This article explores students' experiences of intellectual, social, and emotional growth during the first year at university and the extent to which these experiences can be considered transformative (Mezirow, 1981). The study is a qualitative interpretive multiple-case study built on semi-structured interviews with students in two higher…

This article presents case study findings about undeclared student experiences in a two-and-a-half-year interdisciplinary learning-living program that integrates the arts, humanities, and social science disciplines. The study examined how the program helped students make informed decisions about academic majors and vocational choices. Participants…

The formative merits of university education are at risk of being reduced from graduateness in the sense of broad academic cultivation to professional training with a strong emphasis on employability. The difficulty in opposing this trend is the absence of a clear framework for academic cultivation. The aim of this study is to construct a model…

Service-learning is a form of experiential learning that combines academic coursework with voluntary service in the community. There is a dearth of critical analysis of the effects of service-learning. To address this issue, this practitioner research aimed to explore and understand its effects. An inductive approach, using qualitative and…

The main research question of this study was: How do student life offices at four diverse Catholic colleges and universities create an environment that is expressive of a Catholic way of life? This research question was operationalized by two research sub questions: How do senior student affairs officers, mid-level student affairs officers, and…

Use of Perry's developmental scheme to test college students' intellectual development found that instead of developmental stages, there are two possible general attitudes taken toward knowledge: it (1) consists of facts to be supplied by faculty; or (2) is a quest in which students have responsibility for their own learning. (Author/MSE)

A study investigated the extent to which 210 college students' learning orientations were shaped independently and jointly by their academic and nonacademic experiences. Findings indicated that the two kinds of experience each made statistically significant and unique contributions to gains in intellectual orientation after controlling for…

The research of William Perry, the Harvard psychologist who documented cognitive growth in undergraduates, is summarized. Perry's theory is compared to Piaget's theory, and the view that Perry is an extension of Piaget is discussed. Also noted is the shift in locus of control and other measures that occur as students progress through Perry's…

Perry's theory of intellectual and ethical development of college students is briefly reviewed. This theory was based on work with Harvard University students, and addresses dualism, multiplicity, and relativism. In the first stage, a student sees the world in right-wrong, black-white terms, with no room in the thinking process for conditional or…

A commonly held assumption is that students should enter college with values and attitudes shared by their parents and, following 4 years of preparation, leave as adults with identical values and attitudes. It is becoming evident that today's students have chosen to depart from these expectations, since growing numbers of them are entering college…

Seldom are college students introduced to theories that describe how they and other students change intellectually during their college years. Two epistemological perspectives on cognitive development in college students and how they can be presented to students are examined in this paper. The first perspective is William Perry's forms of…

This article presents results of several studies examining differing perceptions of influential factors on gifted children's development. Parents, teachers, and gifted children were asked what factors, behaviors, and attitudes they saw as contributing to "giftedness." Implications for instruction and assessment are explored. (Author/PB)

Highlights epistemological development of young adults, including the nature of problems commonly confronted by college students, by reporting on an investigation into the epistemic orientation of general education faculty, focusing on their assumptions about typical undergraduates' approaches to reasoning; and discusses implications for…

Youthful idealism like that found among college students is seen as an important part of the developmental process and also as an opportunity for college teachers to learn about how today's students view the world and to explore the connection between intellect and experience. (MSE)

Research and theory suggest that college students' motivation to learn is related to their epistemological beliefs. Faculty can promote student motivation by designing learning activities that facilitate student development of more sophisticated epistemological beliefs. Faculty developers can assist in this by giving special attention to the…