Students' Perceptions of Faculty's Office Arrangements

Abstract

A study was conducted to assess the effects of sex of student, sex of professor, and office arrangement on college students' evaluations of possible interactions in faculty offices. It was expected that offices arranged to put the professor in total control would evoke more negative evaluations from students than offices arranged to allow students some sense of control and that this especially would be true for perceptions of male professors. Subjects looked at four different office types ranging from faculty-controlled to less-faculty-controlled and were asked to evaluate how much control they thought the professor and they as students would have in each setting, how likely they would be to remain in the environment after their business was completed, and how comfortable they would feel. Results showed that students rated the less-faculty-controlled offices more favorably than the faculty-controlled offices, although an interaction showed that men more than women differentially evaluated the offices. The most negative office ratings were made for male professors in faculty-controlled offices, but again men more than women made these distinctions.