Structural equation modeling (SEM) considering how students’ non-cognitive attributes influence first-year college student persistence remain extraordinarily rare—as are studies that test and expand upon published structural models or studies that include college student food security. This study addresses each. We surveyed “Beginner” Freshmen, capturing eight non-cognitive measurements and ussing institutional data on performance and fall-to-fall persistence measures, we then tested the structure of Bowman et al.’s (Res High Educ 60:135–152, 2019) SEM model. In Model 1, we mimic the Bowman model’s financial variable by only including financial stress. We confirm that Bowman is a good structural model of student persistence, although our data were collected for another purpose, using different scales for non-cognitive elements and even one different non-cognitive measurement. We found students’ non-cognitive attributes remain importantly influential to social adjustment (r = .65), commitment to persist (r = .40), college GPA (r = .25), and fall-to-fall persistence (r = .30). In Model 2, we generated a latent financial security variable incorporating financial stress and food security. Including food security generated a direct influence from the financial security variable to high-school GPA (r = .25), not found in the Bowman model or Model 1, and a direct significant relationship from financial security to social adjustment (r = .11)—not found in Model 1. Further changes are observed in the indirect relationship from financial security to college GPA from Model 1 (r = .29) to Model 2 (r = .51). We highlight the robustness of the Bowman model and that the inclusion of food security brings increased strength to several relationships without sacrificing optimal fit.

中文翻译：

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在区域性公共机构中建立第一年的保留期：验证和完善Bowman SEM分析的结构

考虑到学生的非认知属性如何影响大一学生的持久性的结构方程模型（SEM）仍然极为罕见-测试和扩展已发表的结构模型或包括大学生食品安全性的研究的研究也很少。本研究针对每个问题。我们调查了“初学者”新生，捕获了八项非认知测量指标，并使用了有关表现和持续下降指标的机构数据，然后测试了Bowman等人的结构（Res High Educ 60：135-152， 2019）SEM模型。在模型1中，我们仅通过包括财务压力来模拟Bowman模型的财务变量。尽管我们的数据是出于其他目的而收集的，但我们确认鲍曼是学生持久性的良好结构模型，对非认知元素使用不同的量表，甚至使用一种不同的非认知度量。我们发现学生的非认知属性仍然对社会适应产生重要影响（r  = .65），坚持的承诺（r  = .40），大学GPA（r  = .25）和跌落持续性（r  = .30）。在模型2中，我们生成了包含财务压力和粮食安全的潜在财务安全变量。包括粮食安全在内，从财务安全变量到高中GPA均产生直接影响（r  = .25），这在鲍曼模型或模型1中没有发现，并且从财务安全到社会调整也具有直接显着关系（r  = .11） ）（在模型1中未发现）。从金融安全到大学GPA的间接关系从模型1（r  = .29）到模型2（r = .51）。我们强调鲍曼（Bowman）模型的稳健性，包括粮食安全性在内的多种关系中增加了强度，而没有牺牲最佳拟合。