The Future of Education

Academic entitlement (AE) is an increasing problem among students in recent years (Singleton-Jackson, Jackson & Reinhardt, 2011). This problem is characterized by the expectations of the students regarding high grades above their performance in exams or homework, and the attribution of personal academic responsibilities to external factors (Chowning & Campbell, 2009; Kopp, Zinn, Finney & Jurich, 2011). Students with high AE beliefs suppose that they automatically deserve high grades and diplomas (Kopp et al., 2011). This belief leads to conflicts with the faculty members in the academic environments (Ciani, Summers & Easter, 2008), creates unfairness of the academic success measurement (Elias, 2017), and shows a decrease in the academic success (Yan, Xi, Shu & Li, 2021). It also causes the exploitation of other students' academic rights (Greenberger, Lessard, Chen & Farrugia, 2008). Studies in the literature show that AE is more common and higher among male students than female students (Boswell, 2012; Ciani et al., 2008; Kumari & Gautam, 2022; Seipel & Brooks, 2020; Sohr-Preston & Boswell, 2015; Witsman, 2013). Given that traditional masculine gender norms (TMGN) are highly associated with narcissism, alexithymia, and regulation of emotions, it is thought that there might be a relationship between AE levels of university students and the socially attributed norms to men, namely TMGN. For this reason, it is worth considering the AE behaviors of male students together with their TMGN. In this respect, the main purpose of this cross-sectional study is to examine the mediating role of empathy quotient and alexithymia in the relationship between conformity to TMGN and AE. Quantitative data were collected from Turkish young male university students. Data were analyzed by means of the Bootstrapping method. Results show that there is a positive relationship between TMGN and AE behaviors. The results are argued in terms of the emerging literature on academic entitlement. Implications are discussed for further studies in higher education.