A Sustainable Academic Journey in the Middle East: An Exploratory Study of Female College Students’ Self-Efficacy and Perceived Social Support

Abstract

In a society that is set to move from a patriarchal, gender-segregated workforce to one characterized by gender equity, female college students are the focal agents of change. Thus, they were selected to examine the contribution that perceived social support of women toward other women plays in their self-efficacy (i.e., confidence in one’s abilities) and academic performance (as measured by class grades). Self-reports were used to collect information about perceived social support, its nature and sources, and general self-efficacy from a sample of 131 female college students (age range: 18–24). Regression analyses were used to examine the participants’ responses. Surprisingly, the stronger the perceived positive social support reported by the respondents, the lower their academic performance. The contribution of the sources of negative social support (i.e., criticism) to either performance or self-efficacy was contingent on its being either received or given. Namely, explaining the criticism that women receive from other women by attributing it to their social environment was linked to higher performance, whereas explaining the criticism that women generate toward other women by attributing it to their social environment was linked to lower self-efficacy. However, the more likely women were to respond to criticism of women in person or via social media, the higher their self-efficacy. It was concluded that, for the selected sample, the contribution of social support, either positive or negative, to self-confidence and performance might depend on the extent to which female students perceive themselves as independent agents capable of self-determination in an environment making steps toward gender equity.

1. Introduction

Not long ago, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), stories began to emerge in newspapers and in magazine articles of successful professional women in a broad range of disciplines that have been traditionally men-only fields, such as business, international affairs, politics, sports, law, literature, technology, medicine, etc. The scholarly literature has offered a broader and more nuanced picture of the context upon which these women’s success rests, e.g., [1,2,3,4,5]. Articles have showcased a transition dictated and guided by institutional decrees and public declarations [6]. It entails stepping away from a patriarchal society, where females and males are given separate and unequal spaces to exist and grow [7], thereby advancing an aspirational gender-equitable society, where males and females coexist with equal opportunities to be agents of self-determination [8].

In the language of Dator [9,10], who has conceptualized the multiple ways in which people and related institutional bodies see their societies on the continuum from the present to the future, KSA’s transition efforts can be described under the category “Why don’t you make something of yourself?” (p. 320). The latter reflects an industrial society whose goal is to develop and grow an economy that can compete on the world stage. The leap that KSA is taking is more of a “transformation” [10] than a transition because it embraces a radical, mostly technologically driven, alteration in the conditions of the everyday lives of its people [11]. The signs of this envisioned transformation are visible everywhere [12], as they target both the physical environment (through the initiation of massive public infrastructure projects) and human resources (through the overt promotion of equitable opportunities for women and men encompassing education and the workplace). In this period of transformation, women, particularly young women, are suddenly catapulted into center stage. They are given responsibilities previously the sole domain of men and are asked to quickly learn to navigate environments outside the comfort of their homes that have been the unclaimed territories of the opposite sex for as long as anyone can remember [13,14]. Most importantly, they are expected to excel in such environments, which have been dominated by patriarchal views of women as housewives [7]. Of course, some changes, although envisioned, are yet to be implemented in some areas [15,16]. Notable among the latter is higher education which is still largely gender-segregated [17,18,19]. Only recently have some academic programs been opened up to women (e.g., engineering), albeit the curriculum and instruction of female and male students are under the unifying directives of the Ministry of Education [20], which ensures quality control in the name of equity. As such, these programs suffer from the under-enrollment of female students. In contrast, business programs are flooded with female students [21]. Choices of major do not merely illustrate students’ preferences for particular professional roles. On the contrary, they foreshadow an imbalance in the contribution of females and males to the workforce of the society that embodies KSA. The latter aims to be not only a greater but also a different player in the world’s economy by supporting sustainable structural and functional solutions in everyday life. To this end, KSA is moving from an exclusively oil-based economy to one that also relies on renewable energy [12]. In this context of change, it is reasonable to ask whether young women (i.e., female college students), who are assumed to be the main beneficiaries of the planned transformation as well as the main agents of change [22], see other women as supportive entities.

Positive social support usually refers to a network of social resources that people believe they possess, which may involve opportunities for mutual assistance, guidance, and validation in everyday life [23]. Studies have examined either the structure of social support, which primarily refers to the number of relationships and the frequency of exchanges that a person possesses, or the function of social support, which refers to the quality of these relationships [24]. Functions [25] may be instrumental (forms of tangible assistance), informational (exchanges of valuable information and offers of guidance), and emotional (communications that make the recipients feel better about themselves). However, not all social exchanges are viewed as beneficial by the recipients [26]. To wit, support that is intended by the provider to be positive may be viewed as negative by the recipient because it either results in a negative outcome or is conceptualized as an undesirable act [27]. Negative social support may entail criticism and hostility, which causes the recipient to desire to avoid interactions. Whereas recipients of positive social support tend to exhibit an approach stance, expressing a desire to initiate and continue interacting with the agents of such support, negative social support causes recipients to want to avoid interactions that exhibit its features [28]. The perception of support articulates how the recipients of support feel about it. Perceived positive support is the subjective sense that others are available and willing to satisfy particular needs [19,23,29,30,31]. As such, it is the degree to which one experiences a subjective feeling of being understood, respected, and supported by others within a collective. Not surprisingly, people’s perceived social support, rather than the actual social support received, has been shown to significantly impact the physical and mental functioning of its recipients [32,33].

2. The Present Study

The research described below was guided by the assumption that individuals cannot be understood separately from the society (culture) in which they exist [34,35]. To this end, it is reasonable to describe KSA as a society traditionally collectivistic [36,37,38] that faces increasing individualism, especially among its youth [39,40]. Collectivism in KSA exists within a power structure of tribal networks. As such, it promotes collaboration and mutual humility among the members of the society, mostly based on Islamic doctrine [41,42,43], as well as respect for the power structure that defines the tribal networks [44,45].

According to the social-cognitive perspective of human development, contextual factors and the individual are locked into bidirectional interactions that can be explained as reciprocal determinism [46,47]. Namely, individuals are constrained by the contexts in which they exist. Yet, individuals can also shape how such contexts are experienced and the responses they elicit through direct personal agency, proxy agency (i.e., reliance on others to secure desired outcomes), or collective agency [48]. At the very minimum, how contexts are experienced can determine their impact on individuals in a never-ending cycle of influences. Embedded into the broader social-cognitive perspective, historical changes in developmental contexts (HIDECO) [35] is a theoretical framework that places in the spotlight the impact of the context on the individual, calling attention to the relevance of the particular time during which such an impact is examined. Thus, in the present study, the assumption that the society in which one lives is relevant at the individual level was based on the HIDECO framework [35]. According to HIDECO, an individual’s psychological state is shaped by the particular features of the contexts in which the individual exists. At any given point in time, four categories of contextual factors create pathways of influence for the underlying events that embody such factors: individual-level resources (e.g., educational attainment and perceived control on one’s life), social structure, technology, and zeitgeist and norms (i.e., the spirit and beliefs that define the epoch in which one exists).

The additional assumption upon which the present research rests was that people’s receptivity to the impact of structural changes in their society is mediated by the stage at which they are in their lives [49]. Thus, the research focused on female college students because they are viewed as the main agents of change [22] in a society, such as that of KSA, motivated to abandon its traditional gender-segregated economic engine [7,49,50,51]. This research was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic which forced all face-to-face classes to be moved online, thereby capturing a time of uncertainties and challenges in students’ educational journey [52,53]. Students were required to adjust to synchronous online instruction, which was not only unfamiliar but also deprived of the richness of human contact that characterizes customary face-to-face interactions in the Middle East [54,55]. According to Silbereisen and Tomasik [56], events that are located in the macro context of a person’s ecosystem become impactful when they move into one of the proximal micro-ecosystems of that person, such as the ordinary academic life of a student. Thus, students’ perception of social support was examined in its relationship to academic performance and self-confidence in one’s ability to perform well (i.e., self-efficacy) during a time of uncertainties and challenges, which, due to its being brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, made social support particularly relevant.

We examined general self-efficacy and performance as they relate to social support for two key reasons. First, in the extant literature, evidence regarding the female population selected for the present investigation is mostly missing. The little available evidence is not entirely clear. Second, in this day and age, the perception of oneself as in control of one’s own life, including the view that one possesses the ability to exercise such control, is seen as a basic disposition for mastering challenges arising from the practical demands and expectations of adult life [57]. General self-efficacy is a psychological construct that specifically refers to the confidence individuals possess concerning their ability to perform well in a variety of situations and tasks. It reflects a “can-do attitude” that is developed over one’s lifespan from the accumulation of successes and failures [58]. It is considered a key aspect of human agency since it embodies people’s confidence in their capabilities to exercise control over their lives [46,59]. Bandura [46] notes that all potential motivators and guides of human action and thought are rooted in the core beliefs that one has the power to produce desired outcomes through action [60]. Without such beliefs, there would be little or no incentive for people to act or persevere when difficulties arise. That is, self-efficacy beliefs define the essential aspect of human agency. In agreement with Bandura’s characterization of human agency, high self-efficacy is often associated with an active approach to challenging situations, persistence, and great effort, whereas low self-efficacy is associated with avoidance of such situations [61,62,63,64,65].

“People do not live their lives autonomously. Many of the things they seek are achievable only through socially interdependent effort.” [46] (p. 270). Social support is essential to securing what the individual cannot accomplish alone. Studies have shown that a person’s self-efficacy and academic performance benefit from positive social support [66]. As such, positive social support is assumed to be an important contributor to self-efficacy. Specifically, social support that instills a sense of personal efficacy and self-worth is thought to promote academic performance and resilience in the face of adversity [67]. To wit, social support from significant others may not only buffer against the stresses, challenges, and taxing demands that students encounter but also enhance their belief in their ability to overcome difficulties. Yet, according to the social-cognitive perspective of Bandura [67], internal factors, behaviors, and external events can all influence each other. Thus, not only may positive social support enhance self-efficacy, but also individuals with confidence in their abilities may craft more supportive social relationships than those who are less confident. Not surprisingly, positive social support has been reported to be linked to self-efficacy [68]. However, the relationship between general self-efficacy and performance is not always so clear. Mixed findings exist. For instance, general self-efficacy has been reported to decrease as academic performance declines [69], or as being unrelated to performance [70]. The evidence regarding the link between social support and performance is similarly less than straightforward. For instance, Cutrona et al. [71], Malecki and Elliott [72], and Tayfur and Ulupinar [73] reported a small but significant relationship between students’ perceived support and their grade point average (GPA). Levitt et al. [74] found positive social support to be related to standardized test scores but reported no relationship between social support and GPA. Instead, Cauce et al. [75] reported that higher levels of positive social support (mostly from friends) were related to poorer academic achievement. In other studies, negative social support was found to be linked to stress which might either benefit academic performance by motivating students or impair it by inducing discouragement [76,77,78].

In our study, a survey, including qualitative and quantitative information, was used. Namely, we asked questions that could be answered in a quantitative format and then applied inferential statistics (i.e., regression analyses) to identify the contribution of different facets of women’s social support to students’ self-efficacy and academic performance. Accompanying these questions were short-answer questions intended for respondents to describe in greater detail their thoughts and accounts of women’s social support. Then, qualitative analyses of students’ written answers to such questions were used to clarify and explain the outcomes of inferential statistics. Taken as a whole, the questions were built on the recognition that social support is not only either positive or negative but also a bidirectional process. It results from the interaction between the giver and the receiver of support. Thus, respondents were expected to describe the type and amount of support they received and offered [79].

Given that privacy within one’s social collective (which includes the extended family or tribe) is highly valued and guarded in KSA [80,81], the topic of social support for most women may be considered a sensitive matter. As such, the present study did not explicitly ask participants to report the particular structure of their social support. It merely asked female college students to quantify women’s social support (i.e., estimate the extent to which they believed women support other women) and then explain in their own words the general features of women’s social support. Specifically, they were asked to describe the nature and sources of positive support (i.e., mutual assistance, guidance, and validation), and negative support (i.e., the content of women’s criticism of other women and its presumed motives). The generality of the inquiries was intended to ensure participants’ comfort with the topic and candor in the content of their responses.

The present research was guided by hypotheses regarding the ability of social support to predict either performance or self-efficacy in the selected student population. Hypotheses were framed by the cultural and societal contexts in which female students exist. The focus was on social support by women toward other women to understand the extent to which the sisterhood networks that have traditionally defined women’s lives in KSA hold under the top-down pressure of gender integration [82].

On one hand, the impact of women’s perceived social support was predicated on the assumption that KSA’s patriarchal structure is fading, but its mark on women and men cannot be suddenly deleted. Thus, we predicted that women’s perceived positive social support may contribute to neither self-efficacy nor academic performance since power has been and still is in the hands of men. On the other hand, in times of uncertainties within a society guided by the collectivistic norms of Islam, positive social support becomes noticeable as needs increase, whereas negative social support (e.g., criticism) remains an outlier that disrupts the unity of the collective. Thus, in this context, positive social support may be associated with enhanced self-efficacy and academic performance, whereas negative social support may contribute to self-efficacy and academic performance differently depending on whether it is received or imparted and on its source. The latter may be societal, as arising from the provider’s upbringing, or internal, as motivated by ill will. Upbringing is intended to refer to both formal and informal contextual influences, including familial, scholastic, and broader cultural values, ideas, and practices [83,84]. Received criticism may be discounted if it is perceived as motivated by ill will, thereby not contributing to either self-efficacy or performance. In contrast, received criticism may be impactful if it is seen as arising from the provider’s upbringing. As such, it may motivate women to exert more effort, as a way either to oppose it or to overcome it, thereby potentially being linked to a greater sense of self-efficacy and performance. Instead, imparted criticism may be seen as a violation of the cohesiveness of the collective that does not reflect well on the provider. Consequently, it may negatively contribute to her self-efficacy even if its source is seen as societal.

3. Methods

3.1. Participants

The participants were 131 female college students from urban centers of the Eastern Region of KSA. They were all full-time students who were enrolled in an introductory Arabic and Islamic culture course (n = 150), generally taken by freshmen across all majors during their first year in college. All of the students were of Saudi nationality and had completed their earlier education in KSA. Their ages ranged from 18 to 24 (M = 19.47; SD = 1.38). Arabic was identified as the first language and English as the second language. Convenience sampling was used to identify potential respondents. The response rate was 87%.

3.2. Procedure

This research was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a protective measure throughout the pandemic, students accustomed to face-to-face classes were asked to move to synchronous online instruction. The online mode was not only unfamiliar but also deprived students of the richness of human contact that usually characterizes face-to-face interactions in the Middle East [85]. In class, students mostly communicated with the instructor and with each other through messages written in a chatbox or expressed orally through a microphone. Due to technical restrictions, the camera function was rarely utilized.

Students were told that their answers could serve as tools for self-reflection and that the collected data would remain confidential. Students’ academic performance was operationalized as class grades at the end of the semester. It included the average of the grades obtained on a written assignment and four tests. The course in which students were enrolled was split into four sections, each taught by the same instructor, thereby ensuring consistency in grading across the sections. Informed consent was obtained. The data collection complied with the guidelines of the Office for Human Research Protections of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and with the American Psychological Association’s ethical standards in the treatment of human subjects. The study was reviewed and approved by the Deanship of Research of the selected institution.

3.3. Measures

Toward the middle of the semester, students were asked six questions involving their perceived social support of women. Each question (see

Table 1. Mean values and standard errors of the mean (SEM) of the answers to the social support quantitative questions and the self-efficacy questionnaire.

Type of Question	Range of Scale	Mean	SEM
Strength of Perceived Social Support among Women	Strongly Disagree (0)–Strongly Agree (4)	3.06	0.073
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Given to Women	Never (0)–Always (4)	2.41	0.089
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Received by Women	Never (0)–Always (4)	2.23	0.083
Emotional Reaction to Criticism Toward Women	Never (0)–Always (4)	2.73	0.115
Desire to Respond to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	Never (0)–Always (4)	1.73	0.109
Actual Response to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	Never (0)–Always (4)	1.24	0.122
Self-Efficacy	Strongly Disagree (0)–Strongly Agree (4)	3.13	0.040

) was accompanied by a five-point scale (quantitative data collection measure) and a space where students were to write their explanation of their answers (qualitative data collection measure).

The strength of perceived social support was measured by the extent to which the respondents believed women support other women on a scale from strongly disagree (0) to strongly agree (4). This question was followed by open-ended questions to explain in their own words the general function(s) of women’s social support (qualitative data). Namely, the respondents were asked to describe (a) the nature of positive support (i.e., how women support each other), and (b) the nature of negative support (i.e., the content of women’s criticism of other women and the presumed motives behind such criticism). The remaining questions asked respondents to estimate the motives of negative social support (e.g., one’s upbringing), either received or given, evaluate its impact, and report the frequency with which it translated into overt behavior. Such responses were measured on a scale from never (0) to always (4). Each was followed by an open-ended question to explain the selected rating (qualitative data).

The questions were initially developed by the researchers who then assessed their face validity [86] by asking a sample of respondents from the same subject pool (n = 5) of the research to rate each question as ‘‘clearly representative’’, ‘‘somewhat representative’’, or ‘‘not representative” of the intended meaning (as identified by the researchers). The target questions were initially intermixed with a comparable set of unrelated questions to assess the quality of the respondents’ judgment. In this pilot study, questions that did not receive a judgment of “clearly representative” by at least four of the five raters were rewritten and subsequently subjected to the same evaluation by another sample of respondents from the same subject pool (n = 5). Students who contributed to the pilot study were not included in the sample who participated in the ensuing research.

In addition to questions about social support, students were asked to complete the new general self-efficacy (NGSE) scale [58,87], which was used to measure students’ general confidence in their ability to deal with a range of challenges [88]. Students reported the extent to which they agreed with each of the eight statements of confidence on a scale from strongly disagree (0) to strongly agree (4) with two serving as the neutral point. Cronbach’s alpha, a measure of internal consistency, was 0.76.

A test–retest reliability check was performed by another sample of respondents (n = 20) who were administered the questions on perceived social support and the self-efficacy questionnaire twice, four weeks apart, to overcome the bias arising from the retention of previously given answers [89]. A Pearson correlation for the questions on social support to be answered on a 0–4 scale yielded a test–retest reliability coefficient of 92%. The test–retest reliability coefficient for the self-efficacy questionnaire was 91%.

3.4. Data Analysis

Thematic analysis was used to summarize the participants’ responses to open-ended questions [85]. Coding was approached as a descriptive process to remain as close as possible to the content of participants’ responses (i.e., to obtain a factual account of their thoughts) [90,91]. Thematic analyses, which were conducted by two independent raters, included familiarization with the content of the responses to each open-ended question, development of conceptual sets for each particular question, and coding of records according to conceptual sets. For each question, the ocular scan method was used to determine whether the participants’ written answers added information to those provided through the five-point scale [92]. Then, excerpts made by the participants were compared and contrasted to determine whether they offered similar or different information. A conceptual set included similar excerpts, each linked to its quantitative answer on the five-point scale. The inter-rater reliability produced by two independent raters who coded students’ responses to open-ended questions into conceptual sets was 89%. The most frequent excerpts were used to explain the meaning of the corresponding quantitative answers. To yield accurate reports of the participants’ perspectives [91], agreement by both independent raters was necessary for the excerpts to be considered as reflecting the participants’ views.

Descriptive statistics were performed on the quantitative measures to highlight the characteristics of the sample of respondents. Then, a linear regression analysis with the quantitative measures of social support and performance as the predictors and self-efficacy as the outcome variable was carried out to determine the extent to which social support and performance might rely upon female students’ sense of confidence in their abilities. A linear regression analysis was also conducted with social support measures and self-efficacy as the predictors and performance as the outcome variable. It aimed to assess the contribution of these individual difference variables to academic performance.

4. Results

Descriptive statistics are reported in Table 1. All inferential statistics presented below are significant at the p < 0.05 level.

Participants agreed that positive social support among women was present (as demonstrated by the value of 3.06 on a scale from 0 to 4 with 2 as the neutral point). When asked to describe how women support each other, the participants made statements that fell evenly into the three types of functions that social support serves [24]: instrumental (i.e., offering concrete assistance to a person), emotional (i.e., making a person feel better, such as expressing words of encouragement when the person faces difficulties), and informational (i.e., sharing useful information and advice with a person who is facing hardships). When asked to identify the behaviors that women criticize in other women (i.e., instances of negative social support), most of the responses fell into the following sets: (a) personal choices not understood by other women regarding proper attire, education, and occupation, (b) direct interference with private matters, (c) behaviors that challenge the idea of being a member of a collective of equals (e.g., independence, competition, and a lack of modesty), and (d) backbiting. When asked to explain the motives behind the reported instances of negative social support, the participants mentioned negative emotions (e.g., hate and jealousy), competitiveness, and selfishness in the name of one’s reputation, irrespective of the extent to which they attributed negative social support, either received or given, to one’s upbringing.

A linear regression analysis with the quantitative measures of social support as the predictors and self-efficacy as the outcome variable was performed (see

Table 2. Regression analysis with self-efficacy as the outcome variable and social support questions and performance level as the predictors.

	B	Std. Error	Beta	t	Sign.	rs
Constant	2.772	0.365
Strength of Perceived Social Support among Women	0.036	0.048	0.066	0.753	ns	+0.20
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Given to Women	−0.093	0.042	−0.206	−2.201	0.030	−0.50
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Received by Women	0.027	0.046	0.055	0.570	ns	+0.17
Emotional Reaction to Criticism Toward Women	−0.004	0.030	−0.012	−0.134	ns	−0.02
Desire to Respond to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	0.005	0.034	0.013	0.136	ns	+0.22
Actual Response to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	0.073	0.031	0.223	2.347	0.021	+0.68
Performance Level	0.004	0.004	0.104	1.157	ns	+0.45

Note: R = 0.328.

). No evidence of multi-collinearity (tolerance values greater than 0.79; mean VIF = 1.16) and autocorrelation (Durbin–Watson test = 2.02) was found [93]. The sample size was deemed adequate, according to the rule that the minimum acceptable sample size would be 111 (104 + number of predictors) [93]. In Table 2, the b-values indicate the degree to which a predictor contributes to the selected outcome variable when the other predictors are held constant. In the last column, structure correlations (i.e., r_s = r _Y–X/R; the relationship between each predictor and the outcome variable when the variables are taken two at a time) are displayed [94].

Two variables were found to contribute to self-efficacy but in opposite manners. The more likely one’s upbringing was to be held responsible for the criticism that women express toward other women, the less self-efficacy was reported by the respondent. In contrast, the more likely the respondent was to respond to criticism of women in person and on social media, the higher her self-efficacy. In the respondents’ written answers, reacting to events that are perceived as violations of the harmony of the community was reported to give respondents a sense of control over their lives. It indicated agency for self-determination. Instead, attributing responsibility for the criticism of women toward other women to their upbringing was perceived as a way of devaluing one’s self-determination.

A linear regression analysis was then conducted on performance as the outcome variable (see

Table 3. Regression analysis with performance level as the outcome variable and social support questions and self-efficacy as the predictors.

	B	Std. Error	Beta	t	Sign.	rs
Constant	77.496	8.669
Strength of Perceived Social Support among Women	−2.565	1.191	−0.186	−2.154	0.033	−0.44
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Given to Women	−1.765	1.070	−0.156	−1.649	ns	−0.24
Upbringing as the Source of Criticism Received by Women	2.470	1.151	0.202	2.146	0.034	+0.49
Emotional Reaction to Criticism Toward Women	−0.026	0.766	−0.003	−0.034	ns	−0.04
Desire to Respond to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	−0.991	0.850	−0.107	−1.166	ns	−0.13
Actual Response to Criticism of Women in Person and on Social Media	1.057	0.799	0.127	1.322	ns	+0.40
General Self-Efficacy	2.613	2.258	0.104	1.157	ns	+0.45

Note: R = 0.331.

). Multi-collinearity (tolerance values greater than 0.78; mean VIF = 1.16) and evidence of autocorrelation (Durbin–Watson test = 1.93) were not detected [86]. In Table 3, b-values indicate the degree to which a predictor contributes to the selected outcome variable when the other predictors are held constant. In the last column, structure correlations (i.e., the relationship between each predictor and the outcome variable when variables are taken two at a time) are displayed [94].

This analysis indicated that the perceived strength of the social support that women receive from other women was inversely related to performance. To wit, the weaker the perceived social support, the higher the students’ performance. The respondents’ written answers suggested that a lack of social support was conceptualized as a motivator. In such answers, academic success was seen as a largely independent endeavor and as a way to demonstrate competence despite low expectations for women (i.e., a way to challenge the remnants of patriarchy). Instead, students’ academic performance increased when the responsibility for the criticism that women received from other women was attributed to their upbringing. Written answers suggested that discounting negative comments by attributing them to people’s upbringing was used to make the criticism less distracting and thus less hurtful when the goal was academic success.

5. Discussion

The present research relied on the HIDECO framework [35] to gain insight into female college students’ self-efficacy and perceived social support at a particular point in time (during the COVID-19 pandemic). According to the social-cognitive perspective of which HIDECO is a relative, the human condition of any particular group of individuals is determined by the reciprocal interaction between these individuals and their contexts [95]. As such, HIDECO does not deny that the reciprocal determinism [96] between people’s dispositions and the context they face at any given point in time is key to understanding their views and actions. However, it specifically focuses on how contexts, defined as dynamic entities experienced by individuals, may impact them. Most importantly, it emphasizes that the impact of contexts on individuals is likely to vary with the passage of time.

Within the continuum of time underscored by HIDECO, we chose the point that was defined by the COVID-19 pandemic. Right before the pandemic, the context of Saudi women could be defined by increasing individual resources (e.g., education), and a more gender-equitable social structure, including social roles and norms intended to temper the past overriding patriarchy. If gross domestic product (GDP) growth rates during the COVID-19 pandemic are considered, gender-equity progress might be described as having come to a halt [97]. In this particular context, our study examined two features of individual resources: women’s perceived social support and sense of control (as measured by self-efficacy). Female students’ academic performance served as the main outcome variable to measure the impact of the selected individual resources. The data, which were gathered from a sample of educated young women, offered a one-time window into these women’s perceived social support and sense of control amid the top-down social-economic changes in educational and occupational opportunities that were shaping their society [35]. These women were considered the ideal birth cohort (i.e., a group of people who are raised during a historical period) [98] as events occurring during the transition to adulthood tend to be more impactful than those occurring at other periods [99,100].

The present results can be summarized in three points. First, the strength of positive social support among women, evaluated as a whole, was related to diminished academic performance. At first blush, this finding is surprising. However, at a closer look, it may be merely the by-product of one’s perceived sense of agency and effort exerted. Namely, if women see themselves as alone in their journey to success, and success is currently defined as independent academic achievement, substantial effort is likely to be expended in academic endeavors which, in turn, leads to higher academic performance [101,102]. That is, deficiencies in positive social support may motivate women to action. On the other hand, if women see themselves as supported by other women, increased personal effort may be seen as superfluous, thereby leading to lower academic performance.

Second, self-efficacy was higher among women who reported a greater tendency to actively respond to criticism of other women in person and on social media. Criticism in a collectivistic society is often seen as an action that can puncture the unity of the collective, and thus a threat to be minimized. In this context, the relationship between self-efficacy and active responses to criticism may reflect a sense of personal agency applied to norm violation.

Third, the distinction between criticism received and given determined its selective impact on the outcome variables of the present research. To wit, the beneficial contribution of received negative social support to performance may reflect not a discounting of criticism, but rather its use as a motivator. Yet, when negative social support is given, it appears to stain the self-concept of the giver as a norm violator, thereby being accompanied by lower self-efficacy. This association is not surprising since most women attributed criticism given to other women to negative traits or attitudes, such as jealousy, arrogance, needless competition, backbiting, etc. No one described it as potentially constructive criticism motivated by good intentions.

5.1. Implications

Understanding how young women experience social support in a society that aspires to gender equity in its institutional embodiments [22,103] is critical to understanding how equity can be achieved. Because self-efficacy beliefs play a dominant role in educational and professional pursuits [46], understanding self-efficacy in such women is also critical to their attainment of gender equity. This two-fold rationale motivated the present research and guided its implementation.

In our study, the participants’ responses seem to bring forth the sense of personal agency that women are believed to need if they are to overcome the obstacles that exist on their path to academic and professional success [103]. The scholarly literature reports that women experience career and development constraints on account of equal but different gender roles [104]. On the other hand, research on gender equity in KSA has highlighted college students’ confidence and optimism toward gender equity seen as an aspirational goal, albeit resistance from those who hold traditional views is often reported along with the obstacles faced by women as active members of the workforce [105]. In our study, the impact of skeptical expectations of women as independent agents, a vestige of patriarchy, may be seen as reinforcing their determination to be independent agents who skillfully deal with the criticism they received by using it as a motivator.

It is generally understood that women’s agency is necessary for gender equity to be realized within a social system [46,106]. It is important to note here that gender parity and gender equity represent different goals of fairness. Parity refers to rights, institutions, and opportunities to be equally distributed to all. For instance, if men have the right to vote, women should also have the same right. If men have access to a particular type of training, women should have access to it too. Gender equity differentiates distribution depending on the needs of the recipients. Gender equity in education is beneficial from an economic and humanitarian standpoint, promoting economic growth and improving measures of well-being, such as a reduction in child mortality and undernutrition [107,108].

5.2. Limitations

Limitations exist that are to be addressed in future research. First, although the generality of the questions used was intended to ensure candor and comfort in the respondents, it did not allow us to examine more closely the networks of relationships that the respondents possess and the specific nature and quality of such networks. Second, the specific sample selected was of women from the Eastern region of KSA, one of the traditionally “liberal” enclaves of a society that has been known for its strict adherence to a severe code of conduct defined by a literal reading of the Quran and Sunna. Female college students from other regions may respond differently as the visibility of institutional changes establishing gender equity may vary from region to region. Indeed, the Saudi Women Participation in National Development (SWPND) index, which relies on five dimensions (economic status, social engagement, legislative structure, education, and health), shows noticeable regional differences in the values of each contributing dimension [108]. Third, the study relied on the HIDECO conceptual framework to identify two types of individual resources that define young Saudi women’s experiences at a given point in time. The selected framework, though, contemplates sociocultural factors other than individual resources that may be instrumental in defining such experiences, including social structure, technology, and zeitgeist. To this end, it is important to consider that our study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic which enhanced the use and perceived utility of technological tools across the entire country. Cellphones and Internet-based tools (e.g., WhatsApp, Facebook, etc.) became the primary mode of communication among the many physically distant members of the rich social networks that define Saudi society [109,110]. The role played by technology in defining young Saudi women’s experiences may have lessened in the post-pandemic world, thereby marking another limitation of our study. Fourth, our study is a snapshot, taken at a time of forced isolation from ordinary quotidian life, rather than a window into a time continuum (as underscored by the HIDECO framework). Thus, we can only speculate on the accrual of changes over time experienced by the selected sample of women in their sociocultural context. Fifth, the extent to which the educational attainments of young Saudi women become a sustainable reality in the workforce depends on the particular interactions of sociocultural and personal factors that need to be further examined through a longitudinal perspective. Sixth, self-efficacy was measured through the NGSE scale [87]. Undergraduate students from the Western hemisphere originally contributed to the development and validation of the scale, thereby questioning its validity for the current sample of female students from KSA. Evidence exists that cultural differences may impact users’ responses to a self-report instrument [111]. In our earlier research work e.g., [112], the NGSE was found to be unlikely to elicit queries intended to clarify the meaning of any of its statements. Furthermore, in such research, the scale had been repeatedly submitted to the face validity procedure suggested by Hardesty and Bearden [86] prior to administration. Its items had been found to elicit “clearly representative” judgments by most of the raters from the same student population of the present study. For this reason, the assessment of face validity was not performed before the administration of the scale in the present study. Nevertheless, further research is needed to assess the impact of response styles [111] in the selected population.