Cruce, T.M., Wolniak, G.C., Seifert, T.A., Pascarella, E.T. (2006). Impacts of good practices on cognitive development, learning orientations, and graduate degree plans during the first year of college. Journal of College Student Development, 47(4), 365-383.

This study estimated separately the unique effects of three dimensions of good practice and the global effects of a composite measure of good practices on the cognitive development, orientations to learning, and educational aspirations of students during their first year of college. Analyses of longitudinal data from a representative sample of colleges and universities were conducted, and net of a battery of confounding influences, measures of good practices were positively related to a number of first-year outcomes. The magnitude of the effects of these good practices differed by the pre-college characteristics of the students and by the type of institution attended.