Master's Theses

Document Type

Thesis - campus only access

Date of Award

Summer 2000

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Psychology

Advisor

Amy Claxton Kallam

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate college learning environments, teaching methods, and academic advising and student opinions and preferences about them. Students were categorized into three groups: traditional students, nontraditional students, and graduate students. Previous surveys from an investigation by Parker-Price and Claxton (1996) were used for the traditional and a portion of the nontraditional students, and new data was gathered for the graduate students and the remaining nontraditional students using the FHSU Student Satisfaction Survey. This survey rates student opinions and preferences in regard to the three categories and was administered to students at Fort Hays State University, a medium-sized mid-western university. The results received from the various student groups were then compared to one another in order to investigate if there were any significant differences among them in regards to their opinions and preferences of the three categories. The results obtained showed that when all of the items in each section were combined to form one overall rating, no significant differences existed among any of the three student groups regarding learning environments, teaching methods, or academic advising. However, several individual items in various sections did show significant differences among the three groups. This suggests that although the students didn't seem to have significantly different opinions regarding the three topics overall, they did view several subcategories in some sections differently. This leads to the possibility that there are some strong differences among these three student groups in regards to certain areas. Because of this possibility, even though no overall significant results were received from this study there is still the potential for further research to be done in these three areas and with these three types of student groups.

Comments

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Rights

© 2000 S. Daniel Stunes

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