Comparative Study of Undergraduate Students Studying in Various Disciplines

Abstract

The present study compares the personal values of students of undergraduate courses under three primary discipline groups; arts and humanities, science, and commerce. The difference in gender among the undergraduate courses in the discipline groups is also studied, along with the interaction of gender and course discipline. The population consisted of 120 undergraduate students enrolled in the above disciplines in universities across India aged 18-25. PVQ questionnaire by Sherry and Varma is used. The results found that there is significant difference of personal values between all the discipline groups, i.e., Science, Commerce and Arts and humanities. There was no significant difference in the personal values of religion value, aesthetic value, family prestige value, democratic value between genders and course groups. However, there is significant difference of health value and knowledge value between science students and arts and humanities; they differ in health value among both arts and humanities and commerce. Arts and humanities discipline differ in social value from both science and commerce, and differed significantly from commerce in hedonistic value. Commerce students have significant difference of economic value from both science and arts and humanities students but differ significantly in power value with arts and humanities only. There was an interaction of gender and course in the social value only, with girls of science discipline differing significantly from boys in the same discipline significantly, however, no significant difference of gender was found among any other disciplines or values.