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Alfano, H. J. Eduljee, N.B. (2013). Differences in work, levels of involvement and academic
performance between residential and commuter students. College Student Journa 47(2), 334342.
Introduction
The number of off-campus commuting students is increasing, causing colleges and universities
nationwide to begin to compete for residential students. Numerous studies have indicated that
students who live on-campus (residential) and students who live off-campus (commuter) have
different experiences being students of the same institution. These experiences differ in
involvement in on-campus activities, levels of stress on the job, and feeling like they are a part of
the campus community. This particular study investigated the academic performance, levels of
on-campus involvement, and the effect of working while in college on both residential (oncampus) and commuter (off-campus) students. Research on examining the differences between
residential and commuter students and working while in college is minimum. The literature
shows that students who are residential are more likely to be involved in on-campus activities
and feel as though they are more accepted in the campus community.
The authors of this study had four research questions: is there a relationship between
hours worked and GPA for residential and commuter students, is there a difference in levels of
involvement of school-sponsored activities, is there a difference between commuter and
residential students in how they feel about being a part of the college community, and are there
greater levels of stress at work which is a result of being a residential or commuter student. The
independent variables in this study was residential and commuter students. The dependent
variables were on-campus involvement, work and work stress levels, and academic performance.
Methods

The participants of this study were undergraduate students at a private college in the
Northwest. There were a total of one hundred and eight students of which 37 males and 71
females, ranging from age 18 to 46 years old who participated in this study. Of the one hundred
and eight students surveyed, 66 were residential and 42 were commuting students. In regard to
having a job, 75 students reported having at least one job, while 33 reported being unemployed.
Of the 75 students who had a job, 45 lived on campus and 30 lived off campus.
Four author created instruments were administered to the one hundred and eight
participants. The first asked participants to complete demographic information, such as gender,
age, area of study, GPA, and residential status if indicated off-campus, the students were asked
to estimate commute time. The second instrument asked participants to identify their work status.
Information, such as hours worked per week, number of jobs held, days and times of the week
they worked, reason for working and to rate their level of stress at their jobs. The third aimed to
identify campus involvement. The students were asked to identify the number of collegiate
athletic teams, on-campus clubs, student sponsored events, and intermural sports they
participated in during the fall semester. The fourth consisted of five questions which measures
the student sense of campus community on a 5-point scale (1= strongly agree and 5= strongly
disagree).
Results
In regard to the hours worked and the effects on a students GPA, the results showed that
residential students worked an average of 16.49 hours a week and commuting students worked
an average of 20.43 hours a week. The correlation between hours worked per week and the
students GPA showed no significant relationship for residential and commuting students. The
difference between residential and commuting students levels of involvement in school
sponsored activities is not significant in levels of involvement in collegiate athletics, school
sponsored clubs, club athletics and intramurals; however, there was a significant difference in the
level of school sponsored student activities.
According to the study the instrument that indicated feeling to be part of the college
community, of the five questions, four were answered strongly agree or agree by residential

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students.
The top three reasons for working for residential students included spending money, pay
tuition and pay bills/rent, whereas students who commute indicated their reason for working
were to pay bills/rent, pay tuition and for spending money. There were significant levels of stress
between commuting and residential students; where commuting students has higher levels of
stress at work than residential students.
Discussion

This study showed that there was not a significant relationship between the hours a
student worked and the GPA of either residential and commuter students, that 66% of commuter
students engaged in school sponsored activities in comparison to that of residential students
(21%), a greater percentage of residential students agreed to feeling as though they are part of the
college community in comparison to commuting students, and that commuter students feel a
greater sense of stress at their job than their residential counterparts.
The lack of a significant relationship between GPA and hours worked shows that despite
having a job, employed students are maintaining a similar GPA as those who are not working.
According to the participation, more residential students did participate more in on-campus
sponsored activities; however, there was no area of participation which was significantly
different between commuter and residential students. When asked whether a student felt like
they were a part of the college community more residential students felt they were a part of the
community as compared to commuter students. Residential students indicated experiencing
lower levels of stress at their job than commuter students. For future research it was suggested
that the study should be done with a larger sample size because of the variability of
characteristics of the students and the size of the college may have in fact influenced the impact
of student involvement, work/stress levels and academic performance.
The authors do provide a rationale for this study, they were looking to see the impact of
working while in school, school involvement and stress levels of students who commute to those
of students who live on-campus. The authors provided many literature articles which in the end
supported their results.
I felt that the author should have been more informative about the way the students were
selected for this study. Also the lack of school demographics made me question if this study was
done to the extent it should have been. The number of males to females and commuter to
residential student was not equal, and I thought that the method/ instrument should have been
explained in a little more detail, it was assumed that this was a survey (or questionnaire) given to
these students.
The information which was present as the finding of this study were consistent with the
information of the literature which was described in the literature review section of the article. I
did find that it would have been more helpful if the graphs (Tables 2-6) were explained a little
better, since the information was just listed as are presented below. There was also a line in the
paper which needs to be corrected. The line is on page 338 and reads For the four statements,
more residential students agree or strongly agree with the statements than did residential
student. I assumed that the second residential (which I underlined both to show the mistake)
was to be commuter. This information did answer the research questions which were introduced
under the research question section of the article and was consistent with the previous literature.
The author does present a convincing conclusion; however, the study does need to be
done on a large scale to see if the results will still stand. The literature and this study itself were
similar, I did find that this study should have been done on a larger scale for a unique
contribution to be produced.

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