New Life, Old Friends

Communication technologies make it possible for college freshmen to maintain their pre-college relationships, while at the same time building new relationships on campus. For American freshmen the transition to college is generally considered as a major change that involves distancing oneself from family and pre-college friends, while for Flemish freshmen the transition to college appears to be a more gradual process. Consequently, American freshmen might benefit more from using communication technologies to build new relationships, while Flemish freshmen might benefit more from using communication technologies to maintain existing relationships. This article reports the results of a cross-cultural survey study among American (N = 198) and Flemish freshmen (N = 326) at the beginning of the academic year. The results indicate that both for American and Flemish freshmen calling, texting, instant messaging and emailing more frequently with one’s pre-college friends is associated with a higher sense of belongingness to a strong and supportive social network. Communicating with new college friends, however, is only associated with an increased sense of belongingness for American freshmen.

[1]  E. Kelly.  Individualism and collectivism , 1901 .

[2]  Richard L. Daft,et al.  Organizational information requirements, media richness and structural design , 1986 .

[3]  Lee Sproull,et al.  Reducing social context cues: electronic mail in organizational communication , 1986 .

[4]  E. Trickett,et al.  Social network formation of college freshmen: Personal and environmental determinants , 1988 .

[5]  Bruce M. Smith.  The Personal Development of the Commuter Student: What is Known from the Comparisons with Resident Students? An ERIC Review , 1989 .

[6]  J. Walther,et al.  Relational communication in computer-mediated interaction , 1990 .

[7]  G. M. Johnson,et al.  An ecological perspective on the transition of new university freshmen , 1995 .

[8]  B. Ellis,et al.  Communication Networks and Perceptions of Social Support as Antecedents to College Adjustment: A Comparison between Student Commuters and Campus Residents. , 1996 .

[9]  Robert E. Kraut,et al.  Internet paradox. A social technology that reduces social involvement and psychological well-being? , 1998, The American psychologist.

[10]  Susan A. Elkins,et al.  Tinto's Separation Stage and Its Influence on First-Semester College Student Persistence , 1998 .

[11]  Robert D. Putnam,et al.  Bowling alone: the collapse and revival of American community , 2000, CSCW '00.

[12]  Katelyn Y. A. McKenna,et al.  Plan 9 From Cyberspace: The Implications of the Internet for Personality and Social Psychology , 2000 .

[13]  E. Paul,et al.  Friendsickness in the Transition to College: Precollege Predictors and College Adjustment Correlates. , 2001 .

[14]  M. McPherson,et al.  Birds of a Feather: Homophily in Social Networks , 2001 .

[15]  Louis Leung,et al.  College Student Motives for Chatting on ICQ , 2001, New Media Soc..

[16]  Jonathon N. Cummings,et al.  Internet Paradox Revisited , 2002 .

[17]  Caroline Haythornthwaite,et al.  Strong, Weak, and Latent Ties and the Impact of New Media , 2002, Inf. Soc..

[18]  Katelyn Y. A. McKenna,et al.  Relationship formation on the Internet: What's the big attraction? , 2002 .

[19]  Michael B. Duggan.  E-Mail as Social Capital and its Impact on First-Year Persistence of 4-Year College Students , 2004 .

[20]  Nancy K. Baym,et al.  Social Interactions Across Media: Interpersonal Communication on the Internet, Telephone and Face-to-Face , 2004, New Media Soc..

[21]  Virpi Oksman,et al.  Mobile Communication as a Social Stage , 2004, New Media Soc..

[22]  M. Clark.  Negotiating the Freshman Year: Challenges and Strategies Among First-Year College Students , 2005 .

[23]  Lisa S. Lee.  Young people and the Internet , 2005 .

[24]  Robert E. Kraut,et al.  Communication Technology and Friendship During the Transition From High School to College , 2006, Computers, Phones, and the Internet.

[25]  Irina Shklovski,et al.  Teenage Communication in the Instant Messaging Era , 2006, Computers, Phones, and the Internet.

[26]  Rachael Dyson,et al.  Freshmen adaptation to university life: depressive symptoms, stress, and coping. , 2006, Journal of clinical psychology.

[27]  Kenichi Ishii.  Implications of Mobility: The Uses of Personal Communication Media in Everyday Life , 2006 .

[28]  Anabel Quan-Haase,et al.  University Students' Local And Distant Social Ties: Using and integrating modes of communication on campus , 2007 .

[29]  Cliff Lampe,et al.  The Benefits of Facebook "Friends: " Social Capital and College Students' Use of Online Social Network Sites , 2007, J. Comput. Mediat. Commun..

[30]  Naomi S. Baron,et al.  Text Messaging and IM , 2007 .

[31]  B. Vilhelmson,et al.  Mobiles everywhere , 2007 .

[32]  P. Valkenburg,et al.  Preadolescents' and adolescents' online communication and their closeness to friends. , 2007, Developmental psychology.

[33]  G. Gonzales,et al.  Information Technologies , 2019, Encyclopedia of Education and Information Technologies.

[34]  Richard Emanuel,et al.  How College Students Spend Their Time Communicating , 2008 .

[35]  Yi-Fan Chen,et al.  Extending family to school life: College students' use of the mobile phone , 2009, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[36]  Oscar Westlund,et al.  New(s) functions for the mobile: a cross-cultural study , 2010, New Media Soc..

[37]  Naomi S. Baron.  Introduction to special section: mobile phones in cross-cultural context: Sweden, Estonia, the USA and Japan , 2010, New Media Soc..

[38]  Göran Bolin,et al.  Domesticating the mobile in Estonia , 2010, New Media Soc..