Professional Identity Development of LGBTQ+ Engineering College Students
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and/or Queer/Questioning (LGBTQ+) college students are a minority group who face the emerging challenges of adulthood and career decision making, as well as the unique challenge of navigating a minority sexual or gender identity. Some emerging adults may find identity exploration and commitment to be a smooth process; however, emerging adults with marginalized identities, such as sexual[HC1] and gender minority youth, may find identity development to be an arduous process as they navigate oppressive contexts. Engineering has historically been dominated by white, heterosexual males, where LGBTQ+ persons are underrepresented, possibly leading to unique sexual identity and career development experiences of LGBTQ+ engineering students. Currently, career and vocational identity development among LGBTQ+ college students and engineering students is understudied.
This study fills an important gap in literature about the relationship between career development and decision making and identity development. A nationwide survey of over 400 LGBTQ+ college students was conducted across all majors, followed by an additional survey of 88 LGBTQ+ students in engineering. As part of the survey, respondents answered questions about mental health, sexual orientation history, discrimination, educational and career development history, vocational identity, career decisions, and sexual or gender identity, as well as demographic information. Respondents also answered three open-ended questions about their career goals, perceived barriers to meeting those goals, and support systems which helped to address those barriers. Our preliminary results show that many more LGBTQ+ college students’ express confidence in their sexual identity than in their career identities, potentially indicating that LGBTQ+ students must first overcome feelings of alienation towards their sexual identity before they can comfortably develop their career identity. [RB2] This supports the “bottleneck hypothesis”, which indicates that LGBTQ+ youth may delay aspects of their identity, such as a career identity, until they have worked through the process of developing a LGBTQ+ identity.
This presentation will also summarize the reported barriers and supports to LGBTQ+ students achieving their career goals. Initial analysis identified 5 main themes in the reported barriers of the respondents, including health, discrimination, resources, technical skills and emotional ability. Additional analysis will contrast and compare the differences in responses between LGBTQ+ engineering students of the second survey with the responses of the initial survey of LGBTQ+ college students of all majors. The conclusions of this research will help to identity challenges and support systems more precisely, as well as lay the foundation for further supports to be built for LGBTQ+ students.
Professional Identity Development of LGBTQ+ Engineering College Students
Category
Poster Presentation
Description
Session: 17-01-01 Research Posters - On Demand
ASME Paper Number: IMECE2020-25151
Session Start Time: ,
Presenting Author: Maggie Lea
Presenting Author Bio:
Authors: Margaret Lea Utah State Universtiy
Harley Cragun Utah State Universtiy
Joshua Parmenter Utah State Unviersity
Renee Galliher Utah State University
Ryan BerkeUtah State University