Abstract
Despite scholars’ praise of liberal arts education as a model form, very little research has examined the actual impact of liberal arts education on learning outcomes. The elaborate rhetoric and anecdotal support, long used to advance liberal arts education as the premier type of education with value for all, is no longer sufficient. The practices and conditions that lead to outcomes of a liberally educated student remain an empirical black box. Guided by the work of Pascarella et al. [2005, Liberal arts colleges and liberal arts education: New evidence on impacts. ASHE Higher Education Report, 31(3)], this study examined the extent to which an institutional ethos, that values student–student and student–faculty interaction within a supportive environment characterized by high expectations for developing the intellectual arts, manifests in the lived experiences of students and predicts the development of outcomes theoretically associated with the liberal arts. Specifically, we investigated the construct and predictive validity of the liberal arts experience scale relative to liberal arts outcomes. Using data from the first phase of the Wabash National Study of Liberal Arts Education, net of student background characteristics and institution attended, we found liberal arts experiences had a positive effect on four of six liberal arts outcomes, including intercultural effectiveness, inclination to inquire and lifelong learning, well-being, and leadership.
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Notes
As noted in Pascarella et al. (2005), we recognize the debate and distinctions that have been drawn between “liberal education” and “liberal arts education”. We use the term “liberal arts education” in this paper.
Because we had small sample numbers by racial/ethnic groups and that the variable serves solely as a control in the analyses, we have chosen to retain the dichotomous racial/ethnic distinction.
Because the sample from this study was not randomly assigned to treatment conditions (college versus other post-high school experience), we are not able to use the term ‘effect’ in the experimental sense. ‘Effect’ is used rather in its statistical sense in that variables which may have a confounding influence on the relationship under examination have been statistically controlled, leaving that part of the variance in y that can be attributed to x (Shadish et al. 2002).
Internal consistency estimates for the RCI score are .61 for freshmen and .67 for seniors (Kitchener et al. in preparation).
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Acknowledgment
This research was supported by a grant from the Center of Inquiry in the Liberal Arts at Wabash College.
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Seifert, T.A., Goodman, K.M., Lindsay, N. et al. The Effects of Liberal Arts Experiences on Liberal Arts Outcomes. Res High Educ 49, 107–125 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-007-9070-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-007-9070-7