Emporia State Research Studies Vol. 54, Iss. 1

Emporia State Research Studies Vol. 54, Iss. 1 November- December 2023 Artwork “Taking Up Space: Mia (detail)” by Stephanie Alaniz

EMPORIA STATE UNIVERSITY

Emporia State Research Studies Volume 54, no. 1 November-December, 2023 Cover: “Taking Up Space: Mia (detail)” by Stephanie Alaniz Relief on Fabric with Appliqué 2022

Editors: Michael A. Smith and Erika Martin

Lesly R. Krome, David Tomchuk, Naciha Alami, and Alyssa Mohney: The Influence of the Stereotype Content Model on Prospective College Enrollees’ Institutional Assessments

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Emporia State Research Studies

Vol. 54, no. 1, p. 1-14 (2023)

The Influence of the Stereotype Content Model on Prospective College Enrollees’ Institutional Assessments Lesly R. Kromea, David Tomchukb, Naciha Alamic, & Alyssa Mohneyd Department of Industrial/Organizational Psychology St. Mary’s University TX, Department of Allied Health, Kinesiology, and Sport Sciences Southeast Missouri State University MO, cFAB Group France, dApex Systems St. Louis Division MO Corresponding Author: lkrome@stmarytx.edu a b

The purpose of the study was to determine if stereotype formation of academic institutions (through organizational personification) follows the same pattern as the stereotype formation of groups. The universal dimensions of social cognition, competence and warmth, are the basis for stereotype formation of groups under the Stereotype Content Model (Fiske et al., 2002). The present study manipulated aspects of posted online student reviews for an institution of higher education to reflect varying levels of competence and warmth, and then measured the likeability of the organization and perceptions of power and threat (N = 136). A two-way factorial MANCOVA (with Bonferroni correction) revealed that warmth was an important aspect of organizational likeability, F1, 131 = 26.823, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.170, as was competence, F1, 131 = 89.635, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.406. However, only competence perceptions affected participants’ interpretations of institutional power, F1, 131 = 129.468, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.497. The universities presented as high in competence (M = 11.29, SD = 1.88) were perceived as more powerful than universities with low competence (M = 7.22, SD = 2.22). The interaction between the IVs of competence and warmth was significant for the DV of organizational likeability, F1, 131 = 5.956, p = 0.016, η2p = 0.043, with greater favorability being shown for universities identified as both warm and competent. The current investigation provides institutions of higher education and marketing educators with valuable insights that can be applied to marketing campaigns about how the Stereotype Content Model affects the perceptions of potential future college enrollees.

Keywords: judgement/decision-making, marketing, Stereotype Content Model, online reviews Introduction In the late 19th century, the concept of college or university advertising was considered a departure from academic dignity and abnormal academic behavior (Adams-Johnson et al., 2019). The philosophy and approach to recruiting students to attend institutions of higher education evolved from posting notices of curriculum and admission requirements while constructing a personal letter to a prospective student in the early 20th century, to one involving standardized testing and considering personal characteristics in the middle of the 20th century, to integrating campus-wide and alumni involvement to promote the establishment to prospective students at on- and off-campus events and

various electronic platforms in the late 20th and early 21st centuries (Adams-Johnson et al., 2019). Thus, it is evident that there has been a gradual but clear transformation in the process of soliciting students to academic entities. Currently, formal and informal recruitment efforts have become vital to the success of any institution of higher education where the institution must determine the message that it wishes to transmit to potential enrollees and how it wishes to transmit the message (Kuzma & Wright, 2013; Tapp et al., 2004). For the purposes of the current paper, the terms “college” and “university” will be used interchangeably to denote an institution of higher education (though the authors acknowledge the differences that exist between these two entities).

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 College enrollee recruitment changes typically coincide with population growth and decline, the number of options for post-secondary education, financial aid and grants, and the shifting demographics and characteristics of those attending college (Adams-Johnson et al., 2019). College recruitment efforts will increase in importance throughout the first half of the 21st century as the projected population of graduating United States (U.S.) high school students is predicted to grow from 3.5 million in 2014 and peak at around 4 million students in 2025, then is expected to decline until the year 2037 to about 3.52 million (Bransberger et al., 2020). Based on this data, the 2037 United States high school graduate population will be equivalent in size to that of 2014 (Bransberger et al., 2020).

These enrollment declines were already expected from the “birth dearth” following the Great Recession of 2008, where the number of births between 2008 and 2011 declined rapidly (Barshay, 2018; Bransberger et al., 2020). However, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on short and long-term college enrollment remains uncertain and fluctuating.

Depending on the type of institution, the actual undergraduate enrollment for the 2020-2021 academic year declined 3.3%, whereas the graduate enrollment increased by 4.3%, still resulting in a decrease in the overall number of college enrollees (Barshay, 2018). The expected “birth dearth” decline, combined with COVID-19 pandemic or future unforeseen complication, for attending college in the U.S. will make the college recruitment process more competitive as institutions of higher education seek to transform themselves to operate on the likelihood of declining enrollment, growing distrust of the higher education system, and reduced endowments and taxpayer support of public education (Hill, 2021; Maloney & Kim, 2020). Because of these issues and more, organizations must work hard to project the best possible image of their institution in order to be more desirable to potential enrollees. Specifically, the universal dimensions of interpersonal and intergroup social cognition can help enhance or detract from the perceived status and viability of an organization.

2 Universal Dimensions of Social Cognition.

The universally recognized dimensions of warmth and competence are believed to serve as the origin of stereotype formation while changing social pressures and perceptions have been found to affect the stereotypes of various groups (Fiske et al., 2002). Warmth, the association of perceived cooperative intentions and prosocial behavior, and competence, the ability to execute on desired intentions, have been identified as universal dimensions of social cognition (Fiske, 2018; Fiske et al., 2007; Fiske et al., 2002). Perceptions of people and groups who possess both warmth and competence generally elicit positive reactions and sentiment, whereas opposite perceptions (cold and incompetent) elicit generally negative reactions and sentiment (Aaker et al., 2012; Fiske et al., 2007). Those who display elevated levels of warmth or competence but are not regarded as high or low in both categories generally receive ambivalent reactions (Fiske et al., 2007). The interaction of warmth and competence form the basis of the Stereotype Content Model (SCM), where stereotype formation occurs from assigning group characteristics to individual group members because the person is identified as a group member (Fiske et al., 2002; Kolbl et al., 2019). Common stereotyping examples include the elderly, children, and disabled individuals (perceived to have high warmth and low competence), citizens and middle socioeconomic class members (perceived to have high warmth and high competence), poor individuals, homeless, and immigrants (perceived to have low warmth and low competence), and the rich, professionals, and technical experts (perceived to have low warmth and high competence; Fiske, 2018).

Under the SCM, two critical factors are considered: is the stereotyped entity a threat and does the stereotyped entity possess power? Perceiving threats and power stems from evolutionary mechanisms essential in a living organism’s ability to survive (Fiske et al., 2007). Identifying if one’s life is at risk is primarily the purpose of threat detection, but in a modern world, recognizing competition

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 for valued and limited resources or damage to one’s livelihood is a more accurate depiction of threat (Fiske et al., 2007). A lack of warmth can signal the potential for threat, especially if it is coupled with a perception of competence.

Competence also signals perceptions of power, which can be viewed as the ability to control resources and is strongly linked to status (Cuddy et al., 2008). Thus, perceptions of power and threat have great relevance in stereotype formation within the SCM. The SCM initially sought to evaluate biases and stereotypes formed by society about specific groups of individuals regarding factors such as age, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, professional work, societal status, and national origin. More recently, the SCM has been applied to investigate tourism (Shen et al., 2019; Tung et al., 2020), product selection based on country of origin (Diamantopoulos et al., 2017), brand marketing (Güntürkün et al., 2020; Ivens et al., 2015), mobile phone usage and perceptions (Schwind et al., 2019), and hospital choice (Drevs, 2013). Stereotypes can also be formed about companies through organizational personification. Organizations that are socially responsible may be viewed as warm whereas companies solely focused on the bottom line (especially at the expense of their employees) may be considered cold institutions. Additionally, organizations can actively personify their company via social media interactions with consumers (Sung & Kim, 2018).

The stereotypes of global brands on warmth and competence affect consumer perceptions of the brand on characteristics of ownership and purchase intentions (Kolbl et al., 2019).

Brands that consumers perceive as local are thought of as local cultural icons or symbols of local culture and considered with high warmth and provide insights into the brands’ “intention” (Kolbl et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2020). Alternatively, brands perceived as global in nature are stereotypically observed as highly competent and describe the brands’ performance based on concepts of reliability and consistency (Kolbl et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2020). Although often viewed as organizations that offer education and

3 training, colleges are inherently businesses and brands that desire to be viewed favorably by current and potential consumers. Thus, branding and advertising institutions of higher education through all possible channels becomes critically important. One particular channel that has become highly relevant in recent years is that of online reviews posted on social media websites which depict positive or negative consumer evaluations.

Brand Identity and Social Media Utilization. The authentic personal experiences of others, conveyed in the form of personal narrative or quantitative review/ evaluation, has the ability to influence how consumers view products, companies, and higher education institutions. Karakaya and Barnes (2010) evaluated the impact that online reviews have on brand or company selection.

By analyzing online brand and company selection, social media websites influenced consumer opinion and increased consumer information-gathering and engagement in online activity through the active involvement in online customer care experiences. Karakaya and Barnes (2010) also determined that non-socially based websites, including the company website, internet search engines, and consumer advocacy websites, had no significant impact on consumer opinion. The authors revealed that consumers who value and trust social media websites also utilized social media platforms to share their customer care experiences with other users; consumers who believed their voice would make a difference were more inclined to share their opinions. Additionally, consumers who are heavily engaged in online activities are highly likely to choose brands and companies based on the online reviews and experiences of others who previously utilized the product.

Social media platforms have become integral components of recruiting college students and are expected to continue expanding throughout the 21st century (Adams-Johnson et al., 2019; Galan et al., 2015). By performing in-depth interviews of postgraduate students’ college decisionmaking process, Galan et al., (2015) determined that the top two priorities to using

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 social media were to make determinations about student life and to obtain reviews from former students. Separate articles have presented how organizational image affects college selection and how prospective college attendees interact with the available information (Le et al., 2019; Pampaloni, 2010). Although prospective students have different primary desires and priorities in selecting a college—including career preparation, scholarships and financial aid offered, or proximity to a location—students prefer seeking and consuming information about prospective colleges via the internet (Le et al., 2019; Pampaloni, 2010). College characteristics were rated higher than interpersonal and informational resources when prospective students weighed their decisions to apply to a college, and students were more likely to respond to information they found themselves through the internet or requested compared to material sent by the university (Pampaloni, 2010).

Additionally, prospective students noted how they desired information from students already enrolled at the institution or recently graduated (Pampaloni, 2010). Le et al. (2019) explored how prospective students utilize electronic word-of-mouth and social media resources when selecting institutions of higher education because these resources are public, easily accessible, and beneficial to the sharing of information from multiple unsolicited perspectives. The top seven factors that prospective college enrollees seek from online resources (degree reputation, course content, university reputation, employment prospects, image, psychosocial life, and course difficulty) relate to perceptual information that prospective attendees desire to gather public first-hand experiential information about (Le et al., 2019). The subsequent five factors searched by prospective students through social media regarding college selection (i.e., entrance requirements, location, cost of living, admission process, and course flexibility) related to factual knowledge students might be confirming to ensure the correctness of official marketing and website material (Le et al., 2019). Among the lowest identified resources prospective college enrollees attempt to

4 gather through social media resources were available college resources and rankings (Le et al., 2019). These combined findings indicate that prospective college enrollees are voracious consumers of social media and actively pursue information that is not directly controlled or provided by the standard institution marketing procedures but what is instead available through online social reviews.

The Current Study. From a postsecondary education perspective, warmth and competence have been shown to influence student evaluations of instructors (Carbajal & Hughes, 2016) and how perceived stereotypical professor warmth and competence affects the likelihood for a student to register for a course (Nesdoly et al., 2020). As previously mentioned, however, stereotypes can be formed for nonhuman entities too (e.g., personification of organizations or brands), such as a college or university. Following the current literature review, the authors determined that warmth and competence have not been applied to the viewing of publicly available online college review, rating, and comment platforms that are common components of social media.

This identified gap in the literature is the crux of the current study.

The authors chose projected warmth and competence as two independent variables (IVs) depicted in online reviews of a fictitious university and assessed the impact that the manipulation of those factors had on participants’ likeability rating of the institution. Perceptions of institutional warmth and competence were manipulated through four online review statements designed to reflect high and low expression according to condition (high competence/high warmth, high competence/low warmth, low competence/high warmth, low competence/ low warmth). Likeability ratings of the organization was a dependent variable (DV), as well as perceived power and perceived threat, two constructs associated with the SCM. Political orientation was identified as a possible covariate because of current research (Dodd et al., 2012; Hibbing et

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 al., 2014; Oxley et al., 2008; Salter et al., 2022) associating conservatives with greater sensitivity to perceived threats (perceived threat being one of the DVs).

Therefore, the purpose of this investigation was to determine if prospective college enrollee ratings would be influenced by the perceived warmth and competence of an institution when viewing an online review of a university. The following hypotheses were proposed based on previous research pertaining to group-based stereotype formation: H1: Participants will perceive the warm and competent organization most favorably.

H2: Participants will perceive the cold and competent organization as the most powerful and threatening.

Evaluating whether warmth and competence are perceived by prospective college enrollees when examining publicly available online college reviews will contribute to the overall understanding of organizational stereotyping and the universal dimensions of social cognition. Additionally, this investigation will provide insight into how prospective college enrollees interpret publicly posted information from current and past college attendees when deciding whether that college is appropriate to continue investigating for possible attendance.

Methods Participants. An a priori power analysis using G*Power indicated that a sample size of 130 participants was necessary to achieve an effect size of f = 0.40. The current study obtained a total of 146 participants, but only 136 participants (93 women, 43 men) had usable data; the mean age of participants was 20.4 years and 75.2% of participants identified as White. Participants were recruited online through a snowball sampling method in which the survey weblink was distributed through

5 email and social media amongst the researchers’ networks. Additionally, undergraduate students enrolled in psychology courses at a regional Midwestern U.S. university were invited to participate for course credit, via the institution’s research participation portal, Sona System. Students could access the Sona System website to view and select from several different research study survey weblinks (the current one included). All participants were treated according to American Psychological Association (APA) ethical guidelines for research and by the standards stipulated by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) that approved the study.

Materials. To vary the two IVs (competence and warmth), the researchers established four different conditions: high warmth and high competence, low warmth and low competence, high warmth and low competence, and low warmth and high competence. To represent those four conditions, we created screenshots of “Grade Reports,” an online review website for current students and graduates to post evaluations on a given university. West Forest University is a fictitious institution that we chose for this study to represent the branded university about which reviewers had posted evaluations. Each screenshot of Grade Reports was digitally manipulated in Microsoft Office Paint to reflect the varying conditions of the institution. All conditions were transmitted through four different evaluative online review comments posted by four identified postgraduate students: two of the online reviews included both warmth and competence features (varied as high or low by condition), one student review included only warmth (or lack of warmth) features, and one review included only competence (or incompetence) features. Warmth was communicated through written commentary in the website screenshot with terms such as “friendly,” or “welcoming.”

In contrast, the lack of warmth was communicated through “unfriendly,” or “not nice.” Competence was illustrated by “prestigious,” or “knowledgeable.” In contrast, low competence was transmitted through “not rigorous,” or “not effective.”

To test the efficacy of the differing conditions

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023

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and evaluate the selected vocabulary to distinguish between the four experimental conditions, we ran a pre-experimental manipulation check by asking a diverse group of 30 individuals (who were not invited to participate in the actual study) to provide feedback on our Grade Reports screenshots.

Each person was given two of the four conditions and asked to give feedback on what each comment meant. The results of this manipulation check demonstrated that the vocabulary selected for the online reviews were inducing individuals in the manipulation check to assess the organizations as either warm/cold or competent/incompetent, or some similar synonyms, based on the condition the participants were provided. Once the screenshot material was tested, it was placed into the Survey Monkey website so that after participants viewed the screenshot, they would be directed to the surveys via a weblink.

than a group of people. Sample items from this scale included “How prestigious are the jobs typically achieved by members of this organization?” and “If members of this organization get special breaks, this is likely to make things more difficult for people like me.” The Power Subscale had a high internal consistency of coefficient alpha 0.903 while the Threat Subscale had an acceptable internal consistency of coefficient alpha 0.766.

The surveys in the current study included the following: a researcher-generated questionnaire regarding the likeability of the organization, the Status and Competition Scale (Fiske et al., 2002) which were slightly modified for the current study, and a demographic survey. The organizational likeability survey was a nine-item survey utilizing a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = neither agree nor disagree, 4 = agree, and 5 = strongly agree. This survey evaluated participants’ favorable rating of the school. Sample items included: “I like this university,” “I would be respectful of this university if I attended here,” and “This university is off-putting,” (reversecoded). The organizational likeability survey had high internal reliability, with a coefficient alpha of 0.949.

Procedure. The survey was distributed through email and social media (Facebook) as well as having the link posted in the Sona System. The first step of the survey was the informed consent; each participant had to voluntarily consent to be able to participate in the study and had to identify as older than 18 years of age. After providing informed consent, each participant was brought to the Survey Monkey platform through a link and was randomly assigned to view one of four screenshots of West Forest University online reviews on Grade Report. Participants had unlimited time to observe the screenshot.

Once participants were ready, they had to click on “next” to access the surveys. Participants first filled out the organizational likeability survey, the Status and Competition Scale, and finally provided demographic information.

Participants were not financially compensated, but students enrolled in an introductory psychology course were given one research credit in a course assignment for participating in the study.

The modified Status and Competition Scale was an evaluation of participants’ perception of the organization’s prestige and power. This scale uses a 5-point Likert with response options being: 1 = not at all, 2 = low, 3 = somewhat, 4 = high, and 5 = extremely. There are only six items in this scale, with three questions addressing each of the two constructs. This scale was modified to reflect an organization rather

Finally, demographic information was collected about the participants. This information was collected to better understand the make-up of the study sample as well as to assess potential covariates. Participants’ provided details regarding their age, sex, ethnicity, gender identity, religious orientation, and political orientation as well as their major/ intended major and class ranking (for the student respondents).

Results The data was first screened prior to analysis; Tabachnick and Fidell’s (2007) guidelines were referred to during data screening and

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 subsequent analysis. All reverse-coded items were changed and then missing data was examined. Ten participant responses were eliminated entirely for excessive missing data, which brought the final sample size used in analysis down to 136. There were also several instances of data missing completely at random (MCAR) on two of the DVs which was determined per Little’s MCAR test non-significance in IBM’s SPSS. In two separate cases for the DV of organizational likeability, the participants’ response averages for the entire scale were imputed for the missing value for each respective individual.

One missing data point was imputed into the Threat Subscale using the participant’s average for the subscale.

Scale reliability analyses were run for the three DVs and Cronbach’s alphas for each of the scales were computed. All scales were found to have acceptable reliability (previously reported). The data was screened for outliers, but none were found. Normality was assumed due to cell size (69 participants were in the low warmth condition and the same number were in the low competence condition and 67 participants were in the high warmth condition and also the high competence condition).

The Box’s Test of Equality of Covariance Matrices was significant, indicating that the covariance matrices of the DVs were not equal across the groups, F18, 61,352.114 = 2.734, p < 0.001. However, Box’s is a very sensitive test and further analysis revealed that the assumption of equality of variance was met for all three of the DVs. Levene’s Test of Equality of Error Variances was not significant for organizational likeability, F3, 132 = 2.601, p = 0.055, power, F3, 132 = 0.395, p = 0.757, and threat, F3, 132 = 0.434, p = 0.729.

A two-way factorial MANCOVA was run using the Bonferroni confidence interval adjustment to account for the multiple comparisons. At the multivariate level, political orientation was found to be a significant covariate (Wilks’ Lambda = 0.921, F3, 129 = 3.693, p = 0.014, η2p = 0.079). The IVs of warmth (Wilks’ Lambda = 0.782,

7 F3, 129 = 12.018, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.218), and competence (Wilks’ Lambda = 0.452, F3, 129= 52.048, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.548) also appeared significant at the multivariate level analysis; additionally, there was a significant interaction between the two IVs (Wilks’ Lambda = 0.942, F3, 129 = 2.631, p = 0.05, η2p = 0.058) which demanded further examination.

At the univariate level of analysis, political orientation was found to be significant for the DV of perceived threat, F1, 131 = 10.975, p = 0.001, η2p = 0.077, with conservative participants providing higher ratings of threat (M = 9.50, SD = 2.11) and liberal participants indicating lower perceptions of threat (M = 7.41, SD = 2.49) from the organization. This was a very interesting finding in that political orientation was the only significant variable for the DV of perceived threat; this finding is supported by previous research, which is why political orientation was considered a covariate in the first place.

The IV of warmth was significant for the DV of organizational likeability, F1, 131= 26.823, p < 0.001, η2p = .170; participants had differential ratings of favorability for the organization depending on whether the organization was high (M = 27.99, SD = 8.99) or low (M = 22.19, SD = 7.74) in perceived warmth. In a subsequent analysis, the simple main effects showed that the IV of warmth was significant in impacting perceptions of organizational likeability (p < .001) but not for perceived power (p = 0.615) or perceived threat (p = 0.079).

The IV of competence was significant for the DV of organizational likeability, F1, = 89.635, p < 0.001, η2p = 0.406, with 131 universities high in competence (M = 30.36, SD = 7.61) being favored over universities low in competence (M = 19.88, SD = 6.62).

The IV of competence was also significant for the DV of perceived power, F1, 131 = 129.468, p < .001, η2p = .497. The universities presented as high in competence (M = 11.29, SD = 1.88) were perceived as more powerful than universities with low competence (M = 7.22, SD = 2.22). In the analysis of simple main effects, the IV of competence was significant

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 in impacting perceptions of organizational likeability (p < 0.001) and perceived power (p < 0.001), but not for perceived threat (p = 0.366).

The interaction between the IVs of competence and warmth was significant for the DV of organizational likeability, F1, 131 = 5.956, p = 0.016, η2p = 0.043, with greater favorability being shown for universities identified as both warm and competent (see Fig. 1). However, this interaction effect was not present for the DVs of perceived power F1, 131= 0.001, p = 0.972, η2p < 0.001 and perceived threat F1, 131 = 0.096, p = 0.757, η2p = 0.096.

8 hypothesis (H2) that universities high in competence but low in warmth would be viewed as most powerful and threatening was only partially supported. The results of this study indicated that prospective students who perceived a college as more competent (regardless of warmth) found the college to be a more powerful organization with more admiration for attendance. Colleges interpreted as being warm and incompetent were less desirable compared to cold and competent institutions. Each of the DVs evaluated by the analysis was significant except for threat (which was only significant with the covariate of political orientation; conservatives found institutions more

Figure 1. Perceived Organizational Likeability, Power, and Threat by Experimental Condition.

Discussion The purpose of this current investigation was to apply the universal dimensions of social cognition (warmth and competence) to evaluate the perceptions of prospective enrollees regarding a fictitious university based on written reviews posted on an open public forum website. The first hypothesis (H1) that participants would perceive the warm and competent university most favorability was supported, while the second

threatening than individuals of other political affiliations). These findings were at odds with the hypothesis, which theorized that more competent and cold colleges would be perceived as most threatening (this hypothesis aligns with previous research surrounding the SCM and group attributions).

Classically, the dimensions of warmth and competence are how individuals spontaneously interpret behavior to form impressions of groups, creating the foundation for stereotype formation (Fiske et al., 2007). Between

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 warmth and competence, warmth is typically judged before competence because warmth provides if a judgment is perceived as positive or negative. In contrast, competence predicts how positive or negative the interaction is (Fiske et al., 2007). Additionally, warmth has a more significant weighted influence when compared to competence when evaluating individuals and social groups, meaning that displaying warmth is a stronger indicator for viewing an individual or group as acceptable compared to competence. However, the present investigation suggested that when considering an online college review, competence is weighted higher compared to warmth because the participants indicated that if given a bipolar choice, the preference was for a competent and cold college instead of an incompetent and warm college.

During individual and group stereotype formation, perceptions of the warmth and competence of others influences perceived competition (Fiske et al., 2002). When people or groups meet, each side desires to understand the goals of the other to determine how efficient the opposite individual or group will be towards meeting their stated goals or whether the other party will result in difficulty attaining the goal. Groups and related allies who do not compete with each other are acknowledged as warm. In contrast, competitive groups and groups perceived as parasitic appear incompatible and are perceived as cold (Fiske et al., 2002). Colleges desire to appear warm and competent to new prospective members (individuals or groups) while simultaneously appearing non-threatening to other groups that include competing colleges and individuals choosing not to attend college. However, fundamentally, colleges provide a specific consumer education product wherein identifying a constant supply of new customers (students) enables the entities’ success. Until recently, the concept of university image and how that relates to its reputation was investigated minimally; however, it has been shown that the primary variable that determines the supportive attitude of how first-year students perceived their college’s organizational

9 personality, reputation, and external prestige was the perception of how others view the university they belong to (Sung & Yang, 2008). Although less significant factors than external prestige, the university’s “personality traits” and reputation also impacted firstyear student constructs of university image.

Sung and Yang (2008) investigated the university image of currently enrolled firstyear students, whereas the current study investigated how prospective college enrollees perceived attending a university based on an online review. The current investigation indicated that prospective college enrollees favor competence over warmth regarding unsolicited online reviews. Although higher education institutions cannot directly control public review forums, colleges can control how they provide their entire product to its consumers (students) over multiple years.

Focusing on providing a competent service across the entirety of the student experience can increase the likelihood that current enrollees will provide positive unsolicited online reviews of the institution for prospective students to read and consider.

In 1983, the organized ranking of American colleges began when US News & World Report published its first ranking of American colleges and universities (Morse & Brooks, 2020). During the subsequent years, various other entities such as the Princeton Review, Forbes, and Niche developed their proprietary ranking of colleges and universities.

Historically, these rankings are based on reported metrics such as the student-tofaculty ratio, the average federal loan debt of graduates, and graduation and retention rates (Morse & Brooks, 2020). These ratings often require the cooperation of the college or university and focused on the comprehensive academic institution but began expanding to various types of academic programs.

However, prospective college attendees may be more inclined to seek information regarding college ranking through social media platforms (Galan et al, 2015). During the 21st century, websites such as www. ratemyprofessors.com and www.gradreports. com and various social media platforms, including Facebook and Google Reviews,

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 have provided a platform for college students to openly and freely review their institutions of higher learning, individual professors, and academic programs and share that information on the internet. These reviews are published in real-time, are easily accessible, free, unsolicited, and offered through means which are outside the control of the institution’s marketing and image campaigns. These reviews can be solicited or unsolicited, but minimal research about how these reviews can influence prospective student enrollment exists. As demonstrated by Le et al., 2019 and Pampaloni, 2010, prospective college attendees in the 21st century seek out these unofficial channels and methods to review and evaluate various colleges to obtain the insight of current students and graduates to determine if the institution is a good match.

Given that the Generation Z cohorts have a tremendous propensity for smartphone and internet access and commonly upload to and view multiple social media websites throughout the day (Anderson & Jiang, 2018), unsolicited college reviews by potential future peers and alumni on these platforms can influence potential enrollees during the college selection process (Galan et al., 2015; Le et al., 2019). Additionally, as Karakaya and Barnes (2010) indicated, heavily engaged consumers of online content base their product choice on the available reviews and experiences of others and are inclined to share their experiences with other potential or actual users when it is believed the opinion would make a difference. Given the internet and social media usage numbers of Generation Z individuals, these actual and potential consumers of a post-secondary education product are likely to share and read online reviews of various aspects of any institution of higher education and read the posts of others. As indicated by the current study, these combined weighted influences can indicate some combination of competence and warmth. The current study helps colleges and programs understand the potential weighted influence of competence and warmth when prospective college attendees view social media and similar electronic word-of-mouth posts of the potential future peers and alumni

10 because potential college enrollees seek and value these information sources during the search process.

Consider prestige (university reputation) as an example. Prospective enrollees may find an institution based on the college marketing its regional prestige in the local area. The potential consumer will then evaluate the college based on brand localness or brand globalness (Kolbl et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2020). Then a Generation Z individual would search the institutions’ social media reviews or contact those currently attending or who recently graduated to confirm this information (Galan et al., 2015; Le et al., 2019). If graduates describe difficulty obtaining employment in their field or employers not considering them, this could be viewed as a threat to the college’s ability to provide a competent education -- influencing the potential enrollees’ willingness to attend the institution. Prospective enrollees can also decide to check the published college admission requirement with current students to ensure the official marketing and website material is accurate, also determining institutional competence. Since prospective college enrollees are obtaining information and perceptions about colleges through social media and by methods outside of traditional college marketing efforts to get a sense of the organization from peers currently or formerly recently affiliated with the institution, the college must provide an overall experience to current attendees that establish competence and warmth. By focusing on competence and warmth, current students and recent graduates will provide positive unsolicited online reviews that would highlight positive aspects of the degree and university reputation, institution image, and psychosocial life that prospective attendees highly search for.

The findings of the current investigation are valuable to institutions of higher education and those who create and maintain college recruiting and marketing materials. College officials may not have consciously thought about how potential enrollees consider publicly available unsolicited online review sources and that competence and warmth can

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 be extracted from these posts. Additionally, potential enrollees may only examine these materials for a short period before continuing to a competing institution. If several publicly available review posts describe institutional coldness or incompetence during that instance, that potential enrollee may eliminate the institution from consideration before reviewing the traditional collegecontrolled marketing materials and official social media channels. Institutions of higher education should ensure the competence of all employees (faculty and staff) and departments (student life, housing, financial aid, admissions, registrar, etc.) to increase the likelihood that current attendees and graduates will continuously post positive comments about the institution on various social media review websites, and that these posts highlight the competence of the institution.

Limitations and Further Research. This study possessed several limitations. The first limitation was that our branded institution (West Forest University) is fictitious. We purposely choose to fabricate a university for this study because we wanted the subjects to focus on the wording of the review instead of the institution name to reduce any potential biases due to perceived tuition or prestige and to eliminate how location affects institution selection. However, West Forest University being fictitious provides an incomplete picture of the institution during the college selection process and may have affected external validity. The second limitation was the demographics of the respondents. Of the 136 respondents, 93 identified as female, and 75.2% stated their ethnicity was White. Although this survey instrument was distributed to a diverse pool of potential respondents through email and posted on social media platforms, the actual respondents skewed towards female and White participants. It remains unknown if the findings of the current study would generalize to a more diverse group of respondents.

Although not stated previously, the survey instrument was distributed, and data collection occurred, during the initial phases of the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown in the spring of 2020. Although survey distribution

11 coincided with a worldwide adverse event, this timing was unplanned and unexpected.

The timing of survey distribution potentially limited our respondents to those who were generally unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic shut down for various reasons.

This limitation potentially excluded subjects who otherwise would have responded or inadvertently captured a more significant percentage of subjects from a higher socioeconomic group, those with stable internet connections, or individuals with stable housing.

Conclusions and Implications. The current study demonstrates that the universal dimensions of social cognition (warmth and competence) and the SCM can be applied to online review posts of higher education institutions and that potential attendees can determine the institution’s warmth and competence based on these unsolicited and publicly available reviews. Future studies can further evaluate this topic to identify if the same principles apply to diverse groups when evaluating colleges for attendance (transgender or ethnic minorities), if a nonfictitious college brand would influence the perception of warmth and competence, or how socioeconomic or metropolitan demographics (rural, suburban, and urban) affect the perception of warmth and competence on college brand and attendance.

Warmth and competence have been identified to influence the perceptions of individuals, businesses, and brands with sparse application to college recruitment and online reviews.

After viewing an unsolicited online review of a fictitious college, prospective attendees discerned the warmth and competence of the institution. Although colleges should appear warm and competent to their prospective customers and future students, colleges must specifically appear competent on sociallybased online review platforms to manage how prospective enrollees respond favorably to the institution. By emphasizing competence and ensuring that all employees (faculty and staff) are competent in their jobs, college graduates should write online reviews that describe the institution’s competence. Warmth

Emporia State Research Studies 54(1), 2023 should never be undermined, but a college that appeared more competent than warm in our investigation was more desirable for prospective students. As institutions of higher education enter the second quarter of the 21st century and an era of projected enrollment declines, they should consider the totality of the academic, social, campus life, and career development interactions each current student receives to facilitate each graduate posting an online review that describes the competence and warmth of the institution on various social media platforms.

Data Availability Statement. The data (and stimuli) that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, [Lesly R. Krome], upon reasonable request.

Competing Interests Statement. The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

Ethical Statement. The current study received approval from the Southeast Missouri State University Institutional Review Board (Approval #20200038) prior to data collection and all participants received a thorough informed consent and debriefing.

The research was conducted in accordance with APA guidelines.

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