Dropout Intention Among Sexual Minority University Students: The Mediating Role of Academic Engagement

Introduction Sexual minority university students face an elevated risk of academic attrition, yet the mechanisms linking sexual orientation to dropout intention remain underexplored, particularly in European higher education contexts. Drawing on minority stress theory, this cross-sectional study examined whether academic engagement statistically mediated the association between sexual minority status and dropout intention, and whether this mediational pattern differed by gender.Methods Participants were 4,345 students from five Italian universities (M age = 24.47, SD = 7.25), of which 9.37% identified as sexual minority. A parallel multiple mediation model was estimated via path analysis, with six dimensions of academic engagement entered simultaneously as mediators.Results Results indicated that sexual minority students reported significantly higher dropout intentions than their heterosexual peers. Perceived capability to persist emerged as the dominant mediating pathway, accounting for nearly half of the total effect. Multigroup analyses revealed overall invariance of the model across gender, although one pathway, through university-personal network relationships, was significant only for men.Conclusions These findings are consistent with the possibility that minority-stress-related processes may undermine academic persistence primarily through diminished self-efficacy beliefs.Policy implications Higher education institutions should target academic self-efficacy alongside affirmative campus climate when designing retention strategies for sexual minority students, for instance through mentoring programs, identity-affirming advising, and curricular visibility of sexual minority perspectives.