The Effect of Selected Demographic Factors on Prediction of GPA by Male Freshman Students

Abstract

Student ability to predict first semester grade-point averages (GPA’s) was examined in a study of 1,025 male college freshmen in the fall of 1968 at The University of Texas, El Paso. A questionnaire was designed to yield socioeconomic data, ethnic information, information on educational background, and choice of college major. Data were subjected to a factorial analysis of variance and all hypotheses were tested for significance at the .05 level. The results of this analysis indicate that three main effects and two interaction effects were significant. More specifically, it can be seen that choice of college major, socioeconomic level, and the factor of average high school grade were found to have a significant effect upon prediction of GPA by male freshman students. The interaction effect of the factors of ethnic background and average high school grade were significant in the prediction of GPA by the Ss. A final interaction which had a significant effect on predicted GPA was that of the four main independent variables of choice of college major, ethnic background, socioeconomic level, and average high school grade of male freshman students. Implications were stated for academic advising and financial aid and a recommendation was made for further action research in the area of freshmen aspiration levels using the results found in this study.