Developing interdependence: an analysis of individual and school influences on a social outcome of schooling created by John Ainley

A sense of interdependence, in terms of relations with other individuals, groups, and institutions, is at the heart of the social outcomes of schooling. This paper investigates the views of school students in late primary and middle secondary school about the importance to them of relating constructively with others, commitment to community well-being, and adherence to rules and conventions. It describes scales to measure these orientations, investigates relationships with age, gender, and other student characteristics, and examines the extent to which individual student orientations are related to school environments. Data are from a survey of nationally representative Australian samples of approximately 8,000 students in Years 5 and 10 from more than 500 schools as well as 2,600 teachers from those schools. Multilevel regression analyses indicate that differences in student orientations are associated with age, gender, and educational aspirations as well as a number of other school and individual factors. Differences among schools account for approximately 11% of the variance in student scores and school environments and practices are found to be associated with differences in student responses.