Students’ Personal Growth During the First Two Years of College

Is students’ reported personal development during the first two years of college (after controlling for individual, pre-matriculation differences) reliably related to their collegiate experiences during those years? Do the sources of influence on that growth vary from one year to the next. LISREL results indicate that both social and academic integration levels are reliably related to reported personal growth in each year, but academic integration is stronger, particularly in the sophomore year. Academic and social integration in the first year was related to integration levels in the second, but reported personal development in the freshman year may be independent of the growth reported in the sophomore year.