The Developmental Effects of College

Dr. Tim Cain, Assistant Professor
Education and Organizational Leadership, College of Education

In 1868, John Milton Gregory used his inaugural address as the first Regent of the Illinois Industrial University to identify the purposes and outlooks of the new institution. He discussed the growing interest in educating members of all socioeconomic classes and the need for education to be practical. He acknowledged the desire to instruct students in the latest techniques of production but challenged those who argued for industrial training or the memorization of established facts. Instead, he conceived of the institution, which would later be renamed the University of Illinois, as a "full table spread with every form of human knowledge." He contended,

It is comparatively easy to load the youthful memory with the knowledge which has been wrought out by other minds, and to send our students forth to the encounters of life burdened, rather than armed, with the ponderous armor of some Saul of science. Education, under careless or unskillful teachers, always tends strongly towards this excessive use of mere verbal memory. It is much easier to learn and remember than to investigate and think. But to link the scholarly study of truths and theories, the reasoning upon general laws, and the comprehension of the sciences, in their completeness, with a practical mastery of their application in the arts, is a work of double difficulty.

Almost a century and a half later, Gregory's words would resonate with many in American colleges and universities, as educators articulate students' need to think critically about vexing societal issues. If anything, the increased complexity of the modern world and the diversity of lived experiences have made the challenges facing students and the task before universities even more pressing.

One way that educators understand the process of student learning is through cognitive development theories, a collection of models and frameworks that together provide insight into students' meaning making and the methods that can be used to foster increasingly complex abilities. These modern understandings can be traced to the work of William G. Perry, Jr., a Harvard professor and administrator who questioned why some students had difficulty making arguments in their writing or responded with shock and anger to the diversity to which college exposed them. He noticed that some struggled to provide evidence to substantiate their thoughts while others refused to consider that any one opinion was more valid or supportable than any other. Perry's attempts to understand and describe these students' ways of viewing the world built on the work of developmental psychologist Jean Piaget and led to an entire field of study. In the years since, scholars such as Marcia Baxter Magolda, Patricia King, and Karen Kitchner have asked related questions, elaborating on, challenging, countering, and reworking Perry's initial understandings.

Although the resulting models are distinct, they share general conceptions of cognitive development, including that it can be understood as progressing through stages of increasingly complex ways of making meaning. In these stage-based theories, development is directional with each new stage subsuming the previous and people retaining the ability to function at a more complex level once it is achieved. This development occurs when students adjust their ways of understanding to complex situations rather than trying to fit the situations into existing static frameworks. In educational settings, it can be fostered by providing appropriate challenges in supportive environments; too much challenge forestalls development while too little won't make it necessary. Cognitive development, while a crucial part of college and of life, can be difficult and frustrating for students as they challenge their own conceptions and fundamentally alter how they understand the world.

Many traditional age students enter an institution such as the University of Illinois viewing the world dualistically, where some things are known and others are not. They respect the power of authorities and understand education as similar to the content accumulation that Gregory dismissed. They expect their instructors to provide them with answers, trusting those answers based on the status of an author or scholar, rather than the supporting evidence. Uncertainty is thought to be a temporary status that will ultimately be overcome by more knowledgeable authorities. This uncertainty, though, can provoke development and lead students into periods of subjectivity or extreme relativism during which they are unable to decide between competing explanations. When viewed through these lenses, all opinions are equally valid. Development beyond this subjectivity can be fostered by modeling the use of evidence and requiring the justification of beliefs. It occurs when students come to realize that uncertainty and ambiguity are ubiquitous but that ubiquity does not relieve them of the responsibility to make informed decisions. Educators are attempting to promote these higher stages of functioning, where people view themselves as producers of knowledge, weigh and use evidence, and author their own lives. As Gregory might have attested 140 years ago, when understood as only one part of larger human development, "it is a work of double difficulty."

To Learn More
(Items are available through the U of I Library or your local library)

M. B. Baxter Magolda & P. M. King (2004). Learning partnerships: Theory and models of practice to educate for self-authorship. Sterling, VA: Stylus.

Baxter Magolda, M. B. (1992). Knowing and reasoning in college: Gender-related patterns in students' intellectual development. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

King, P. M. & Kitchener, K. S. (1994). Developing reflective judgment: Understanding and promoting intellectual growth and critical thinking in adolescents and adults. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

King, P.M., & Baxter Magolda, M.B. (1996). A developmental perspective on learning. Journal of College Student Development, 37, 163-173.

Love, P. G. & Guthrie, V. L. (1999) (Eds.). Understanding and applying cognitive development theory. New Directions for Student Services, No. 88. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

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