Undergraduate Political Attitudes: Peer Influence in Changing Social Contexts
Undergraduate Political Attitudes: Peer Influence in Changing Social Contexts
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本科生的政治态度：不断变化的社会背景下的同伴影响
DOI：
10.1080/00221546.1997.11778990
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发表时间：
1997
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Eric L. Dey
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Eric L. Dey
学生受他们就读的学院和大学的影响是多方面的。当然，这些影响中的许多都是有意和有计划的。例如，高等教育机构及其教职员工制定正式的学术计划，旨在促进学生在特定领域的学习和发展(Stark&Lattuca，1997)。相比之下，其他结果，即使是那些可能与一所机构的使命有关的结果，也可以由学生的非结构化和非正式经验产生。学生的态度和价值观就是这种结果的例子，大量的研究证据表明，学生的态度和价值观在大学期间会受到影响(Astin，1993；Pascarella&Terenzini，1991)。然而，大多数学院和大学几乎没有做出正式的努力来塑造学生的价值观，尽管人们普遍认为高等教育需要这样做(Pascarella&Terenzini，1991)。但是，如果学院和大学通常不组织起来塑造态度和价值观，这一领域的结果是如何产生的？对于大学对学生态度和价值观的影响，社会化是最常见的解释。社会化是个体获得未来有用的知识、习惯和价值取向的过程(Brim，1966)。实际上，社会化观点表明，学生在改变和维持他们的态度、价值观和信仰的过程中，平衡了他们自己的倾向和目标与不同群体产生的规范压力(Weidman，1989)。这涉及在正式和非正式环境中发生的组织、人际和个人内部过程(Levine，1966；Weidman，1989；Weil，1985)。许多因素使得了解社会化过程如何影响学生的态度变得重要。从实践的角度来看，高等教育越来越多地被要求对其产生的结果负责，即使这些结果完全独立于任何正式的机构行动。从研究的角度来看，这也是一个需要理解的重要问题，因为个人变化和社会变化之间的紧密联系，这一现实向研究人员提出了大量的方法和理论挑战(Alwin，Cohen&Newcomb，1991；Astin，1993；Gurin，1971；Pascarella&Terenzini，1991)。个人、社会机构和一般社会力量之间的联系使唯一确定因果关系成为问题。此外，解释挑战是由学科界限造成的，这些学科界限导致了这样的观察：“关于社会变革的理论通常忽视个体变革的过程，而人类发展和变革的理论往往忽视社会变革的问题”(Alwin&Krosnick，1991，p.170)。在这种背景下，这项研究的中心目标是使用社会化框架来考察大学对学生态度和价值观的变化影响。通过考察不同时期的大学影响，我希望阐明大学影响和那些与一般社会趋势相关的影响之间的相互联系。我使用魏德曼()提出的大学生社会化模型作为启发式框架，研究大学校园的规范情境、学生与同龄人的互动以及更大社会情境的变化如何影响学生的态度、大学预科网络和大学特征。自由主义、大学影响和社会变革为了解决社会化进程的一般问题，我考察了本科生政治取向发展的具体案例。从对大学影响的最早研究开始，用自由主义和保守主义来定义学生的政治取向就一直是一个挑战。例如，在他关于从本宁顿学院学生收集的数据的早期报告中，纽科姆(1943)指出，现有研究文献中对保守主义一词的定义有很大的差异。…
Students are influenced in a number of ways by the colleges and universities they attend. Many of these influences, of course, are intentional and planned. Higher education institutions and their faculties, for example, develop formal academic programs that are designed to promote student learning and development in specific areas (Stark & Lattuca, 1997). In contrast, other outcomes, even those that may be tied to an institution's mission, can be produced by unstructured and informal experiences of students. Student attitudes and values are examples of such outcomes, and an abundance of research evidence shows that student attitudes and values are influenced during college (Astin, 1993; Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991). Most colleges and universities, however, make little formal effort to shape student values, in spite of general agreement about the need for higher education to do so (Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991). But if colleges and universities do not typically organize themselves to shape attitudes and values, how are outcomes in this area produced? Socialization is the most commonly offered explanation for the influence of college on student attitudes and values. Socialization is the process through which individuals acquire knowledge, habits, and value orientations that will be useful in the future (Brim, 1966). In effect, the socialization perspective suggests that students balance their own predispositions and goals with normative pressures generated by various groups in changing and maintaining their attitudes, values, and beliefs (Weidman, 1989). This involves organizational, interpersonal, and intrapersonal processes that occur in both formal and informal settings (LeVine, 1966; Weidman, 1989; Weil, 1985). A number of factors make it important to understand how socialization processes influence student attitudes. From the perspective of practice, higher education is increasingly being held accountable for the outcomes it produces, even if these outcomes occur completely independently of any formal institutional action. From a research perspective, this is also an important issue to understand because of the tight interconnections between individual change and social change, a reality that presents researchers with a multitude of methodological and theoretical challenges (Alwin, Cohen, & Newcomb, 1991; Astin, 1993; Gurin, 1971; Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991). Linkages among individuals, social institutions, and general social forces make the unique identification of causes and effects problematic. Moreover, interpretational challenges are created by disciplinary boundaries that have led to the observation that "theories about social change generally ignore processes of individual change, and theories of human development and change tend to ignore issues of social change" (Alwin & Krosnick, 1991, p. 170). Set within this context, the central goal of this study is to examine the changing impact of college on student attitudes and values using a socialization framework. By examining college influences across different time periods, I hope to illuminate the interconnections between college effects and those that are related to general social trends. I use the model of undergraduate socialization provided by Weidman (1989) as a heuristic framework for studying how the normative contexts of college campuses, students' interactions with peers, and changes in the larger social context serve to influence the attitudes of students, net of precollege and college characteristics. Liberalism, College Impact, and Social Change To address the general problem of socialization processes I examine the specific case of the development of political orientations among undergraduate students. Defining student political orientations in terms of liberalism and conservatism has been a challenge noted since the earliest research on college impact. For example, in his early report on data collected from Bennington college students Newcomb (1943) noted a great variability in the way the term conservative was defined in the existing research literature. …