Wendy Young, Associate Director, Judicial Affairs, JMU Chris Orem, PhD Candidate, Center for Assessment & Research Studies, JMU

 Discuss how student affairs and assessment professionals can collaborate to create or improve intentional educational programming.  Identify pertinent literature that informs the research areas of interest.  Evaluate the results from two years worth of research involving the relationships between dysfunctional impulsivity, entitlement, and the judicial student population.  Discuss a pilot study done on dysfunctional impulsivity and peer influence that expands the understanding of this relationship in order to begin to inform programmatic technique.  Develop strategies for using data gathered on characteristics of student populations to make programmatic and instructional changes.

Establishing Objectives Selecting/ Designing Instrument Collecting Information Analyzing/ Maintaining Information Using Information *Note: Adapted to fit research instead of program development

 Objective—Understand the characteristics of judicial students more in order to provide better education and services  Office began looking at decision-making of college students as a construct  Found decision-making construct to be broad with many components  Brought in an expert from our Psychology department on cognitive psychology and behavior  At the expert’s suggestion, we decided to look at characteristics we perceive may lead to poor decisions for college students who break a code of conduct

 Had a discussion of characteristics we perceive in students who go through a judicial process  What characteristics do you believe describe this population of students? **It’s what we think, what our gut tells us, but do we really know?

Impulsive Lower Self Esteem Entitled

 After deciding on which characteristics, the CARS graduate students did a review of the literature to find appropriate measures  Judicial staff met with CARS to determine measures  Chose 3 instruments: --Dysfunctional Impulsivity (Dickman, 1990) --Perceived Entitlement Scale (Campbell et al, 2004) -- Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1989)

 Measures of Dysfunctional Impulsivity (DI), Self Esteem, & Entitlement were given to all students who were found responsible for a violation of the code of conduct and received an educational sanction  Dysfunctional Impulsivity (DI), Self Esteem, & Entitlement measures were given on Assessment Day to the freshman class as well (comparison group)  Analyses were done in the summer of 2010

 By the Numbers: *Two hour program *Community standards, laws, resources, risk reduction *Minor violations of alcohol policy  Calling the Shots : * Three weeks, two hours each week (6 hours total) *Decision-making and alcohol *Major violations or multiple violations of alcohol policy  Back On Track: *Five weeks, two hours each week (10 hours total) *Physiology of addiction, Stages of Change and Health Belief Models, attendance in AA or NA, resources *Major alcohol/drug violations and repeated substance violations  High Expectations : *Two hour online program & 2 hour workshop *Minor violations of drug policy for marijuana  Values In Action: *Two weeks, two hours each week (4 hours total) *Personal values and decision making in personal and community life  Site Experience: * 30, 45, or 60 site hours *Connection to the university through involvement *Reflection paper & groups  Mentor Experience: *8, 10, 12, or 15 hour-long meetings with volunteer faculty or staff member *Develop personal mission, goals, and action items *Connection to the university through development of personal direction *Reflection paper

 Participants (two samples):  3,600 Freshmen  1,200 Students required to visit Judicial Affairs  719 Assigned to Educational Sanctions  483=Freshmen, 170=Sophomore, 49=Juniors, 17=Seniors  13 research questions were investigated

 Do first year students who visited the Office of Judicial Affairs differ from those who didn’t visit on measures of entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and/or self- esteem? ScaleStudent TypenMeanSDtd Entitlement Visited Judicial Affairs Did Not Visit Judicial Affairs Dysfunctional Impulsivity Visited Judicial Affairs **0.31 Did Not Visit Judicial Affairs Note. ***p<.001

 Do students who visited Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and self-esteem depending on their year in school?

 Do students who visited Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and self-esteem depending on the program they were sanctioned? ScaleOJA ProgramnMeanSD F Dysfunctional Impulsivity By the Numbers Calling the Shots/Back on Track High Expectations * Values in Action Mentor/Site Experience BASICS Total

 Did students with multiple visits to Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and self-esteem than one-time offenders? ScaleStudent GroupnMeanSDtd Entitlement One Time Visitor Multiple Visits Dysfunctional Impulsivity One Time Visitor **0.24 Multiple Visits Note. **p<.01

 Did students with a non-compliance charge differ in entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and/or self-esteem than those without a similar charge? ScaleStudent GroupnMeanSDtd Entitlement Compliant Non-Compliance Charge Dysfunctional Impulsivity Compliant ***0.60 Non-Compliance Charge Note. ***p<.001

Significant differences in dysfunctional impulsivity surfaced in multiple tests Older students seemed to be more entitled, while younger students were more impulsive We were only testing students who received an educational sanction, not all students found responsible

 Give entitlement and dysfunctional impulsivity again to see if replication will occur; give to all students found responsible  Begin sharing results with assistant directors overseeing educational programs  Begin brainstorming how we might change programs or processes  Design a pilot study to look at any correlation between dysfunctional impulsivity and peer influence (since most of our programming is peer-based)

 DI & Entitlement were given to all students who were found responsible for a violation of the code of conduct  DI & Entitlement were given on Assessment Day to the freshman class as well (comparison group)  Pilot correlation study was done in Fall 2010 on Peer Influence & DI

 Participants: --N=665 (Female-530; Male-131) --Voluntarily took a qualtrics survey sent in an in November freshmen, 118 sophomores, 130 juniors, 172 seniors, and 74 graduate students  Measures: --Peer & Parent Influence Scale (PPI; Werner-Wilson and Arbel, 2000) --Dysfunctional Impulsivity (Dickman, 1990)  Main Finding: -- There is a small, positive correlation between dysfunctional impulsivity and peer influence (Spearman=.258; p<.0001, N=665)

 Participants (two samples):  3,745 Freshmen  1,181 Students charged with at least one violation  570 Sanctioned to Educational Programs  394=Freshmen, 130=Sophomore, 46=Juniors and Seniors,  13 research questions were investigated  When appropriate, data were combined with data

 Do freshmen students who visited the Office of Judicial Affairs differ from those who didn’t visit on measures of entitlement and /or dysfunctional impulsivity? ScaleStudent TypenMeanSDtd Dysfunctional Impulsivity Visited Judicial Affairs **0.34 Did Not Visit Judicial Affairs Note. ***p<.001

 Do students who visited Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement and/or dysfunctional impulsivity depending on their year in school?

 Did students with multiple visits to Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement and dysfunctional impulsivity than one-time offenders? ScaleStudent GroupnMeanSDtd Dysfunctional Impulsivity One Time Visitor ***0.30 Multiple Visits Note. ***p<.001

 Do students who visited Judicial Affairs differ on entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and self-esteem depending on the program they were sanctioned? ScaleOJA ProgramnMeanSD F Dysfunctional Impulsivity By the Numbers Calling the Shots/Back on Track High Expectations ** Values in Action Mentor/Site Experience BASICS Total Note. **p=.002

 Did students with a non-compliance charge differ in entitlement, dysfunctional impulsivity, and/or self-esteem than those without a similar charge? ScaleStudent Groupn Mea nSDtd Dysfunctional Impulsivity Compliant ***0.42 Non-Compliance Charge Note. ***p<.001

 Do students who are not assigned to educational sanctions differ in levels of entitlement and/or dysfunctional impulsivity from students who are assigned to educational sanctions? ScaleStudent GroupnMeanSDtd Dysfunctional Impulsivity Educational Program Probation/Other Note. Sample only includes the first case in which the student was involved.

 Any effects involving entitlement were non- existent.  Students (particularly freshmen) who visited Judicial Affairs are slightly more dysfunctionally impulsive than students who did not visit.  Students in higher level alcohol programs had higher levels of DI than students in lower level programs.  Non-compliance may be more related to DI than to entitlement, as originally hypothesized.  Students who were sanctioned to probation did not differ from those who received educational sanctions.

 Implement additional follow up studies to look at the relationship between peer influence and dysfunctional impulsivity for the judicial student population  Do a qualitative study by talking with students who score higher and lower in dysfunctional impulsivity to see how they experience decision-making and how they experience our programs

 Introduce classroom strategies that work best for students high in DI (e.g. ADD/ADHD research), especially in higher level programs  Give instruments before program attendance to determine which program the student is assigned to (e.g. all high DI students in same program)  Use language and strategies that work best for students high in DI (e.g. ADD/ADHD research) in our proactive education  If we continue to see relationship between DI and peer influence, look for strategies for having peers be more involved, in various ways, with our proactive education and our classroom environments (e.g. teaching, videos, peer mentoring)  Look for ways to educate students with non-compliance charges keeping DI in mind

Questions & Discussion

Wendy Young Associate Director Chris Orem Doctoral Candidate, CARS