The relationship between psycho-social factors and the scholastic achievement of college students

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was: (1) to determine the relationship between academic achievement and the psycho-social and architectural environment that existed within dormitories and (2) to determine what relationship existed between the University Residence Environment Scale (URES) and the College and University Environment Scales (CUES II). The sample consisted of 280 students residing in four dormitories on the Montana State University campus. The subjects were fulltime students and either sophomores, juniors, or seniors. A table of random numbers was used to select the subjects proportionate to the number of students living in each of the four dormitories and proportionate to the sex of the students. Instrumentation included URES, CUES II, and the Campus Architectural Rating Scale (CARS). CARS is a nominal rating scale which differentiated architectural factors that existed between dormitories. Each subject answered the 96-item URES and the 160-item CUES II. In addition, each subject was given a rating on CARS depending on his dormitory of residence. A multiple regression program was used to predict grade point average from a combination of URES scales, CUES II scales, CARS factors, and university computed expected grade point averages. Using these variables, 30.88% of the variance in obtained grade point average was explained at the .01 level. Expected grade point average accounted for 28.55% of the total variance which was explained. The URES scale Independence was the only other variable that significantly increased the prediction efficiency. Of the 70 correlation coefficients which were computed between the 10 URES scales and the 7 CUES II scales, 50 were significant. No CARS factor was significantly related to academic achievement. Only one URES scale, Innovation, was significantly related to academic achievement. Although the relationship between Innovation and academic achievement was significant, it was not sufficient to be useful in predicting academic achievement.