Possible methods of student attrition research are the autopsy or retrospective study, the longitudinal study and the cross sectional study. The autopsy study is least valuable but can be effective when modified and combined with the other two, depending on the resources of the college. (JAC)

A LISREL analysis indicated that students' academic integration level in each of the four years had a direct effect on reported academic skill development in that year and an indirect effect on reported growth in succeeding years. Social integration was influential only in the junior and senior years. (Author/MLW)

Discusses a study which investigated effects of student characteristics and measures of social and academic integration on voluntary college freshman withdrawal decisions. Findings indicated that student-faculty relationships were the most important factors influencing whether students remained in college. (Author/DB)

A study of the predictive validity of Tinto's theory of college student attrition is described. Compensatory interaction between levels of goal and institutional commitment indicated that institutional commitment had its greatest positive influence on retention for students with low levels of commitment to completing a college degree, and vice…

Salient findings of six studies assessing the construct validity of Tinto's model of college student attrition are described. The studies are based on three independent data collections over a three-year period and indicate the students' informal contacts with faculty are consistently related to subsequent persistence/withdrawal decisions.…

A five-scale instrument developed from a theoretical model of college attrition correctly identified the persistence/voluntary withdrawal decisions of 78.5 percent of 773 freshmen in a large, residential university. Findings showed that student relationships with faculty were particularly important. (Author/PHR)

The relation between residence arrrangement and college attendance patterns was studied. The degree to which the nature of the group with whom a freshman college student lives may influence that student's decision to continue enrollment into the sophomore year was assessed. (MLW)

An earlier path analytic study of the predictive validity of Tinto's theory of college student attrition was replicated using an independent sample of students from another university. Tinto conceived of the attrition/retention process as a series of sociopsychological interactions between the characteristics students bring with them to college…

The validity of Tinto's (1975) theory of student attrition, which asserts that withdrawal relates most directly to students' integration in the social and academic systems of an institution, is examined. This study supports that theory and also suggests that informal interaction with faculty plays an important role as well. (Editor/LBH)

The influence on freshman student attrition of the group with whom a student lives (i.e., the composition or contextual character of the collegiate residence unit) was investigated. Based on Tinto's (1975) model of college student attrition, a longitudinal study was conducted at a large, independent, residential university in New York State having…

To test Tinto's theory of college attrition, a longitudinal study involving 766 students enrolled in Syracuse University in September 1975 was conducted to determine whether freshmen persisters and voluntary dropouts differed on certain attitudinal and behavioral measures of academic and social integration once selected background characteristics…