Sorority Rituals - Reflections On Rites of ... - Mari Ann Callais

affiliation through the first year of college. This study found that the negative effect of sorority
impact was not as pronounced as with fraternity men, but found the following:
Compared to their counterparts, who remained independent, women who joined sororities
had significantly lower levels of end-of-first-year reading comprehension and composite
achievement. Differences between Greek-affiliated and independent women on end-offirst-year
mathematic and critical thinking were small and nonsignificant (Pascarella,
Edison, Whitt, Nora, 1996).
Pascarella, Flowers, and Whitt (2001) conducted a follow-up study to evaluate the influence of
Greek affiliation on the cognitive growth as students’ progress beyond the first year of college.
The most recent study found:
During both the second and third years of college, Greek-affiliated women reported
greater gains in understanding science…and compared to women who remained
independent, Greek-affiliated women reported significantly higher gains in writing and
thinking skills after 2 years of college.
An interesting point was found when comparing these two studies:
Taken together, the findings of this investigation, along with Pascarella et al (1996), tend
to support the hypothesis that any major negative learning consequences of Greek
affiliation occur primarily when students pledge a fraternity or sorority in the first year of
college. It may simply be that the pledging process itself interferes with a students’ ability
to adjust to the rather rigorous intellectual demands of the first year of college. After the
initial first year of college, however, any negative consequences of fraternity or sorority
membership may tend to diminish if not totally disappear…some evidence was found to
suggest that sorority membership may have modest beneficial consequences for women
during the second and third years of college (Pascarella et al., 2001, p. 297).
Although these studies address the affects of cognitive development and not necessarily women’s
development per se, it is essential to understand what effects, if any, sorority affiliation has on
the academic development of sorority women.
Sorority Culture
Sorority culture, like any student culture, can affect the development of identity and
purpose in women by encouraging wide-ranging exploration or curtailing it. The sense of self is
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