FACTORS RELATED TO STUDENT PERCEPTIONS OF THE HIGH SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT

Abstract

The study investigates the relationship of intelligence, sex, and selected “home background” variables to student perceptions of the high school environment. In addition it also investigates the independence of the Activities Index (AI) and the High School Characteristics Index (HSCI) which are parallel instruments based on Murray's need press theory. There are two major conclusions arising from the findings of this study. Firstly, student perceptions of the school environment are influenced by a number of variables, namely, sex, intelligence, educational aspiration, mother's occupation, and personality. This influence, however, is not strong enough to affect seriously the normal use of the HSCI as a measure of the global or overall environment of the high school. But evidence points to the need for further investigation of individual differences in perceptions of the school environment. Secondly, the study shows that the parallel instruments are “factorially” independent of each other. This means that students' perceptions of the school environment are largely independent of their personality.