Correlates of Ratings of Teaching Effectiveness: Gordon's Survey of Interpersonal Values

Abstract

The relationship between undergraduates' perceptions of the interpersonal values of their professor and their ratings of his teaching effectiveness was assessed. Students' perceptions of their professor's interpersonal values were elicited by having the students complete Gordon's Survey of Interpersonal Values (Gordon, 1960) as they thought the professor himself would complete it. This technique represented a departure, suggested and defended by Gordon (1972), from the typical use of the survey in which the individual completes the instrument for himself. The 64 males and 20 females enrolled in a juniorlevel course in accounting rated the professor's teaching effectiveness on a five-point scale. Thirty-rwo of the students had taken a course from this professor in the preceding semester. The survey measures the relative importance an individual places on six types of interpersonal relationships: Support-rece~ving encouragement from other people, being treated with understanding; Conformity-doing what is accepted and proper, folloa~ing regulations closely; Recognition-being considered important, achieving recognition; Independence-being free to make one's own decisions, being able to do things in one's own way; Benevolence-doing things for other people, being generous; Leadershiphaving authority over others, being in a position of leadership or power. When all subjects were considered, none of the six Pearson correlations between value scores and ratings of effectiveness was significant (p > .OS). However, when the subjects wtre partitioned by sex, correlations berween ratings of effectiveness and Conformity (-.54) and Independence (.48) were significant for females. In addition, for Recognition, Independence, Benevolence and Leadership, the correlations for males and females were in opposite directions, and one such difference (Independence) was significant (p < .01)TWhen the subjects were partitioned according to whether they had taken the prior course from this professor, correlations berween ratings of effectiveness and Recognition (-.40) and Beoevolence (.40) were significant (p < .05) for the group with prior exposure to the professor. The correlation involving Recognition (.38) was also significant (p < .01) for the group with no prior exposure but was in the opposite direction. In addition, correlations involving Independence and Benevolence were in opposite directions, and two of chese three differences (Recognition and Benevolence) were significant (p < 111 .U 1 ) . While these differences in value correlates of ratings of teaching effecuveness between the two sets of subgroups are interesting, these results must be considered preIi~ninary.' These data suggest perceived interpersonal values are more highly related to female students' ratings of a male professor's teaching effectiveness than to male students' ratings and are more highly related to the ratings of those students with some prior exposure to the professor than to ratings of students with none. Future researchers may wish to consider these variables in invesrigarions of factors related to ratings of teaching effectiveness.