Presented By: Christopher Estepp, University of Arkansas
Co-Authors: Will Doss, University of Arkansas
Donald Johnson, University of Arkansas

Student engagement is a necessary component of academic success, and student motivation affects the extent to which students engage in the classroom. Classroom comfort, how comfortable students feel interacting with peers and faculty, is one important motivational influence in determining student engagement. Accordingly, certain factors lowering students' classroom comfort can result in decreased student engagement. The purpose of this study was to determine if selected personal, peer, and faculty characteristics predicted classroom comfort for freshmen agriculture students (n = 321) in a land grant university. Data were collected in fall 2023 using a survey instrument administered in a required freshman orientation course. The instrument used multi-item summated scales to assess classroom comfort, intrinsic and extrinsic academic motivation, perceived college value, peer support, in-class peer interaction, faculty support, faculty empathy, and help-seeking behaviors using a 1 (strongly negative) to 5 (strongly positive) Likert scale. Coefficient alpha construct reliabilities ranged from .75 to .93. Construct means ranged from 3.17 (SD = 1.01) for in-class peer interaction to 4.42 (SD = 0.60) for perceived college value. Classroom comfort had a mean of 3.48 (SD = 0.97), indicating students were somewhat comfortable engaging in classroom activities. The results of multiple regression analysis indicated that a linear combination of peer support, faculty support, intrinsic motivation, help-seeking behaviors, and perceived college value explained 48.9% of the variance in classroom comfort, with all variables being statistically significant (p < .01). To demonstrate support, faculty can create welcoming classroom environments, be approachable, and build rapport with freshmen students.