The Structure of Social Networks and Its Link to Higher Education Students’ Socio-Emotional Loneliness During COVID-19

Abstract

Lonely students typically underperform academically. According to several studies, the COVID-19 pandemic is an important risk factor for increases in loneliness, as the contact restrictions and the switch to mainly online classes potentially burden the students. The previously familiar academic environment (campus), as well as the exchange with peers and lecturers on site, were no longer made available. In our cross-sectional study, we examine factors that could potentially counteract the development of higher education student loneliness during the COVID-19 pandemic from a social network perspective. During the semester, N = 283 students from across all institutional faculties of a German comprehensive university took part in an online survey. We surveyed their social and emotional experiences of loneliness, their self-reported digital information-sharing behavior, and their current egocentric networks. Here, we distinguished between close online contacts (i.e., mainly online exchanges) and close offline contacts (i.e., mainly in-person face-to-face exchanges). In addition, we derived the interconnectedness (i.e., the densities of the egocentric networks) and heterogeneity (operationalized with the entropy) of students’ contacts. To obtain the latter, we used a novel two-step method combining t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding (t-SNE) and cluster analysis. We explored the associations of the aforementioned predictors (i.e., information-sharing behavior, number of online and offline contacts, as well as interconnectedness and heterogeneity of the close contacts network) on social and emotional loneliness separately using two hierarchical multiple linear regression models. Our results suggest that social loneliness is strongly related to digital information-sharing behavior and the network structure of close contacts. In particular, high information-sharing behavior, high number of close contacts (whether offline or online), a highly interconnected network, and a homogeneous structure of close contacts were associated with low social loneliness. Emotional loneliness, on the other hand, was mainly related to network homogeneity, in the sense that students with homogeneous close contacts networks experienced low emotional loneliness. Overall, our study highlights the central role of students’ close social network on feelings of loneliness in the context of COVID-19 restrictions. Limitations and implications are discussed.

Stress development during emergency remote teaching in higher education

“…More cautious use of communication tools (e.g., webcams – Bedenlier et al, 2021 ), which might be associated with the feeling of higher loneliness, is a frequent point of criticism in connection with e-learning, already before ERT ( Jiménez et al, 2018 ; Rajabalee et al, 2020 ). Since these criticisms of e-learning have become even more pronounced in the context of ERT, it must be assumed that students will experience the semester in which face-to-face teaching has been completely substituted by e-learning in a significantly different way than in previous semesters ( Bedenlier et al, 2021 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ). Existing research in Germany, however, has so far produced inconsistent findings with respect to students stress experience ( Goppert & Pfost, 2021 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ; Voltmer et al, 2021 ).…”

“…Since these criticisms of e-learning have become even more pronounced in the context of ERT, it must be assumed that students will experience the semester in which face-to-face teaching has been completely substituted by e-learning in a significantly different way than in previous semesters ( Bedenlier et al, 2021 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ). Existing research in Germany, however, has so far produced inconsistent findings with respect to students stress experience ( Goppert & Pfost, 2021 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ; Voltmer et al, 2021 ). This could be due to the fact that the individual perception of stress in ERT is linked to university (i.e.…”

“…Studying is associated with increased stress ( Matos Fialho et al, 2021 ; von Keyserlingk et al, 2021 ) even without additional stressors due to the changes brought by the Covid-19 pandemic. With reference to prior findings on the development of stress or students' perception of e-learning ( Garrison et al, 2010 ; Schmidt et al, 2019 ), social presence and cognitive abilities are crucial for the evaluation of the learning process and the motivation in digital learning environments ( Kahn et al, 2017 ) and ERT ( Hadwin et al, 2022 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ). Previous studies revealed core conditions for the development of distress in e-learning: limited opportunities for action (e.g., due to technical difficulties and low support; Hara, 2000 ), reduced social interactions with peers, lecturers, and tutors ( Garrison et al, 2010 ; Henritius et al, 2019 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ), and an increased need to control the learning process by oneself ( Hadwin et al, 2022 ).…”

“…Nevertheless, the ad-hoc shift to online learning (so-called Emergency Remote Teaching; ERT) in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic in the summer semester of 2020 presented a completely new situation for students ( Goppert & Pfost, 2021 ; Hadwin et al, 2022 ; Voltmer et al, 2021 ). As a result, first cross-sectional studies reported a higher experience of stress and an increase in mental discomfort of students ( Hadwin et al, 2022 ; Hopp et al, 2021 ; Tzafilkou et al, 2021 ). Although stress is a common problem among students and fluctuations in stress levels over the course of a semester are well known ( Herbst et al, 2016 ), ERT is characterized by some specifics that are suspected to increase the stress experience (e.g., Goppert & Pfost, 2021 ; von Keyserlingk et al, 2021 ).…”

Loneliness through the lens of Black feminist love-politics: pedagogical practices amid pandemic online learning

“…Amid social distancing measures and the closures of public activities, the pandemic eliminated the typical ways students socialize in schools. Therefore, increased feelings of loneliness among students has become a pressing concern (Bu et al, 2020;Hopp et al, 2020;Killgore et al, 2020;Labrague et al, 2020).…”