The Effects of the Pre-Enrolment Experience on Students’ Relationship Intention

Abstract

Higher education institutions are increasingly involved in measuring students’ satisfaction and communicating messages to prospective, current and previous students. The literature review suggests that institutions have traditionally focused on cognitive rather than affective measures, and have done so in the media environment which could be dominated by the institution rather than peer to peer communication. This paper seeks to make a contribution by investigating the role of social network media in evoking emotions about attending university. This paper is specifically concerned with the pre-entry stage of students’ association with a higher education institution, specifically the role of pre-entry emotions on attitudes to the institution, and the role of pre-entry communication between prospective students on their subsequent satisfaction with the university. The paper seeks to move away from the traditional approach of focusing on students’ cognitive evaluations in an environment of top-down communication, and instead seeks to make a contribution by focusing on students’ affective evaluations in an environment of extensive peer to peer communication.