Using Social Identity Mapping to Explore the Experience of Transitioning International Students

The Activity of Social Identity Mapping

The SIM activity is presented in the form of an Excel workbook, in which students identify between seven and 20 groups or individuals they feel are significant. Figure 1 identifies what may be defined as a group or individual, such as parents, siblings, employers and so forth. Further guidance is provided in the ‘Student Guide to using SIM’, available via the University website (details are given later). Students rank each group or individual by time, how they feel about the group (that group’s importance, helpfulness and the amount of time engaged) as well as the group’s capacity to support their studies. The students define their idea of time and other measurements individually (this is not a comparative tool). Students then consider pairs of groups and decide on a scale of 0-2 how much both these groups together influence engagement with their studies (for example, 2 is a collectively significant influence). When students have inputted all the data, the workbook produces an interactive visual map of their group memberships (their ‘social identity map’). Students can click on each group (also referred to as a ‘node’) to see the strength of influence of that group and its links to other groups as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1.

Profile of the student interviewees

The SIM materials are all available on Lincoln’s Academy of Learning and Teaching (LALT) website of the University of Lincoln. They are available at: