Doctoral Advising or Mentoring? Effects on Student Outcomes

Abstract

This study investigated the extent to which doctoral advisors provided mentoring to their students and if mentor support influenced doctoral student outcomes. Survey results from 477 respondents, across disciplines at two universities, indicated that most students believed mentoring was important and over half of them received mentoring support from their advisor. Regression results showed advisor mentoring was related to student outcomes, but the pattern varied by type of mentoring (psychosocial or career), student outcome (satisfaction, number of presentations, and number of publications), and discipline. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.

Keywords:

• doctoral advisors
• mentoring
• student outcomes

Notes

¹The identification–individuation factor (five questions) was eliminated. Eleven items were eliminated from the psychosocial (four) and career (seven) factor because of low factor loadings.

²Cronbach alpha’s for high commitment subscales: foreclosure (α = .78), achieved (α = .56); and low commitment subscales: moratorium (α = .74), diffusion (α = .59).

³Twenty cases were excluded from the analysis because the individuals were on leave or had withdrawn and the small number of cases did not allow for statistical comparisons.