Research Over The Influence Of College Student Associations On The Socialization Of College Students

College student associations are an important aspect of college students’ campus life, playinga great role in enriching college students’ campus life, cultivating their interests and enhancingtheir self-education as well as the philosophy of self-management. This research aims toexplore the influence that college student associations have on the socialization of collegestudents. With the expanding enrollment of universities and colleges, the quality of highereducation declines, producing many students who generally have high scores in exams butweak capability to deal with real life, therefore, ending up with improper and less opportunitiesfor jobs once graduating from colleges. In response to this phenomenon, college studentassociation should try to cultivate the “social talents” which cater for the needs of societyoutside the normal classroom education. Thus, the quality of college students associations has adirect impact on the degree of college students’ socialization.Based on the sociological theory, this article first does a theoretical analysis over the role thatcollege student associations play in the socialization of college students utilizing education,sociology, educational sociology and so forth. Secondly, this study investigates the status quoof college students’ involvements into college student associations and the degree of thestudents’ socialization by the use of questionnaires and interviews. In the end, this articleanalyzes the influence of college student associations on students’ socialization according to theresearch results.The research results are showed as following:Most college students have joined certain kind of associations, with most of themparticipating only one association, whereas, only a few being engaged into more than one clubs.Their motives of involvement into associations vary greatly. Students in the first or secondgrade are more likely to be involved in associations than those in the third or fourth grade.Furthermore, quality-improvement associations are students’ favorite, followed by academic and technological association and social-service associations, with theoretical and learningassociations the least. The degree of college students’ involvement is relatively low, mainlybeing manifested in the low frequency of social interaction between members. Lastly, thebiggest gains that students consider are the enrichment of their extracurricular knowledge,followed by the expansion of their interpersonal circles.The impacts that college students’ involvement in associations have on their socialization aremanifested as follows:Firstly, except for the minor influence on the socialization of social roles, the involvement inassociations has an impact on students’ socialization of politics, morals and careers. Collegestudents who have joined certain associations generally have a higher patriotism, and theirmoral awareness and ethical behaviors are more in line with social requirements. Moreover,they usually have a more definite orientation of career in terms of the occupational socialization.Secondly, the genre of associations also has an impact on college students’ socialization, forinstance, students who have joined the academic and technological associations generally havea higher political sentiment and attitude and are clearer in the planning of their future careers;those who have been engaged in social-service associations have a higher moral socialization;theoretical and learning associations promote the political socialization of college students;whereas, the political socialization of college students who have joined quality-improvementassociations is relatively unsatisfactory. Thirdly, the amount of association college student haveparticipated plays an insignificant role in their socialization. However, the degree of theirinvolvement in associations’ affairs has a great influence on their socialization, mainly beingshowed in that college students’ moral behaviors are terrible in public areas, but are rather goodin private areas. The more positive are the sentiments and attitudes towards the current politicalsystem that the active members of associations uphold, the more successful their socializationof social roles and occupations would become.