The National Study of Student Learning indicated that membership in Greek organizations can have negative effects on students' cognitive development, particularly during freshman year. In contrast, this study at a midwestern research university found Greek students had higher levels of involvement and gains in general abilities than non-Greek…

A longitudinal study of 2,165 college students at 4-year institutions suggests that students' precollege traits, quality of academic effort in college, and faculty and peer interactions were more influential on learning and student perceptions of cognitive development than institutional characteristics and environment. A resulting causal model is…