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THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY SOCIAL SCIENCES weekly office hours to discuss her issues. And no, she had never gone to see her teaching assistant. And no, she didn’t really understand why, with 400 other students in her section of the course, I could not just change the due dates on her peer review writing assignments so that it would work better for her schedule. I finally had to rather abruptly end our conversation as it became clear that she was prepared to argue her point until I saw it her way. When I told this story to some colleagues, thinking it must be an anomaly, I found out that everyone I spoke to had a story of dealing with a “customer” student also. Historical Perspective and Current Interpretation of Academic Entitlement Academic entitlement as an area of study is gaining momentum in educational research. However, it is not a new topic. An early discussion of students exhibiting entitled behaviour is found in Morrow’s (1994) article discussing achievement in education within the context of Apartheid. However, his conclusions are relevant regardless of the context. He explored the idea of a cultural shift affecting education wherein the focus of education shifts away from the values of education and toward a more achievement awarded focus. Morrow asks educators to consider the impact of awarding degrees based on entitlement as opposed to awarding them based on valid achievement. He further charges educators to consider their role in the emergence of an educational system driven by entitlement. Morrow stated, The culture of entitlement, and its enthusiastic support, runs the serious risk of undermining the very good which it is their objective to obtain. It is incoherent to “delegitimize” or repudiate educational or academic achievements in the name of educational entitlement. To take the citadel this way would be to destroy the treasure that it contained. (p.46) Following Morrow’s 1994 article, research on academic entitlement has continued and taken many directions. Researchers have focused on psychological variables as well as demographic and behavioural variables related to student entitlement (e.g., Achacoso,2002; Campbell, Bonacci, Shelton, Exline, & Bushman, 2004; Ciani, Summers, & Easter, 2008; Chowning & Campbell, 2009; Foster, Campbell, & Twenge, 2003; Greenberger, Lessard, Chen, & Farruggia, 2008; Hoover, 2007; & Twenge, 2006). The current research covers analysis of personality, parenting, motivation, and gender. While these studies have all contributed in different ways to an understanding of academic entitlement, there is still much more unknown than known about the origins and impact of student entitlement. Singleton-Jackson, et al. (2010) added a current socio-cultural twist to the understanding of student entitlement by considering the impact of the Millennials on higher education and the observation of entitled behaviours among students. Millennials are those individuals born between 1982 and 2002. Millennials started arriving in university classrooms in 2002 and will be part of our student bodies until 2020. At a count of 100 million, “Millennials are the largest generational cohort in history” (Rickes, 2009, p.8). Howe and Strauss (2007) indicate that the Millennials will impact higher education as significantly as the Boomers did in the 1960 though in a different way. Choice and control paired with a bent toward immediate gratification are often cited in the literature describing the key characteristics of Millennials. These characteristics neces- 230
JILL A. SINGLETON-JACKSON, DENNIS L. JACKSON, JEFFREY REINHARDT sarily affect students’ approach to learning when played out in the university setting. Singleton-Jackson, et al. (2010) assert that not considering these factors within the context of studying student entitlement will limit understanding of the phenomenon. To further evaluate student entitlement within a socio-cultural context it is necessary to consider the increasing corporatization of higher education. As institutions increase sales and marketing, students’ perceptions of themselves as customers increase. While economic realities may force colleges and universities to compete for students, this complicates students’ roles: are they scholars or customers? When prospective students are treated as customers this brings about a level of entitlement that then follows the students into the classroom. Students may feel confused. Consumers are justified in feeling a certain level of entitlement with regard to purchased goods and services. However, once a student has purchased higher education in the form of tuition and books, a significant portion of the responsibility for learning and success lies with the buyer instead of the seller. It is clear from the historical and current research on student entitlement that there are many avenues and perspectives to consider when attempting to arrive at an understanding of this issue that is currently affecting higher education. Defining Academic Entitlement Academic entitlement can be said to have its roots in the literature on psychological entitlement (Campbell, et al., 2004). Campbell et al. define psychological entitlement as “…a stable and pervasive sense that one deserves more and is entitled to more than others” (p. 31). A similar but slightly different definition is offered by Harvey and Martinko (2009), who indicate that “psychological entitlement refers to the phenomenon in which individuals consistently believe that they deserve preferential rewards and treatment, often with little consideration of actual qualities or performance levels” (p. 459). Jackson, Singleton-Jackson, and Frey (2010) reviewed definitions associated with academic entitlement and found some consistencies as well as differences with respect to how researchers described the construct. For instance, some researchers emphasized entitlement relative to actual academic performance (Singleton-Jackson, Jackson, & Reinhardt, 2010) while others emphasized personal responsibility (Chowning & Campbell, 2009). Furthermore, some authors did not provide a formal definition of academic entitlement but relied on behavioral examples to convey the meaning of the construct (Greenberger, et al., 2008). Empirical work in the area of academic entitlement is relatively new. The first instance of empirical work we located was a dissertation by Achacoso (2002). Subsequent to that there have been only a few studies published (e.g., Chowning & Campbell, 2009; Ciani et al., 2008; Greenberger et al., 2008; Singleton-Jackson et al., 2010). Given this fact, we feel it is important for researchers to clearly define the construct of academic entitlement and, to the extent possible, arrive at a common definition. Different measures developed with different notions of academic entitlement puts this research area at risk of developing different and perhaps contradictory findings. Toward this end of a common definition, Jackson et al. (2010) proposed a definition and suggested that different research teams working in the area should communicate with the intent of developing a common definition of academic entitlement. We argue in this paper that the definition of academic entitlement should be consistent with the definitions of psychological entitlement. A literature search on the keyword academic entitlement produced 231
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