Sense of Community; Socialization; Stress Variables; Student College Relationship; Student Experience; Student Satisfaction
• ISSN: 0888-210X; 2381-2338; 2381-2338
• DOI: 10.1353/csj.2019.0002

Based on Boyer's (1990) principles of community, the purpose of this study was to examine how students' perceived sense of campus community contributed to explaining their satisfaction with school life. Participants were randomly selected from a student email address list obtained by the Office of Assessment at a mid-size university in the Midwest and were sent an electronic mail message inviting them to participate in the study by completing an on-line questionnaire. Three hundred and thirty students answered a 25-item sense of campus community scale developed by Cheng (2004), who had adopted some questions from Janosik's (1991) Campus Community Scale and the Brief Multidimensional Student's Life Satisfaction Scale (Zullig et al., 2005). Multiple regression used six factors from the sense of campus community scale (Teaching and Learning, Residential Experience, Diversity and Acceptance, History and Tradition, Loneliness and Stress, and Socialization Across Backgrounds) to predict satisfaction with school life. The overall regression equation was significant (F=38.20, p