A new study by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania shows that college women who join sororities tend to view the process of joining a sorority negatively. But the study also found that those who joined a sorority generally view membership as highly beneficial. The study found that college women valued the sense of belonging and the support they received from their sisters after they became members.
Colleen Kase, a Penn alumna who is now a research coordinator in the psychology department at Drexel University in Philadelphia and a co-author of the study, noted that the research uncovered “negative effects from just that one week of recruitment. That’s really striking. It’s talked about anecdotally as being a pretty tough process to go through. Thousands of women across the country go through this every year. If this is true more broadly, that it’s such a negative process, then something needs to change.”
But Melissa Hunt, a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, and a co-author of the study, stated that “the girls who were in a sorority did feel a sense of belonging. They felt a sense of support. The sorority did deliver on the social benefits that, in principle, it is there to provide.”
The study, “The Effects of Sorority Recruitment on Psychological Wellbeing and Social Support, was published in Oracle: The Research Journal of the Association of Fraternity/Sorority Advisors. It may be accessed here.