Academic and social integration of international and local students at five business schools, a cross-institutional comparison

An increasing number of students choose to study at a university in a foreign country. A common belief among educators is that international students are insufficiently academically adjusted. Recent research has found a mixed picture on whether international students underperform in academic integration and academic performance. Therefore, Morrison et al. (2005) argue that research should extend its focus to understanding the underlying reasons for these performance differences of international versus local students.In a cross-institutional comparison among 871 students of five business schools, we investigated the differences in academic and social integration amongst local and international students. International students value their faculty and educational system more than local students. However, international and local students have limited social contact with each other and spend their private time differently. Finally, students with a non-Western background are less integrated than Western students, have considerable lower academic and social integration scores and have (marginally) lower grade point average (GPA) and European credit transfer system (ECTS) scores. Institutes with small classes and collaborative learning settings seem to provide a more favourable learning environment for international students

Gene expression identifies patients who develop inflammatory arthritis in a clinically suspect arthralgia cohort

Background: Established rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients display differentially expressed genes coding for cytokine/chemokine-mediated immunity compared to healthy controls. It is unclear, however, if in the pre-arthritis phase of clinically suspect arthralgia (CSA) expression of immune genes differ between patients who do or do not develop clinically evident inflammatory arthritis (IA). Methods: Two hundred thirty-six consecutive patients presenting with arthralgia clinically suspected for progression to RA were followed until IA development or else for median 24 months (IQR 12–26). Baseline whole blood RNA expression was determined for a previously identified set of 133 genes associated with the innate and adaptive immune system by dual-color reverse-transcription multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (dcRT-MLPA) profiling. Cox proportional hazard models were used. Results: Twenty percent of CSA patients developed IA. After correction for multiple testing, expression levels of six genes (IFNG, PHEX, IGF-1, IL-7R, CD19, CCR7) at the time of presentation wer

The influence of academic and social integration on academic performance for international and local students, a cross-institutional comparison

A common belief among educators is that international students are insufficiently academically and socially adjusted to higher education. Recent research has found a mixed picture on whether international students underperform in academic and social integration and academic performance. Therefore, Morrison et al. (2005) argue that research should extend its focus to understanding the underlying reasons for these performance differences of international versus local students. In a cross-institutional comparison among 958 students of five business schools in the Netherlands, we investigated the differences in academic performance amongst local and international students by focussing on academic and social integration. Students’ academic integration was measured with the Students’ adaptation to college questionnaire (SACQ), while students’ social integration was measured with a newly developed and validated questionnaire, the social integration questionnaire (SIQ, 4 factors, 15 items). The results indicated that students with a non-Western background are less integrated than Western students, have considerable lower academic and social integration scores and have (marginally) lower GPA and ECTS score

Correction to: Gene expression identifies patients who develop inflammatory arthritis in a clinically suspect arthralgia cohort (Arthritis Research & Therapy, (2020), 22, 1, (266), 10.1186/s13075-020-02361-2)

Following publication of the original article [1], a typesetting error was reported. The equal contribution note for this article was incorrect. The corrected statement is given below. † Ellis Niemantsverdriet and Erik B. van den Akker contributed equally and are joint first authors. † Annemieke Geluk and Annette H. M. van der Helm-van Mil contrib

Gene expression identifies patients who develop inflammatory arthritis in a clinically suspect arthralgia cohort

Background: Established rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients display differentially expressed genes coding for cytokine/chemokine-mediated immunity compared to healthy controls. It is unclear, however, if in the pre-arthritis phase of clinically suspect arthralgia (CSA) expression of immune genes differ between patients who do or do not develop clinically evident inflammatory arthritis (IA). Methods: Two hundred thirty-six consecutive patients presenting with arthralgia clinically suspected for progression to RA were followed until IA development or else for median 24 months (IQR 12–26). Baseline whole blood RNA expression was determined for a previously identified set of 133 genes associated with the innate and adaptive immune system by dual-color reverse-transcription multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (dcRT-MLPA) profiling. Cox proportional hazard models were used. Results: Twenty percent of CSA patients developed IA. After correction for multiple testing, expression levels of six genes (IFNG, PHEX, IGF-1, IL-7R, CD19, CCR7) at the time of presentation were associated with progression to IA. PHEX and IGF-1 were highly correlated with each other (ρ = 0.97). In multivariable analysis correcting for the different genes, expressions of IL-7R and IGF-1 were independently associated with IA development (p = 0.025, p = 0.046, respectively). Moreover, IL-7R and IGF-1 remained significantly associated even after correction for known predictors (ACPA, CRP, imaging-detected subclinical joint inflammation; p = 0.039, p = 0.005, respectively). These genes are also associated with RA development. Conclusions: IL-7R and IGF-1 were differentially expressed between CSA patients who did or did not progress to IA, independent from regularly used predictors. These biomarkers may become helpful in prognostication of CSA patients. Furthermore, because both genes are associated with T cell functioning, T cell dysregulation may mediate progression from arthralgia to arthritis.Pattern Recognition and Bioinformatic

Correction to: Gene expression identifies patients who develop inflammatory arthritis in a clinically suspect arthralgia cohort (Arthritis Research & Therapy, (2020), 22, 1, (266), 10.1186/s13075-020-02361-2)

Following publication of the original article [1], a typesetting error was reported. The equal contribution note for this article was incorrect. The corrected statement is given below. † Ellis Niemantsverdriet and Erik B. van den Akker contributed equally and are joint first authors. † Annemieke Geluk and Annette H. M. van der Helm-van Mil contributed equally and are joint last authors. The original article [1] has been corrected.Pattern Recognition and Bioinformatic

Understanding academic performance of international students: the role of ethnicity, academic and social integration

More than 3 million students study outside their home country, primarily at a Western university. A common belief among educators is that international students are insufficiently adjusted to higher education in their host country, both academically and socially. Furthermore, several groups of international students experience considerable amounts of stress while adapting to the culture of the host-institute. Several researchers argue that studies on adaptation of international students should widen its focus to the underlying mechanisms that leads towards this “misalignment”. In a cross-institutional comparison among 958 students at five business schools in the Netherlands, differences in academic performance between local and international students were identified by focussing on their levels of academic and social integration. Students’ academic integration was measured with the Students’ Adaptation to College Questionnaire (SACQ), while students’ social integration was measured with a newly developed and validated questionnaire. The results indicate that the degree of academic success of international students is multi-faceted. International students with a (mixed) western ethnic background perform well on both academic and social integration, and also attained higher study-performance in comparison to domestic students. In contrast, international students with a non-Western background are less integrated compared to other international students. Nevertheless, they have a similar study-performance. Finally, academic adjustment is the main predictor of study-performance for Dutch, Western and Mixed-Western students. Social adjustment was negatively related to study-performance. The lack of fit for predicting long-term study success of non-Western students indicates that their academic and social integration processes are more complex and non-linear