Curricular, interactional, and structural diversity: identifying factors affecting learning outcomes

Abstract

ABSTRACT Discussions of ‘diversity’ in higher education are often limited to structural diversity (i.e. access to higher education based on demographic variables), which is just one form of diversity that impacts student learning outcomes. Others include curricular diversity (a measure of the interdisciplinary of the coursework) and interactional diversity (a measure of informal interaction). This study aims to explore the effects of all three categories of diversity on the academic performance of college students. Using data from a top higher education institution in Taiwan, we construct indicators of curricular diversity (i.e. curricular evenness (CE), ratio of elective credits (REC), ratio of inter-collegiate credits (RIC), and interdisciplinary experience (IDE). Interactional diversity was measured using student's participation in activities involving interaction with others, and structural diversity was measured by student's personal and contextual characteristics. Our goal was to determine which of these forms of diversity impacted students’ self-reported skills in interdisciplinary communication (ICS) and collaborative problem solving (CPS). Results show that curricular diversity is significantly associated with interactional diversity. In terms of learning outcomes, curricular and structural diversity are associated with both ICS and CPS, while interactional diversity is associated with CPS. Interactional diversity also moderates the relationships between curricular diversity and ICS as well as CPS. This research implies that institutions of higher education need to promote curricular and interactive diversity to fix systemic biases that limit or relate to structural diversity.