University Dropout: Predictors and Mediators in First-Year Chilean University Students

Social integration in university freshmen has proven to be very relevant to encourage students to participate in an engaged way, obtain good academic results and continue with their university studies. The Covid-19 Pandemic imposed barriers to the social integration of students, changing the forms of interpersonal relationships. The objective of this research was to evaluate a predictive model in which perceived isolation and social support (social integration variables) are predictors of the intention to dropout mediated by the sense of belonging. A study with an associative-predictive cross-sectional design was carried out by testing mediation models with 700 first-year participants from a Chilean university. The results showed a statistically significant indirect effect of the social integration variables on dropout intention. In turn, no direct effects of these variables on the intention to quit were observed. These results indicate that, during emergency virtual education with its barriers to social and academic interaction, the integration variables can predict the intention to drop out of school through their effect on the sense of belonging. These results encourage higher education institutions to pay attention to the conditions in which social integration occurs in virtual media and with the interaction restrictions that are inherent to it.