Research

How belonging works

Belonging does not always just happen. And I think the recent global pandemic was a good reminder of that. Many people around the world, myself included, experienced extended lockdown periods. Our social worlds, as we knew and experienced them, changed. And while social relationships are only one lens through which people experience belonging, for many they are central. Incidental social interactions with everyone from postal workers, doctors, neighbours, and dog walkers were reduced. These are often the people who help us feel seen and valued in our communities. Many loved ones in aged care homes experienced restricted or no visitation. Many people reported loneliness and social isolation. Our sense of belonging was challenged and, for some, diminished. And as a result, in the years following, attention turned toward belonging and the research that seeks to understand it.

This attention was not confined to academia. Brands and organisations also began to speak more explicitly about belonging. Companies such as M&M’s, Disney, Airbnb, and Headspace positioned belonging as something that matters for wellbeing. While these approaches differ in depth, they reflect a broader recognition that belonging shapes how people feel, participate, and belonging across their lifecourse.

Why a framework is needed

The purpose of the integrative framework emerged from acknowledging a research–practice gap. When I joined academia, I was astounded by how long it often takes for research to move into practice. In many cases, this process stretches close to a decade. I was even more astounded to realise that some of the world’s greatest researchers hold knowledge that has never been applied in real settings. Work that could reshape education and the way we approach learning often remains out of reach. This includes insights into how students learn mathematics, how classrooms respond to difference, and how systems support those who feel excluded.

I did not want this to happen in my own research area. I wanted to design an approach from the outset that could be used in a practical sense. I asked questions that practitioners ask. What could a psychologist or health care worker do if a client walked in feeling isolated, lonely, ostracised, or rejected? What could anyone do to help themselves? What could an educator do to build belonging in a classroom or a leader such as CEOs or university vice-chancellor do at an institutional level?

The framework I developed with colleagues focuses on what psychologists call antecedents. Antecedents are the conditions that give rise to belonging. They are not domains that describe what belonging is made up of. They describe what makes belonging possible.

Another motivation of the framework was to bring together theories and research perspectives that have often developed or been applied in fragmented ways. Belonging research spans many disciplines and traditions, yet it has remained scattered throughout the literature. This framework works toward a more coherent account of belonging that draws on multiple knowledge traditions, including Indigenous scholarship, such as the work of Moreton-Robinson, alongside psychological, educational, and sociological research. It also draws attention to research areas that have been underappreciated or sidelined in mainstream belonging scholarship, including older foundational work. In doing so, the framework seeks to honour key theoretical perspectives, including the role of attribution, belonging to place, land sovereignty, and spirituality.

Illustration of the Integrative Framework of Belonging — Allen, 2025; Allen et al., 2021. Illustration: Kathryn Kallady

About the Framework

Belonging develops through a set of interacting conditions that unfold over time and across experiences and settings. This framework brings together decades of research and prespectives from around the world to explain how belonging is built and sustained across the lifespan. It applies to childhood and adulthood, to family and work, to institutions and everyday life.

The framework is now used beyond academic research to guide practice, policy, and system design, including in schools, community organisations, and education systems internationally. It supports institutions to design belonging-centred actions that are practical, observable, and capable of being sustained over time.

An Integrative Framework of Belonging

The framework rests on four interrelated elements that shape belonging and help explain how it develops over time (Allen et al., 2021; Allen, 2025). These are perceptions, motivations, competencies, and opportunities. But it is not just these antecedents. There are broader conditions that also shape belonging, and some of these sit beyond individual control. Social, cultural, and structural forces influence belonging, even when people are motivated, have resources and are capable.

The antecedents are interconnected. They shape one another and are shaped by the wider systems people move within. A shift in one often alters the others, sometimes subtly and sometimes in ways that are immediately felt. Although the framework depicted above appears static, it is dynamic and different in every individual. And even for individuals can be fluid even through the course of a single day. Perceptions, motivations, competencies, and opportunities are always in motion. Changing across moments, settings, and stages of life.

Belonging can also be understood as a mostly active process that benefits from attention and effort. Leaving this to chance can work for some people in some situations. And often we only notice belonging when something feels out of place. Planning for belonging involves recognising which elements are in play, understanding how they interact, and making conscious choices about where to invest effort.

This is what allows belonging to be built and sustained.

Four steps

Step 1

Own a belonging mindset

Belonging begins with how people understand their place in the world. This includes beliefs about their own belonging, how they fit, and how they see the belonging of others. These perceptions matter because they shape how people interpret everyday experiences and social signals.

Research shows that people are constantly reading social cues and making judgements about belonging, their own and that of those around them. A message left on read, a missed invitation, or a period of change at work can all be interpreted as disruptions to belonging. At a broader level, social fragmentation, political polarisation, and attitudes toward immigration and refugees show how beliefs and assumptions shape who is seen as belonging and who is not. These perceptions influence how people experience belonging from a psychological standpoint. They shape responses to uncertainty and difficulty and can determine whether people withdraw, which rarely supports belonging.

Perceptions also matter for how belonging is extended to others. The way people interpret difference, uncertainty, or distance influences whether they create spaces of belonging or reinforce marginalisation or ostracism.

A belonging mindset recognises that belonging fluctuates. It accepts uncertainty without treating it as evidence of not belonging. It understands that belonging is not a fixed state, but something that shifts across time, settings, and relationships.

Step 2

Leverage opportunities for belonging

Belonging opportunities refer to the actual chances people have to engage, participate, be valued and accepted within a setting while feeling safe at the same time. These opportunities can be interpersonal, instructional, or institutional. They include at the most basic level, being invited into a social interaction, or having access to activities, being able to contribute ideas, and having one’s contribution acknowledged.

Opportunities are shaped by how environments are structured and by who those environments are designed to serve. Leadership decisions, classroom practices, organisational routines, informal social networks, and belonging norms and culture all determine opportunities to belong.

Opportunities also depend on how they are experienced. Not every opportunity leads to belonging. Engagement only supports belonging when it allows people to feel heard, valued, safe and able to participate. This is why the same setting can offer belonging to one person and not to another.

Deliberate actions that create new ways for people to connect, contribute, and be recognised are providing opportunities for belonging.

Step 3

Sustain motivation to belong

Motivation reflects how strongly people seek belonging, belonging needs and variation, and how willing people are to seek belonging opportunities, especially when belonging feels uncertain. People differ in their motivations to belong. Past experiences, identity, and perceived risk shape how much effort someone is prepared to invest. For some, the pull toward belonging remains strong even after rejection.

For others, repeated threat, exclusion, or disappointment leads to people feeling uncertain or withdrawing. Therefore, sustaining motivation requires environments that minimise unnecessary threat and make it possible for people to re-enter, reconnect, and try again without penalty.

Step 4

Strengthen competencies for belonging

Belonging is supported by skills and competencies. These include social, emotional, and cultural capacities that help people read situations, respond to others, regulate emotion, and navigate difference and conflict. These skills are learned and refined across the lifespan.

Competencies support belonging in several ways. They help people participate in ways that align with shared norms. They also help people cope when belonging is strained. Skills such as emotional regulation, perspective taking, and communication reduce the personal cost of social difficulty and help build strong interpersonal relationships.

While competencies can be shaped by access to education, culture, and support, they can be built at the individual level and provide a pathway for individuals to take control over their own sense of belonging alongside accessing opportunities, and keeping track of their beliefs and perceptions.

Beyond the four steps

Belonging is shaped by far more than the four antecedents alone. Time, history, context, individual differences, and identity all matter. So do social hierarchies and power relations. These forces influence who is able to belong, where belonging is made possible, and whose belonging is treated as legitimate.

This framework treats belonging as a dynamic and individualised process rather than a single or stable feeling. It helps explain why belonging can feel secure in one setting and uncertain in another, and why it can shift across moments and life stages. It also makes clear that lasting belonging depends on attention to people and to the systems they move within, not one without the other.

Measure your belonging

Coming soon

Application of the Integrative Framework of Belonging across research and practice

Publications and scholarship

Foundational Framework

Allen, K. A., Kern, M. L., Rozek, C. S., McInerney, D. M., & Slavich, G. M. (2021). Belonging: A review of conceptual issues, an integrative framework, and directions for future research. Australian Journal of Psychology, 73(1), 87-102. https://doi.org/10.1080/00049530.2021.1883409

This paper introduces the Integrative Framework of Belonging and specifies the four antecedents that make belonging possible.

Higher education and academic contexts

Allen, K. A., Kern, M. L., Reardon, J., Crawford, J., Slaten, C. D., Heffernan, T., Ma, L., Grove, C., & Roberts, S. (2024). Creating a sense of belonging in academia: Challenges, facilitators, and implications for university leaders, staff and graduate students. In M. S. Edwards, A. J. Martin, N. M. Ashkanasay & L. E. Cox (Eds.), Research handbook of academic mental health (pp. 451-473). Edward Elgar Publishing. ISBN 9781803925073

This chapter applies the framework to belonging among academic staff and postgraduate students.

Allen, K. A., Gallo Cordoba, B., Zech, S., Bonotti, M., Scull, J., Brunet, T., Melzak, E., Warton, W., Atri, A., & Walsh, L. (in press). Evidence-based guidelines for student belonging in higher education. In T. Ryan & C. Baik (Eds.), University student wellbeing in an uncertain future. Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/University-Student-Wellbeing-in-an-Uncertain-Future-Research-Policy-Practice/Ryan-Baik/p/book/9781041091417

This forthcoming chapter translates the integrative framework into evidence-based guidance for policy and practice in higher education.

Abu-Mulaweh, N., Miranda, C., Burkholder Murphy, A., & Frye, J. (2024). Work in Progress: A Comparative Case Study Exploring Sense of Belonging in First-Year Seminars. ASEE Annual Conference. https://peer.asee.org/48336.pdf

This engineering education study at Johns Hopkins University uses the framework to guide data collection and analysis, with a focus on opportunities.

Zhang, H., Abbott, N., Waldeck, D., & Holliman, A. (2025). Social interaction, sense of belonging, and psychological wellbeing: a study of Chinese international students in UK higher education. Frontiers in Education. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2025.1677348

This study of Chinese international students in the United Kingdom is guided by the framework.

Huo, Y., Guo, H., & Song, Y. (2024). International students' dynamics of belonging in a Shanghai university: a feminist, poststructuralist perspective. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2024.2444465

This study of international students in Shanghai combines the framework with feminist poststructuralist theory.

Kekana, P., Van Jaarsveldt, D., & Mathebula, M. (2025). Experiences of health sciences students residing on campus during university recess: A photovoice study. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa 13(2). https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v13i2.5706

This South African photovoice study applies the framework to health sciences students living on campus during university recess.

Särkelä, K., Salovaara, J. J., Vesterinen, V.-M., Siponen, J., Salmela-Aro, K., Riuttanen, L., & Lauri, K. A. (2026). Students' sense of belonging and its impact on effectively teaching about environmental changes in high latitudes during a master's programme. Geoscience Communication 9. https://doi.org/10.5194/gc-9-7-2026

This University of Helsinki study uses the framework to operationalise belonging in a master’s programme.

Neilson, B. D., Parr, R. E., Yeung, M. J., Kish, J. C., Flemings, M., Vitente, A., & Kline, G. M. (2026). Forming meaningful connections: a cross-sectional survey of hybrid doctor of physical therapy students' belonging, well-being, and program recommendations. BMC Medical Education. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-026-08910-8

This study maps its findings onto the framework and extends it by adding programme policies and faculty support.

Ralph, M. C., Pascutto, J., Wright, C., & Pedrosa Martinez, R. (2023). Perceptions of Gender in Classrooms and Associated Expectations of Belonging. Journal of Interior Design. https://doi.org/10.1177/10717641231211544

This study applies the framework to classroom design and belonging.

Theoretical extension and synthesis

Allen, K. A., Kern, M. L., Basarkood, G., Melzak, E., Jain, R., & Boyle, C. (2025). Mapping belonging: A sociocultural and socioecological approach within educational contexts. In G. A. D. Liem, J. A. Fredricks & Z. Y. Wong (Eds.), Sociocultural perspectives on student engagement: Theory, research, and practice. Information Age. ISBN 1837085552, 9781837085552

This chapter uses the framework to show how antecedents interact across sociocultural and institutional systems in education.

Allen, K.-A. (2025). School Belonging: Evidence, Experts, and Everyday Gaps. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-025-10055-x

This paper evaluates the framework in school settings and explains how the antecedents operate under varied structural conditions.

School and Youth

Allen, K. A., Kern, M. L., Slaten, C., D’Argenio, E., Arslan, G., & Reardon, J. (2024). Student belonging in focus: Bridging research, theory, and practice with contextual relevance to enhance wellbeing and academic outcomes (pp. 55-71). In G. Arslan & M. Yıldırım (Eds.), Handbook of positive school psychology: Evidence-based strategies for youth wellbeing. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-54295-4

This chapter applies the framework to student wellbeing and academic outcomes in school environments.

Brown, C., Douthwaite, A., Donnelly, M., & Shay, M. (2025). Connected Belonging: A relational and identity-based approach to schools' role in promoting child wellbeing. British Educational Research Journal 51(4). https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.4112

This paper builds its Connected Belonging approach to school wellbeing around the four components of the framework.

Law, S.-Y. (2022). What does belonging mean to us? Experiences of a Burmese refugee family. He Kupu 7(2). https://hekupu.ac.nz/node/378

This early childhood practitioner study of a Burmese refugee family structures its discussion and recommendations around the four components.

Reviews & Research

Examples of reviews that use the four antecedents as an organising structure appear in the scholarship on belonging in online and blended learning. These reviews classify evidence according to competencies, opportunities, motivations, and perceptions.

Belonging: An Essential Human and Organizational Need

Mary T. Imboden, PhD

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08901171241255204

Cenkci, A. T. (2025). Beyond the screen: an integrative review of belonging antecedents in online courses. Journal of Learning for Development (Emerald). https://www.emerald.com/jole/article-split/doi/10.1108/JOLE-03-2025-0023/1268896/Beyond-the-screen-an-integrative-review-of?utm_source=chatgpt.com

A Conceptual Relation Between the Need to Belong and Sense-of-Belongingness Saga Pardede and Velibor Bobo Kovač

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00332941251320281

Hug, S., & Eyerman, S. (2024, June), Applying an Integrative Belonging Framework to Explore Students' Perspectives at HSIs Paper presented at 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Portland, Oregon. 10.18260/1-2--46590 https://peer.asee.org/applying-an-integrative-belonging-framework-to-explore-students-perspectives-at-hsis

Exclusion, belonging and mental wellness: the sporting and physically active leisure experiences of women in rural Australia

Chelsea Litchfield

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/11745398.2024.2358794?utm_source=chatgpt.com#abstract

Aragoneses de la Rubia, M., Fernandez-Blazquez, M. L. M., & Barrios Fernandez, A. (2026). Sense of belonging in culturally and ethnically diverse educational contexts: a systematic review. Social Psychology of Education 29, art. 42. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-026-10205-1

This systematic review classifies 29 studies according to the four components and supports the framework’s use in educational settings.

Seo, E., Clapper, M., Hecht, C. A., Crosnoe, R., & Yeager, D. S. (2025). Peer Mindset Culture as a Developmental Context for Belonging. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-025-10082-8

This paper draws on the framework to explain how peer mindset cultures shape adolescent belonging.

Howard, J., & Doucet, F. (2024). "Mixed nation!" introducing a conceptual framework for the (im)possibilities of racialized belonging among Black mixed-race youth. Race Ethnicity and Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2024.2328286

This paper builds a conceptual framework for racialised belonging among Black mixed-race youth within the Integrative Framework of Belonging.

Liao, Y., Peng, Q., & Li, R. (2026). Cross-economy stability of predictor rankings for adolescent school belonging and mathematics anxiety: an explainable machine-learning analysis of PISA 2022. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1875261

This PISA 2022 analysis uses the framework to organise the interpretation of predictors of school belonging.

Community, sport and health

Researchers are also using the framework to understand belonging beyond schools and universities, in sport, volunteering, the arts and community life.

Au, A., Hilario, C., Meherali, S., & Salma, J. (2024). Unveiling Social Belonging: Exploring the Narratives of Immigrant Muslim Older Women. Health & Social Care in the Community. https://doi.org/10.1155/2024/5598247

This photo-elicitation study with immigrant Muslim older women in Canada uses the framework to conceptualise belonging.

Oskarsson, J., Flygare Wallen, E., Wickman, K., & Lund Ohlsson, M. (2025). Empower Our Growth as Athletes: Voices of Swedish Athletes With Intellectual Disability. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.70133

This study of Swedish athletes with intellectual disability uses the four components to guide its analysis of belonging in sports clubs.

Meredith, O. S., Litchfield, C., Dionigi, R. A., Olsen, M., Osborne, J., Crawford, R., & Richards, K. (2023). Experiences of belonging and exclusion in sport and physical activity for individuals of diverse sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) in rural Australia. Sport in Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2023.2283138

This study interprets the sport experiences of people of diverse sexual orientation and gender identity in rural Australia through the four components.

Gale, T., Meredith, O., Richards, K., Litchfield, C., Dionigi, R. A., Osborne, J., Olsen, M., & Crawford, R. (2026). First Nations women's experiences of sport and physical activity in rural and regional Australia: community, family and wellbeing. Annals of Leisure Research. https://doi.org/10.1080/11745398.2026.2638214

This study applies the framework to First Nations women’s experiences of sport, adding a cultural and sociological lens.

Marlin, L., Lewis, C., & McLaren, S. (2022). "Being Able to Be Yourself": A Qualitative Exploration of How Queer Emerging Adults Experience a Sense of Belonging in Rural Australia. Journal of Homosexuality. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918369.2022.2092806

This study applies the four components to queer emerging adults in rural Australia and finds that perceptions shape the other three.

Williams, T., Lakhani, A., & Spelten, E. (2024). 'Keeps me young at heart': Exploring the influence of volunteering on social connection, health and well-being in rural Australia. Australian Journal of Rural Health. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajr.13202

This study of rural volunteering interprets its findings against the four components.

Garcia-Cuesta, S., Rios Calderon, G., Lara Garcia, P., Thygesen, S., Westerberg, F., Candal, T., & Diaz Reyes, M. (2025). Co-crafting Artistic Belonging with Communities through Arts-Based Participatory Action Research. Research in Arts and Education. https://doi.org/10.54916/rae.155900

This arts-based participatory action research frames its work around expanding opportunities and challenging perceptions of not belonging.

Popular Books

D. Berger’s The Quest

AnnaHuysse's forthcoming book, Auroimmunity: The Price of Belonging

Doctoral Thesis and Dissertations

A growing body of doctoral research adopts the Integrative Framework of Belonging as a primary conceptual lens. In these theses, the framework is used to structure theory chapters, guide qualitative coding, or justify construct selection in research on student belonging, transition, and marginalised groups.

East Tennessee State University Doctoral dissertation examining undergraduate belonging, explicitly citing Allen et al. (2021) and using the four antecedents to organise constructs and analysis. https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Master’s thesis drawing on the Integrative Framework of Belonging to argue that belonging depends on multiple interacting conditions rather than a single factor. https://escholarship.org/

University of Alberta Graduate thesis explicitly naming Allen et al. (2021) as the Integrative Framework used to structure the study’s conceptual model and analytic approach. https://ualberta.scholaris.ca/

Tampere University, Finland Master’s thesis using the framework as the primary model for examining belonging in place-based and marginalised identity contexts. https://trepo.tuni.fi/

Welsh, J. R. (2026). A Hermeneutic Exploration of Professional Place-Based Belonging Experienced by Faculty in COVID-19 Informed Undergraduate Formal Learning Places. Lesley University Educational Studies Dissertations 14. https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/educational_studies_dissertations/14

This doctoral dissertation uses the framework as its theoretical framework to study belonging among academic staff.

Public Scholarship

Belonging as a framework for health and wellbeing appears in public outlets that extend the reach of the integrative model:

The Sense That You Belong Somewherehttps://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/between-cultures/202112/the-sense-you-belong-somewhere

Psychology Today (2025). Belonging as a framework for health. https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/health-and-human-nature/202512/belonging-as-a-framework-for-health

A Conversation About… The Importance of Belonging for Young People

https://mhpn.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Podcast-Transcript-ACA-Belonging-for-young-people.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Your Sense of Belonging in Modern Times

https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/sense-of-belonging/202201/your-sense-of-belonging-in-modern-times

Impact and Application

In the workplace

Organisations are increasingly using the logic of the Integrative Framework of Belonging to understand how workplace environments shape employee experience. An example is the McLean & Company research report Unlocking belonging in the workplace (https://hr.mcleanco.com/research/ss/unlocking-belonging-in-the-workplace), which applies principles consistent with the four antecedents to show how job role design, social opportunity structures, individual agency, and perceptions of psychological safety interact to support or undermine belonging at work.

Practice pieces for managers and HR leaders (e.g., California Management Review’s practitioner piece “The Basics of Belonging” draws on the 2021 framework to brief executives and MBAs on implementation).

Case Western Reserve University applies the four components to belonging in the biomedical research workforce, with prompts for discussion and reflection. https://case.edu/news/belonging-biomedical-research-industry-too-vague-achieve-or-too-important-not-pursue

University Adoption

The Integrative Framework of Belonging has been used to inform university-level policy design and monitoring.

At Universitas Negeri Semarang, the framework guided institutional approaches to measuring student belonging and wellbeing and was used to support data-informed policy decisions at scale.

Northeastern University’s institutional belonging resources; and Missouri Positive Behaviour Interventions and Supports (PBIS) training materials. The Missouri SW-PBS Summer Institute materials include dedicated sessions on “Creating Spaces of Belonging for Students and Staff,” embedding belonging practices within statewide behaviour support training. The University of Adelaide’s Student Sense of Belonging and Transition guide cites the 2021 framework to shape institutional supports for commencing students.

Curricular use includes a state-funded OpenOregon open-education textbook; Oregon’s publicly funded instructional frameworks, which include a “Student Belonging” strand used by districts and teacher educators, signposting belonging as foundational to early literacy.

University wellbeing units and student support services have adopted the framework to guide belonging initiatives. Examples include public university resources that translate the four antecedents into practical guidance for students and staff.

University of Iowa Wellbeing (2022). Increasing your feelings of belonging requires active participation.https://wellbeing.uiowa.edu/news/2022/09/increasing-your-feelings-belonging-requires-active-participation

At Monash University, University Marketing, Admissions and Communications (UMAC), the Audience Experience team led by Tina Brunet: the Student Sense of Belonging and Transition, conceptual and practical material on belonging and student transition links to the four antecedents and higher education transition planning. In a presentation to the University of Adelaide https://www.adelaide.edu.au/learning/ua/media/2938/student-sense-of-belonging.pdf

The Higher Education Authority in Ireland published Enhancing Student Engagement and Belonging through Collaborative Partnership (2026), led by a University College Dublin team and part-funded by the Department of Health. The report places the Integrative Framework of Belonging at the core of its organising model, the Dynamic Ecosystem of Student Belonging. https://hea.ie/assets/uploads/2026/04/CollaborativePartnership2_FINAL.pdf

The Bristol Institute for Learning and Teaching at the University of Bristol presents the framework to university teaching staff in its conference blog series. https://bilt.online/a-healthy-sense-of-belonging-why-does-this-matter/

Flinders University’s Student Health and Well-being team organises its student guidance on how to belong around the four components. https://blogs.flinders.edu.au/student-health-and-well-being/2023/09/25/how-to-belong/

In the Community

In community and settlement policy, four Local Immigration Partnerships (LIPs) and allied regional networks in Alberta adopted my Integrative Framework of Belonging (Allen et al., 2021) in 2022 to guide local planning for communities of 10,000–65,000 residents. Between 2023 and 2025, the Calgary Catholic Immigration Society (CCIS) structured newcomer needs assessments with 150+ participants around the framework. My role was to brief LIPs and CCIS on operationalisation, co-design survey constructs, and review tools so the framework’s domains were usable locally. Findings identified neighbourhood-belonging shortfalls (30% in Rocky View and Wheatland; 18% in Foothills), and directed investment to social connection, volunteering, and neighbour-to-neighbour initiatives. Participant feedback such as “knowing one’s neighbour plays a great role [in belonging]” and “volunteer and helping people [increases belonging]” was built into subsequent strategy and resourcing. CCIS then embedded the framework in the Little Book of LIP (described as “a go-to” consultation guide that centres newcomer belonging) as the recommended consultation model, sustaining use beyond the initial project and with the Medicine Hat LIP hosting and distributing the guide to partners.

Health & Counselling

Belonging in autoimmune health and functioning:

https://www.youtube.com/c/AnnaHuysse

The sense that you belong somewhere

Cypress Counselling

https://cypresstherapyandcounseling.com/the-sense-that-you-belong-somewhere/#:~:text=According%20to%20psychology%20Today%2C%20belonging%20is%20a,Competencies%20*%20Opportunities%20*%20Motivations%20*%20Perceptions