From boredom to calculating effort: the reasons for university absenteeism
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3989/ris.2024.82.3.23.1273Keywords:
university students, class attendance, pedagogical communication, school evaluation, qualitative techniquesAbstract
University absenteeism is usually explained by student deficits. In contrast, we analyze it as a rational practice of effort management. The research is based on a case study using qualitative techniques in a faculty of social sciences. We found that absentee practices combine two conditions of possibility: “not wanting to attend” and “being able not to attend”. One does not want to attend when the subject produces boredom, which is a product of the pedagogical communication and the adequacy of the content to the students’ interests. When the subject is boring, students stop attending if it does not prevent them from obtaining the desired grade. This depends on the usefulness of attendance to pass the evaluation, as well as on the student’s school competencies and grade objectives. We conclude that absenteeism involves emotional reactions and rational calculations, which vary according to the characteristics of the subject and the student.
Downloads
References
Alonso Carmona, Carlos y Enrique Martin-Criado. 2022. "Analizar sociológicamente la implicación escolar parental: 'el tiempo importa'". Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas (179): 3-20.
Álvarez Pérez, Pedro y David López López Aguilar. 2011. "El absentismo en la enseñanza universitaria: un obstáculo para la participación y el trabajo autónomo del alumnado". Bordón 63(3): 43-56.
Ariño Villarroya, Antonio, Ramón Llopis e Inés Soler Julve. 2012. Desigualdad y universidad. La encuesta de vida y de participación de los estudiantes universitarios en España. Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València.
Barbalet, Jack M. 1999. "Boredom and Social Meaning". The British Journal of Sociology 50(4): 631-46. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-4446.1999.00631.x
Barlow, Joyce y Stephanie Fleischer. 2011. "Student Absenteeism: Whose Responsibility?". Innovations in Education and Teaching International 48(3): 227-37. https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2011.593700
Beaud, Stéphane. 1997. "Un temps élastique. Étudiants des 'cités' et examens universitaires". Terrain (29): 43-58. https://doi.org/10.4000/terrain.3215
Becker, Howard S., Blanche Geer y Everett C. Hughes. 1968. Making the grade: The academic side of college life. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Becker, Howard S., Blanche Geer, Everett C. Hughes y Anselm L. Strauss. 1977. Boys in white: Student culture in medical school. New Brunswick: NJ: Transaction Books.
Bernstein, Basil. 1985. "Clases sociales y pedagogías: visibles e invisibles". Revista colombiana de educación (15). https://doi.org/10.17227/01203916.5119
Black, Paul y Geoffrey Harrison. 1985. In place of confusion: Technology and science in the school curriculum. London: Nuffield Chelsea Curriculum Trust.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1980. Le Sens pratique. Paris: Minuit.
Bourdieu, Pierre y Jean-Claude Passeron. 1977. La reproducción: elementos para una teoría del sistema de enseñanza. Barcelona: Laia.
Collins, Randall. 2004. Interaction Ritual Chains. Princeton: Princeton University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400851744
Daza Pérez, Lidia y Marina Elias Andreu. 2015. Los estudiantes de la universidad actual: quiénes son, cómo son y qué estudian. Barcelona: Octaedro - Universitat de Barcelona. Institut de Ciències de l'Educació.
Dubet, François. 1994. "Dimensions et figures de l'expérience étudiante dans l'université de masse". Revue française de sociologie 45: 511-32. https://doi.org/10.2307/3322182
Entwistle, Noel J. 1998. "Improving teaching through research on student learning". Pp. 73-112 en University teaching: International perspectives, editado por J. J. F.Forest. New York: Garland Publishing.
Erikson, Robert, John H. Goldthorpe y Lucienne Portocarero. 1979. "Intergenerational Class Mobility in Three Western European Societies: England, France and Sweden". The British Journal of Sociology 30(4): 415-441. https://doi.org/10.2307/589632
Erlich, Valérie. 1998. Les nouveaux étudiants. Un groupe social en mutation. Paris: Armand Colin. https://doi.org/10.4000/urmis.396
Finkel, Lucila y Margarita Barañano. 2014. "La dedicación al estudio y al trabajo del alumnado universitario en España". Revista de Sociología de la Educación-RASE 7(1): 82-103.
Finkielsztein, Mariusz. 2020. "Class-related academic boredom among university students: a qualitative research on boredom coping strategies". Journal of Further and Higher Education 44(8): 1098-1113. https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2019.1658729
Glaser, Barney y Anselm Strauss. 2017. Discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203793206
Jary, David y Yann Lebeau. 2009. "The student experience and subject engagement in UK sociology: a proposed typology". British journal of sociology of education 30(6): 697-712. https://doi.org/10.1080/01425690903235219
Langa Rosado, Delia. 2020. "El precio de estudiar en la universidad española para los jóvenes de clases populares: Impacto de la reforma de las tasas universitarias de 2012 a través de los discursos de los estudiantes". Revista mexicana de investigación educativa 25(86): 603-25.
Lapeyronnie, Didier y Jean-Louis Marie. 1992. Campus blues: les étudiants face à leurs études. Paris: Seuil.
López-Bonilla, Jesús Manuel y Luis Miguel López-Bonilla. 2015. "The Multidimensional Structure of University Absenteeism: An Exploratory Study". Innovations in Education and Teaching International 52(2): 185-95. https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2013.847382
Mann, Sandi y Andrew Robinson. 2009. "Boredom in the Lecture Theatre: An Investigation into the Contributors, Moderators and Outcomes of Boredom amongst University Students". British Educational Research Journal 35(2): 243-58. https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920802042911
Martín Criado, Enrique. 1991. "Del sentido como producción: elementos para un análisis sociológico del discurso". Pp. 187-212 en El pluralismo metodológico en la investigación social, editado por M. Latiesa. Granada: Universidad de Granada.
Martín Criado, Enrique. 2010. La escuela sin funciones : crítica de la sociología de la educación crítica. Barcelona: Bellaterra.
Martín Criado, Enrique. 2014. "Mentiras, inconsistencias y ambivalencias. Teoría de la acción y análisis de discurso". Revista Internacional de Sociología 72(1): 115-38. https://doi.org/10.3989/ris.2012.07.24
Martin-Criado, Enrique, Carlos Alonso Carmona y Juan Castillo Rojas-Marcos. 2022. "Los infortunios de la autoridad pedagógica. Un estudio de caso". Revista Española de Sociología 31(3): a117. https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2022.117
McNeil, Linda M. 1986. Contradictions of Control: School Structure and School Knowledge. London: Routledge.
Merchán Iglesias, F. Javier. 2005. Enseñanza, examen y control: profesores y alumnos en la clase de historia. Barcelona: Octaedro.
Miles, Matthew B. y A. Michael Huberman. 1994. Qualitative Data Analysis: An Expanded Sourcebook. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage.
Millet, Mathias. 2003. Les étudiants et le travail universitaire: étude sociologique. Lyon: Presses Universitaires de Lyon. https://doi.org/10.4000/books.pul.10224
Moores, Elisabeth, Gurkiran K. Birdi y Helen E. Higson. 2019. "Determinants of University Students' Attendance". Educational Research 61(4): 371-87. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2019.1660587
Mora, Richard. 2011. "'School Is So Boring': High-Stakes Testing and Boredom at an Urban Middle School". Penn GSE Perspectives on Urban Education 9(1).
O'Sullivan, Sara, Léan McMahon, Gemma Moore, Diane Sabenacio Nititham, Amanda Slevin, Christina Kelly y Lisa Wixted. 2015. "'I Did Not Miss Any, Only When I Had a Valid Reason': Accounting for Absences from Sociology Classes". Teaching Sociology 43(1): 15-26. https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X14554879
Paivandi, Saeed. 2015. Apprendre à l'université. Louvain-la-Neuve: De Boeck Superieur. https://doi.org/10.3917/dbu.vandi.2015.01
Sacristán-Díaz, Macarena, Pedro Garrido-Vega, M.ª del Mar González-Zamora y Rafaela Alfalla-Luque. 2012. "¿Por qué los alumnos no asisten a clase y no se presentan a los exámenes? Datos y reflexiones sobre absentismo y abandono universitario". WPOM - Working Papers on Operations Management 3(2): 101-12. https://doi.org/10.4995/wpom.v3i2.1103
Schmulian, Astrid y Stephen Coetzee. 2011. "Class Absenteeism: Reasons for Non‐attendance and the Effect on Academic Performance". Accounting Research Journal 24(2): 178-94. https://doi.org/10.1108/10309611111163718
Sharp, John G., Jane C. Sharp y Emma Young. 2020. "Academic boredom, engagement and the achievement of undergraduate students at university: A review and synthesis of relevant literature". Research Papers in Education 35(2): 144-84. https://doi.org/10.1080/02671522.2018.1536891
Soler Julve, Inés. 2013. "Los estudiantes universitarios: perfiles y modalidades de vinculación con el estudio en la universidad española". Tesis doctoral. Departamento de Sociología y Antropología Social. Universidad de Valencia, Valencia.
Turull, Max, Berta Roca, Pilar Aparicio-Chueca, Xavier Triado-Ivern, Joan Guardia-Olmos, Pilar Presas, Mercè Bernardo, Amal Elasri-Ejjaberi e Irene Maestro-Yarza. 2019. "Las causas del absentismo de los estudiantes de Derecho según su propia opinión". Revista de Educación y Derecho 19. https://doi.org/10.1344/REYD2019.19.29094
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
© CSIC. Manuscripts published in both the print and online versions of this journal are the property of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, and quoting this source is a requirement for any partial or full reproduction.
All contents of this electronic edition, except where otherwise noted, are distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence. You may read here the basic information and the legal text of the licence. The indication of the CC BY 4.0 licence must be expressly stated in this way when necessary.
Self-archiving in repositories, personal webpages or similar, of any version other than the final version of the work produced by the publisher, is not allowed.
