Abstract

Research on social class in higher education indicates that students with a lower social class background are less integrated in the university setting (Rubin, 2012), have
poorer academic outcomes (e.g., Walpole, 2003), and lower expectations of social mobility (Jetten et al., 2008). The novelty of the present research is that students’ social
class background was conceptualized in terms of a collective identity (Ashmore et al., 2004) that may have beneficial consequences. The present research demonstrated that university students’ social class background is a meaningful aspect of the self involving attachment (a sense of belonging to one’s class background), private regard(feeling good about one’s class background), and public regard (perceptions of how much others value one’s class background). On the basis of attachment theory (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007), it was theorized that students’ attachment to their social class background is a psychological resource that promotes exploration and success, which would be reflected in their greater integration in the university milieu and their greater expectations of upward class mobility via their studies. As expected, in Study 1(N = 959), working and middle class students’ greater attachment to their class background was associated with greater belonging in the student community as well as with greater expectations of upward mobility. Attachment to one’s class background was distinct from private and public regard for one’s class background, as well as from attachment to parents and friends, and from perceived support from parents. In Studies 2 and 3 (total N = 298), the salience of attachment to and private regard for one’s class background were manipulated. As expected, students in the attachment condition reported greater expectations of mobility relative to students in the private regard condition. The findings
are discussed with regards to prior research on social class, the social identity model of identity change, and the origins of attachment to one’s social class background.