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Book Review
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What Matters in College? Four Critical Years Revisited
Alexander W. Astin
February 1997, Jossey-Bass, ISBN: 078790838X
 Check it out in the Emma Waters Summar Library or Buy It At 
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In this sequel to the widely referenced Four Critical Years, higher education researcher Alexander Astin, director of HERI (Higher Education Research Institute) at UCLA, presents substantially broader results obtained from a longitudinal study of approximately 25,000 undergraduate students who were initially surveyed as freshmen in 1985 and then again in a follow-up survey four years later in 1989-90. The goal of the study was simply to gain a better understanding of how students are affected by their college experiences.
In What Matters in College?, Astin overwhelms the reader with statistical results obtained from the data. After discussing the design of the study in Chapters 1 and 2, Astin moves to specific examples of how college environment variables and student involvement measures affect the undergraduate’s political orientation (Chapter 3), personality and self-concept (Chapter 4), attitudes, values, and beliefs (Chapter 5), patterns of behavior (Chapter 6), academic and cognitive development (Chapter 7), career development (Chapter 8), and satisfaction with the college environment (Chapter 9). Each of these chapters provides its own interesting findings, some of which are fairly predictable. The chapters may be read independently.
In the final three chapters, Astin presents a coherent summary of his findings. In Chapter 10, the student outcomes produced by environmental effects such as institutional characteristics, curriculum, faculty orientation, and peer group orientation are discussed. In a similar manner, Chapter 11 deals with the effects of student involvement (e.g. place of residence, academic involvement, interaction with faculty, interaction with student peers, on and off campus work, etc.) on student outcomes. In Chapter 12, Astin first addresses how undergraduate students change during their college years and then translates his key findings into implications for education policy. These last three chapters are an essential read for any college administrator, faculty member, or student development professional who is committed to the providing the best possible college experience for undergraduate students.
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