Family Relationships, Academic Environments, and Psychosocial Development during the University Experience

Abstract

A cohort-sequential study was used to assess family and university environments on identity formation and ego strength. A sample of 294 university students entering school in 1994 and 1995 was assessed in the first and second years. Mailed surveys were completed to assess expressiveness and cohesion in the family, intellectual and supportive activity in academic departments, frequency of critical and analytic teaching in courses, and measures of avoidance decision making, dialectic thinking, identity diffusion and identity achievement, and the ego strength of fidelity. Few developmental changes in any of the variables were observed across the 2 years. However, intellectual and supportive academic departments and democratic family life predicted ego strength. Likewise, the effect of intellectual and supportive academic departments on psychosocial functioning was mediated by information management strategies and the use of dialect thought. The evidence suggests that future research should include both direct effects through perceived environments and indirect effects of the environment through mediating social cognitions.