As I began to look more into the growth and development of efficacy, I was also throwing around the idea of how formal sorority recruitment may impact one’s self and collective efficacy as a member of any sorority chapter. It was clear that no research had been conducted on this topic and I found my gap in the research. Each time I read something else on the development of self-efficacy, I found myself thinking how relevant this was to participation in sorority recruitment, both as a potential new member or an initiated member.
Sororities were originally founded as a way to connect women to other women in order to support and care for one another during a time when they were not welcome on many college campuses. Men were the majority and women were a distant second in all opportunities available at colleges and universities. Women found comfort in coming together and creating a home away from home for one another within their individual sororities. Each respective sorority developed a common purpose for which they would strive for, while the universal concepts of friendship, care, and support continued to be at the core of what participation in sorority life promised.
What I had repeatedly heard from sorority women is that the system selected their members for them and oftentimes they felt as though they had no actual choice. The “system” they were referring to is the Release Figure Method. Individual sorority women shared with me that whatever is planned for a recruitment event does not matter because every potential new member will be invited back regardless of how the women may feel about a particular potential new member. Sorority women explained that the chapter loses momentum and tends to feel discouraged when they are told to meet a certain number of potential new members, instead of recruiting women whose experience and values align with the mission of the organization and will do well in the chapter. The women in the chapter are well aware of how well or poorly they are performing throughout a formalized recruitment process by the number of potential new members they are told to invite back to each round of recruitment. Their sense of confidence may be diminished and level of mastery questioned, which might lower the overall self and collective efficacy for individual women in the chapter, as well as the chapter as a whole. Sorority women have explained the loss of positive feelings regarding how the chapter is progressing throughout the recruitment process and perceive the chapter will never be successful in the recruitment process.
This was it! I had dated my topic long enough to know marrying it was the right way to go. My research questions that guided my study were:
How may participation in formal sorority recruitment impact feelings of self and collective efficacy?
How may formal sorority recruitment efficacy expectancy influence the development of self and collective efficacy?
The possibility that participation in formal sorority recruitment may have an impact on efficacy levels could have significant influence on how organizations educate and train their women on recruitment practices, but also could provide sorority chapters a way to work towards a more balanced idea of what sisterhood could really mean to them. I considered my research to be the starting point for future studies to be conducted to assist in creating a base of scholarly literature on the concept of efficacy within the sorority experience…and I was off and running (or writing…depending on how you look at it!).