The Power of Peer Relationships in Shaping Character: Peer Relationships as a Predictor of College Student Pro-Social Character Development

Character development has become a topic among college administrators and student service professionals as well as parents and students. Although a laudable and much-needed area of investigation, there is a lack of data measuring the impact and efficacy of factors that might support pro-social character development in college students. The purpose of this study was to discover what factors best predict and therefore promote pro-social character in college students with the focus in this case on activities, goals, and values related to student peer relationships. This research also examined how activities, goals, and values related to student peer relationships predict other standard collegiate program measurements, including satisfaction with campus community, satisfaction with interaction with other students, and overall satisfaction with college. Secondarily, this study also examined the influence of gender, institutional characteristics, residential status, and major field of study in predicting pro-social character development. This research utilized a longitudinal study which examines the relationship between character self-ratings by students on the CSBV2003 (College Students Beliefs and Values Survey) and aforementioned variables in the CSBV2003, the SIF2000 (Student Information Form), and the CIRP (Cooperative Institutional Research Program) higher education institutional characteristics regarding type, control, and selectivity, using the database maintained by the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) of UCLA. The design of the study employed Causal Analytic Modeling with Blocked Regression Analysis (CAMBRA) on quantitative data derived from the SIF (2000) and CSBV (2003) surveys on a representative sampling of college students comprising the cohort of entering first-year students in fall 2000 at forty-six colleges and universities of which 12,030 students were sent the CSBV2003 with 3,680 students responding. This study utilized CAMBRA within the IEO model (Input-Environment-Outcome) developed by Astin and colleagues at the HERI to utilize advantages of CAMBRA and best allow for sequential modeling and causal analysis for studying what factors best support certain outcomes. The goal was to better understand and highlight the variables that best predict pro-social character development in college students so that college administrators and faculty, as well as parents and students, can promote pro-social character development. The hypotheses included that predictors of pro-social character development included involvement in activities, goals, and values related to student peer relationships. The student self-ratings were divided into four major groups: achievement orientation- which included courage, creativity, dependability, drive-to- achieve, leadership ability, and self-confidence (intelligence); compassionate self- concept, which included altruism, compassion, empathy, forgiveness, generosity, gratefulness, helpfulness, kindness, and patience; social, which included cooperativeness, humility, loyalty, open-mindedness, respectfulness, self-awareness, self-confidence (social), self-understanding, and understanding of others; and other collegiate outcomes, which included emotional health, physical health, spirituality, religiousness, satisfaction with sense of community, satisfaction with interaction with students, and satisfaction with overall college experience. Activities, goals and values related to student peer relationships had a significant predictive relationship with all of the self-ratings. Secondary factors examined including the influence of gender, institutional characteristics, residential status, and major field of study, which had mixed results in predicting pro-social character development. The results offer insights into the impact of student peer relationships on pro-social character development in college students and may shed light on the importance of related programs and activities for college students for shaping college student’s lives.