2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Changes in Perceived Wellness in First-Year Engineering Students
This Complete Research Paper presents changes in data from a combined wellness, self-efficacy, and mindset survey for new students in the [College] at [University] during their first semester. Correlations between individual survey factors and student retention and success are explored. The general structure of a first-year experience course focused on various dimensions of wellness is also described.

Motivation: The term wellness does not have an agreed-upon definition in the literature [e.g., 1-6]. Unsurprisingly, there is also disagreement about the best methods and instruments to measure wellness. However, ample evidence exists to support the claim that wellness or components of wellness are correlated to various positive outcomes for individuals. Researchers have also discussed the value of a wellness approach to first-year coursework (e.g., [7]). The purpose of this study is to describe the structure of a wellness-focused course for new students in the [College] as well as to quantify the start-of-semester wellness for a subset of students in the [College] as measured by the Perceived Wellness Survey, to measure changes in perceived wellness over the course of the first semester for these students, and to link this information with student success and retention. Based on results from previous studies of first year students, additional survey questions will be included related to participant self-efficacy and mindset.

Background: The Perceived Wellness Model [8,9] is based on the idea that separate individuals, "...process and interpret information from internal and external sources in highly variable ways." In other words, two people placed in similar circumstances could have very different perceptions of the positive or negative aspects of their situation. The theory integrates six components of wellness: physical, social, psychological, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual. These dimensions are not unique to the Perceived Wellness Model, though their specific definitions often vary somewhat between theories. Adams and co-workers developed the Perceived Wellness Survey [8] to assess wellness within the construct of the Perceived Wellness Model. The researchers found that while the Perceived Wellness Survey purports to measure individual wellness dimensions, the result of the assessment appears to be a uni-dimensional wellness assessment. This finding was supported by subsequent analysis by Harari et al. [10]. The Perceived Wellness Survey (PWS) has been demonstrated to be a psychometrically sound wellness-assessment instrument that is relatively short (36 items), is freely available, and is based on a theory (the Perceived Wellness Theory) that focuses on five of the eight wellness dimensions (the theory does not include financial, environmental, or occupational and has an additional psychological component). The 'missing' dimensions of the PWS will be assessed using the Interpersonal, Community, Occupational, Physical, Psychological, and Economic instrument (ICOPPE) [11,12], a 7-item survey focusing on where respondents perceive themselves to be now in each domain, where they were in the past, and where they expect to be in the future. Combined, the two instruments will allow a comprehensive assessment of student wellness.

Methods: Two electronic surveys were created in Qualtrics based on the Perceived Wellness Survey [8,9], the ICOPPE wellness scale [11], mindset [13], and self-efficacy. Mindset questions were obtained from the National Mentoring Resource Center [14]. The survey was administered to new students to the [College] who consented to participate during the Fall 2022 semester. Both first-time-in-college and new transfer students were eligible to participate. Both a start-of-semester (within the first three weeks) survey and end-of-semester survey were administered. Results from the survey were compiled with academic performance results for Fall 2022 and retention to Spring 2023, to inform future student success interventions.

Anticipated Results: Previous research by the authors has shown self-efficacy to be strongly correlated to first semester success and second semester retention. This is expected to remain the case. It is also expected that consistently high or increasing wellness, as measured by the survey results, will be correlated with positive academic outcomes and retention rates compared to consistently low or decreasing wellness during the first semester.