Excerpt: Leaving Home for College: Expectations for Selective Reconstruction of Self

Karp, David, Lynda Lytle Holmstrom, and Paul S. Gray. [1998] 2005. "Leaving Home for College: Expectations for Selective Reconstruction of Self". Pp. 51-57 in Understanding Society, 2nd ed., edited by Margaret L. Andersen, Kim Logio, and Howard Taylor. Belmont, CA: Thomson Learning, Inc.

Every year, thousands of American high school students prepare to leave their homes for college. But in spite of being raised to be fervently independent, both they and their parents are ambivalent about this transition. It turns out that achieving independence in America involves complex social psychological processes pertaining to identity construction and group membership.

The students interviewed for this study were all upper-middle-class; all expected to go to college, and their parents expected nothing less. All of them "saw college as the time for discovering who they really were", as the time for abandoning past identities that they disliked and assuming new ones that they did.

Part of the identity formation process is seen in the choice these high school teens make in deciding which college to attend:

The fateful issue in the minds of the students is whether people with their identity characteristics and aspirations will be able to flourish. Consequently, it is not surprising that the most consistent and universal pattern in our data is the effort expended by students to find a school where "a person like me" will feel comfortable.

The move to college and away from family and friends affords students a "fresh start", which allows them to disregard their past labels and personal histories and forge new roles and relationships. In terms of Goffman's dramaturgical model of interaction, the students practice a calculating method of impression-management through information control (concealing undesired parts of their biographies, revealing others, and fabricating others, knowing that their new friends won't be able to fact-check).

Another common theme expressed by students during their interviews is a concern for their families' adaptation to their departure. Many students worried that, once they were gone, their families would not miss them or their rooms would be claimed by siblings; "how quickly one's bedroom is claimed by other members of the family is, for many of these students, a commentary on the fragility of their position [within the family]".

That college, specifically, is a transformative time for the identities of young adults is common knowledge. But how these students form their identities and how they consciously make sense of the processes is seemingly novel. This is a crucial topic in understanding the American social character, as our self-concept directly affects our actions, choices, and outlooks.

Relevance: 4/5 (relevant)
Salience: 4/5 (salient)

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