The beginning of the fall semester means new clubs, new places to eat, and new friends. A brand new year also means a brand new year for Greek recruitment. I decided to partake in the intense, stressful, sisterhood activities this year as a freshman. So far, I can say it’s taken over my life for the better. Orientation started on Saturday and since then it has been eating, sleep, and recruitment. Since the sorority life has had such a big commitment on my life especially in the last couple of days, I thought it would be the perfect topic to know more about it through the ideas of body image and different experiments used for it.
There was an experiment conducted to research women and their body image while going through the recruitment process. In the full-length experiment, there were 127 participants that were undergraduate women in their first year from 17 to 20 years old. Each participant took multiple surveys discussing their demographics, with their self-esteem, body image and eating habits. Before completing these surveys about being overweight and if they have experience with eating disorders, participants were asked if they were rushing a sorority before answering the questions. The results with the surveys displayed that many young women who did rush a sorority had more body shame than those who didn’t rush a sorority. Women also had a higher risk for bulimia and eating disorders by .3 than those whom didn’t rush a sorority. There was hypothesis titled ‘Initial Impact of Sorority Membership’ that dealt with how girls felt about themselves before rushing and after rushing a sorority. There was only a significant difference in body shame when it was time for the final point and the end of rushing when girls scored higher in eating disorder rates and body shame.
There is many times in which girls rush a sorority and don’t feel any type of body shame or urge to starve him or her. It isn’t like that for me, and I believe that shouldn’t be the case for anyone at Penn State. During recruitment, the sisters and sorority leaders are nice and they’re to help everyone. I believe no girl should feel low self-esteem from Greek life recruitment, from what I have gone to so far in the process; you are in the process of meeting your future sisters, not feeling worse about yourself.
I can understand that Penn State probably does have an amazing Greek recruitment process that allows girls to feel better about themselves rather than feel bad about the way they look. But the beginning of the rushing process is not the only thing to be looked at here. The rushing process is fun and exciting. There are so many new people to meet and it’s exhilarating to find the sorority where you know you belong. But what about the girls who don’t get into the sorority that they fell in love with on bid day? I think that girls putting themselves out there on display to other girls just like them and then being told that they are not wanted in that sorority is what contributes to low self-esteem in girls. Not every girl can be accepted into the sorority they want and that is the devastating part for girls in every college/university there is. No one wants to be denied and yet denial is a huge part of Greek recruitment. Some people make it and a lot of people don’t. And, unfortunately, not every university is as gracious as Penn State in their rushing process. This article shows that other universities are actually pretty judgmental and brutal when it comes to recruiting girls and this kind of recruitment is what contributes to a lot of girls low self-esteem.
I can understand that Penn State probably does have an amazing Greek recruitment process that allows girls to feel better about themselves rather than feel bad about the way they look. But the beginning of the rushing process is not the only thing to be looked at here. The rushing process is fun and exciting. There are so many new people to meet and it’s exhilarating to find the sorority where you know you belong. But what about the girls who don’t get into the sorority that they fell in love with on bid day? I think that girls putting themselves out there on display to other girls just like them and then being told that they are not wanted in that sorority is what contributes to low self-esteem in girls. Not every girl can be accepted into the sorority they want and that is the devastating part for girls in every college/university there is. No one wants to be denied and yet denial is a huge part of Greek recruitment. Some people make it and a lot of people don’t. And, unfortunately, not every university is as gracious as Penn State in their rushing process. This <a href="http://unfspinnaker.com/study-links-low-self-esteem-with-greek-life/"article shows that other universities are actually pretty judgmental and brutal when it comes to recruiting girls and this kind of recruitment is what contributes to a lot of girls low self-esteem.
I can understand that Penn State probably does have an amazing Greek recruitment process that allows girls to feel better about themselves rather than feel bad about the way they look. But the beginning of the rushing process is not the only thing to be looked at here. The rushing process is fun and exciting. There are so many new people to meet and it’s exhilarating to find the sorority where you know you belong. But what about the girls who don’t get into the sorority that they fell in love with on bid day? I think that girls putting themselves out there on display to other girls just like them and then being told that they are not wanted in that sorority is what contributes to low self-esteem in girls. Not every girl can be accepted into the sorority they want and that is the devastating part for girls in every college/university there is. No one wants to be denied and yet denial is a huge part of Greek recruitment. Some people make it and a lot of people don’t. And, unfortunately, not every university is as gracious as Penn State in their rushing process. This article shows that other universities are actually pretty judgmental and brutal when it comes to recruiting girls and this kind of recruitment is what contributes to a lot of girls low self-esteem.
This was a very timely and interesting topic. I personally did not go through the rush process to join greek life, but my roommate and many girls on my floor did. It’s disheartening to see that women in general have such low body image, but especially alarming that it was more present throughout women who were involved in greek life. Rushing a sorority should be a fun and fulfilling thing that opens to the door to lots of new people and opportunities, not low body image and eating disorders. I’m glad you had such a positive experience with the rushing and recruitment process and I hope the majority of girls who went through it did as well.
I have always been curious about this topic! I always felt that girls that go through this process will come out with lower self esteem. Often times I think that this is because girls do not get picked by the sorority they wanted. On bid day, and many days before, I saw multiple girls crying. I think that if girls are crying, they probably don’t feel well about themselves. On the other hand, I saw hundreds of girls in front of Old Main having the time of their lives. It can go either way. I think that this process is all about your attitude, like you said. If you go into it and know that whatever happens, happens for a reason, it will be a much more enjoyable process. It is psychological. I really enjoyed the experiment you mentioned in your blog, it was very interesting. Thank you for sharing this! I’m glad your process went well 🙂
I completely agree with your outlook on the Penn State sorority recruitment process! I think that if students enter the process for the right reasons and with an optimistic outlook on things, positive outcomes will occur! However, I think that some feelings of body shame may be a natural part of the recruitment process. When girls get dropped from sororities they were interested in, they may naturally point out physical imperfections about themselves. However, it is crucial for girls to understand that their self deemed physical imperfections are unrelated to their experience with recruitment. After personally going through the rush process myself this year, I’ve come to realize that girls in sororities come in all different shapes and sizes. I think that girls end up in a given sorority based off of personality traits, interests, and aspirations rather than superficial looks!