Can Social Identities Improve Working Students’ Academic and Social Outcomes? Lessons from Three Studies

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The research is interesting and relevant.

It is necessary to strengthen referencing to other thematic studies. Also, it presents more information about the research methodology, including questions asked, sample selection and study period.

To make an edit by the authors of the texts from the manuscript that match already published texts.

To make a language edit by improving the English.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The style of the manuscript is scholarly, but the presentation of the text could be improved. A language edit is required.

Author Response

The research is interesting and relevant.

Thank you for your considerate response!

It is necessary to strengthen referencing to other thematic studies. Also, it presents more information about the research methodology, including questions asked, sample selection and study period.

Thank you for this suggestion! We have included research by Fleming et al. (2021) and
Jackson & Dean (2023) to talk more about structural approaches to helping working students
and included research by Taylor (2022) which discusses how working can unlock intrinsic
motivation. We now discuss how we collected our sample in more detail and included the years in which we conducted the studies.

To make an edit by the authors of the texts from the manuscript that match already published texts.

Thank you! We have now ensured that the manuscript text is in line with the numbers of the
references.

To make a language edit by improving the English. The style of the manuscript is scholarly, but the presentation of the text could be improved. A language edit is required.

We have undergone a complete quality check of the manuscript which allowed us to make the
meaning of some sentences clearer. We have also changed sentences so that they are
written in active voice (except in the Results section where we discuss the dependent
variables first and which predictors they are associated with after).

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

A definition of social identity would be helpful for the reader.

Although this paper is coming from a psychological perspective, it may be worth flagging the pressure to be in paid employment for low SES students.

I accept the argument that working in a relevant field can increase the student identity with the subject discipline, but not all students will be doing this - simply working for sufficient money to live - so a further caveat around this may be useful.

Line 195 - more explanation of 'symbols of resilience' might be worth consideration as this sounds like an important theoretical concept that could be developed further in future research.

Recognising that there may be word count implications - any further details that can be offered about methodology and methods are likely to be appreciated by the reader. I am assuming three separate questionnaires - but the reader does have to infer this to some extent. Is it worth highlighting the potential limitation of 'self-report' - although clearly the measures that have been used are robust.

Section 3.3 - is there anything that can be added here in regards to findings about the social class aspect measured e.g. Adler's ladder.

Line 346 - can the number of hours worked be clarified? Too many hours are likely to have a detrimental impact on study.

I would perhaps have anticipated some very current references (e.g. last 2 years or so) to be included more consistently - particularly given the topicality of this issue. I accept that there are a number of older seminal references - but some very current research would be advantageous.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Line 47-49 - re-write sentence for greater clarity

Line 50-53 - re-write sentence for greater clarity 

(two shorter sentences can be considered to replace one long sentence).

Check the end of line 54 for clarity of the sentence after the bracket.

Check line 63-65 for sentence clarity - better as two sentences? Should be 'draw' not 'drew'?

Perhaps on line 71 - say 'four' different foci to increase the connection to the paragraph below - line 76.

Line 170 - extra full stop - needs to be removed - replace with a comma?

Line 291 - 'placed'?

Line 293 - 'did not'

Line 396-397 - check clarity of meaning in sentence.

 

Author Response

A definition of social identity would be helpful for the reader.

Thank you for this suggestion! We have now made the sentence on lines 55-57 clearer so
that it is explicit to the reader where the definition is. We also rewrote the paragraph to make
our theoretical rationale clearer for the reader.

Although this paper is coming from a psychological perspective, it may be worth flagging the pressure to be in paid employment for low SES students.

We agree with this suggestion and so we included a sentence on lines 36-38 to illuminate the struggles of students who must work due to being from low socioeconomic backgrounds.

I accept the argument that working in a relevant field can increase the student identity with the subject discipline, but not all students will be doing this - simply working for sufficient money to live - so a further caveat around this may be useful.

In line with the previous suggestion, we also included a further sentence on lines 127-129 to
suggest that the working student identity may not be enhanced for those students.

Line 195 - more explanation of 'symbols of resilience' might be worth consideration as this sounds like an important theoretical concept that could be developed further in future research.

We completely agree as this is something that we also draw on the Discussion. Because of
this, we expanded the sentence on lines 205-209 to illuminate how aspects of the working
student experience can foster identification with the working student identity, which in turn can
develop resilience and help them to garner social support.

Recognising that there may be word count implications - any further details that can be offered about
methodology and methods are likely to be appreciated by the reader. I am assuming three separate
questionnaires - but the reader does have to infer this to some extent. Is it worth highlighting the
potential limitation of 'self-report' - although clearly the measures that have been used are robust.

We added additional information in section 2.1 including explicitly separating the three
different questionnaires and specifying the periods of data collection. We also discussed the
implications of collecting self-report data in section 2.2 by justifying that it would be easy for
respondents to recall the hours they work in paid employment per week and their academic
performance.

Section 3.3 - is there anything that can be added here in regards to findings about the social class
aspect measured e.g. Adler's ladder.

We included the following sentence ‘This suggests that identifying strictly with other students
(rather than specifically with working students) could increase working students’ own societal
perceptions and can indicate that identifying as a working student helps them to see
themselves in a more positive light’ on lines 364-367 to clarify the implications of the result.

Line 346 - can the number of hours worked be clarified? Too many hours are likely to have a
detrimental impact on study.

Yes, we added the following sentence ‘Indeed, although working more hours takes away
opportunities to study, working more hours may also make students feel grateful for their
education and enhance their intrinsic motivation to improve their own understanding of the
material’ on lines 350-353 to clarify this and suggest that working more hours may have
practical detriments and cognitive benefits for working students.

I would perhaps have anticipated some very current references (e.g. last 2 years or so) to be included
more consistently - particularly given the topicality of this issue. I accept that there are a number of
older seminal references - but some very current research would be advantageous.

We agree with this, and we add research by Fleming et al. (2021) and Jackson & Dean
(2023) to talk more about structural approaches to helping working students and included
research by Taylor (2022) which discusses how working can unlock intrinsic motivation.

Comments on the Quality of English Language:

Line 47-49 - re-write sentence for greater clarity
Line 50-53 - re-write sentence for greater clarity
(two shorter sentences can be considered to replace one long sentence).
Check the end of line 54 for clarity of the sentence after the bracket.

Thank you for those! To combine our response to these points, we rewrote the entire
paragraph on lines 53-78 to make our theoretical rationale more explicit for the reader. We
hope that the rewrite has brought enhanced clarity.

Check line 63-65 for sentence clarity - better as two sentences? Should be 'draw' not 'drew'?

These are now two sentences on lines 73-78 and the verb tense has been changed to
present tense.

Perhaps on line 71 - say 'four' different foci to increase the connection to the paragraph below - line
76.

This suggestion has now been incorporated on line 82 of the revised manuscript.

Line 170 - extra full stop - needs to be removed - replace with a comma?

This suggestion has now been incorporated on line 182 of the revised manuscript.

Line 291 - 'placed'?

This suggestion has now been incorporated on line 315 of the revised manuscript.

Line 293 - 'did not'

This suggestion has now been incorporated on line 317 of the revised manuscript.

Line 396-397 - check clarity of meaning in sentence.

This suggestion has now been incorporated on lines 419-421 of the revised manuscript.