Fitting in means changing yourself to be accepted. Belonging means being accepted as you are. The distinction comes from the researcher Brené Brown, and it may be the most useful idea in the whole college search: a college chosen for its name can become a place you have to fit into, while a college chosen for who you are is far more likely to be a place you belong.
What Brené Brown means by belonging
Brené Brown has spent more than two decades studying connection, courage and shame. One of the findings that surprised her most was that fitting in and belonging are not the same thing. In fact, she found that trying to fit in is one of the biggest barriers to belonging.
Fitting in, as she describes it, means reading a room and becoming whoever you need to be in order to be accepted. Belonging asks nothing of the kind. It doesn't require you to change, she writes; it "requires us to be who we are."
She first heard the difference put simply by a group of middle schoolers. Their answer, in essence, was that belonging is when you get to be yourself, and fitting in is when you have to be like everyone else.
Most of us know both feelings. One is a kind of quiet ease. The other is a performance, and performances are tiring to keep up for four years.
Why belonging matters so much in college
Belonging is not a soft extra. Research suggests it is close to the heart of whether students thrive.
- Belonging affects grades and health. In a well-known study, psychologists Gregory Walton and Geoffrey Cohen gave first-year college students a short exercise that helped them see worries about belonging as common and temporary. Over the next three years it raised Black students' grades, halved the achievement gap in the study, and improved students' reported health.
- How you go matters more than where. The Gallup-Purdue Index, a large study of college graduates, found that whether a college was public or private, selective or not, mattered less than experiences such as having a professor who cared about you, a mentor who encouraged you, and a long project or internship.
- Engagement predicts success. A Stanford research review by Denise Pope and Challenge Success found that the students who do best, in college and after, are the ones who engage deeply in their college experience, whatever the school's selectivity. It is much easier to engage fully in a place where you can be yourself.
How a list built on rankings can lead to fitting in
Rankings measure real things, such as graduation rates, resources and reputation among other colleges (see what college rankings measure). What they can't measure is whether a particular student will be able to be themselves on a particular campus.
When the name on the list comes first, the student is left to adapt to the place: to its pace, its social life, its way of learning, its idea of success. Sometimes that works out. Often it means four years of fitting in.
Malcolm Gladwell describes a related effect in David and Goliath: students judge themselves against the people around them, so the same student can feel capable in one setting and out of place in another. And economists Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger found that, for most students, the selectivity of the college they attended made little difference to later earnings, although it mattered more for students from low-income families and for some first-generation students.
None of this means highly selective colleges are the wrong choice. It means the name is the wrong place to start.
What belonging looks like in a college
Belonging shows up in many small ways. It is worth asking about each one:
- Your people. Will you find friends who share your interests, sense of humor or background, without having to become someone else to keep them?
- The pace and the way you learn. Do classes move at a speed that stretches you without overwhelming you? Do you learn best in seminars, labs, projects or lectures, and does this college teach that way?
- The culture. Is it collaborative or competitive? Structured or open? Do people seem free to be different from one another?
- The social life. Does weekend life revolve around things you enjoy, whether that is sports, the arts, the outdoors, faith, service or quiet?
- The place. City or college town, near home or far away, big or small. Where do you feel most like yourself?
- Your values. Does the college care about the things you care about?
How to look for where you'll belong
- Start with who you are, not with a list of names. Your personality, interests, values and the way you learn are the best guide to where you will belong. Write them down before you look at a single college.
- Read colleges in their own words. Admissions pages, student blogs and student profiles show what a college values and how its students describe their days. Notice whether you see yourself in them.
- Ask belonging questions on a visit. Where do students spend a Saturday? What do they wish they had known as first-years? Could you imagine eating lunch with the people you meet?
- Notice the feeling of performing. If you catch yourself imagining a different version of you who would fit in there, take that seriously. It may be telling you something.
- Remember that belonging can grow. No college will feel perfect on day one. The research shows that belonging can be strengthened, which is another reason to choose a place where the starting point already feels like you.
Where Lens comes in
Lens was built around this idea. It begins with who a student is, through seven short assessments drawn from published research in psychology, and then looks for colleges where those qualities are likely to be at home, using federal data and the colleges' own words rather than our opinions. The aim is a starting list made of places where a student may belong, not places they would have to fit into. Start with Lens →
The search is long, and a student will meet many lists along the way. We hope this one simple question travels with them: Could I be myself here?
FAQ
What is the difference between fitting in and belonging? In Brené Brown's research, fitting in means changing yourself to be accepted, and belonging means being accepted as you are.
Is belonging the same as being comfortable? No. A college where you belong can still challenge you a great deal. The difference is that you are stretched as yourself, rather than spending energy pretending to be someone else.
Should I ignore college rankings? Not entirely. They can be one source of information. They just can't tell you where you will belong, so they work better later in the search than at the start.
Can belonging grow after I arrive? Yes. Research by Walton and Cohen found that helping students see early worries about belonging as common and temporary improved their grades and well-being.
Sources
- Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection (2010), Daring Greatly (2012) and Braving the Wilderness (2017), on fitting in and belonging.
- Walton, G. M., and Cohen, G. L. (2011). A brief social-belonging intervention improves academic and health outcomes of minority students. Science, 331(6023). science.org
- Gallup-Purdue Index (2014 onward). Purdue: the Big Six experiences
- Challenge Success and Stanford Graduate School of Education (2018), "A 'Fit' Over Rankings: Why College Engagement Matters More Than Selectivity." Stanford GSE
- Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath (2013).
- Dale, S. B., and Krueger, A. B. (2002). Estimating the payoff to attending a more selective college. NBER working paper