Perceived Stigma and Accessing Higher Education Among First Year College Students in Rural Communities

Background: Research suggests that access to higher education by persons residing in rural locations in the United States is a challenge for many people when maintaining a socially stigmatized identity (SSI). An SSI refers to an identity that the social majority maintains a negative social attitude toward in regards to an individual or group as a result of a perceived mental, physical, or social deficiency. The purpose of this research is to better understand the relationship between Perceived Stigma (PS) and accessing higher education among first year college students who resided within rural communities prior to attending college.

Methods: Logistic regression was used to conduct analyses of data from first year college students attending a university located in the southern United States, which resulted in an analytic sample of n = 193 after assessing for rural placement and missing data. Access to higher education was assessed by examining parental support (PST), secondary education academic preparation (AP) and secondary education college application support (AS). PS was developed using nine indicators of perceived inclusiveness using correlation matrices and factor analyses, while stigmatized identity was developed from self-reported identities of race, sexual orientation, religion, sex and socioeconomic status (SES). After developing PS, logistic regression was used to assess the relationship between SSI and access to higher education at the identified categories, while comparison groups were developed from persons not claiming specific stigmatized identities (n = 47). Interactions between stigmatized identities were not assessed in this research.

Results: Correlation matrices indicated high correlation among all nine perceived community inclusiveness items (r ≥ .70 for all measurements), and factor analyses indicated that all nine items factored together (Factor Loading ≥ 0.50). As a result, the composite variable of PS was created taking the average of these items (Chronbach’s α =.67), where higher scores indicated increased perceived stigma.

Logistic regression results indicated that compared to persons not maintaining an SSI, persons maintaining a SSI experienced different probabilities of PS when accessing higher education at the identified stages. Persons reporting the highest rates of PS were of the LGBTQ+ community when accessing PST (OR = 3.51; 95% CI: 7.58, 1.23) or AS (OR = 2.24; 95% CI: 7.09, 0.91). Persons of Color and persons experiencing low SES report similar probabilities of increased PS when seeking support from parents and secondary education academic preparation, however Persons of Color report higher probabilities of PS when seeking AS. Results also indicated that female participants reported less PS when accessing higher education (PS [OR = -0.93; 95% CI: 5.16, -4.51]); AP [OR = -2.72; 95% CI: 0.23, 6.91]); AS [OR = -1.63; 95% CI: 1.03, -7.22]).

Implications: These results suggest that persons who maintain stigmatized identities experience social stigma at varied severity and that PS is correlated with accessing higher education. Implications for practice, future research and policy are discussed.