The problem with which this investigation is concerned is the identification of selected factors that are closely associated with academic performance. The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship of academic performance to age, gender, reading score, credit hours attempted, and self-assessed personal life skills (self-esteem, growth motivation, change orientation, interpersonal assertation, interpersonal aggression, interpersonal deference, interpersonal awareness, empathy, drive strength, decision making, time management, sales orientation, commitment ethic and stress management).

The problem to which this study is addressed is that of education in a technological age. The principal concern is for the recognition of technology in developing general education for the student with particular reference to industrial arts education. The purposes of the study are to assess technology's significance for education, concepts of education which postulate technology as significant, and the impact of technology on education. Finally, the study discusses critically the implications of these assessments for industrial arts education. Four categories of sources provide the data: the history and philosophy of technology, social sciences, the work of generalists, and education. Selection of data includes both common and divergent viewpoints of facts and judgments. The data are formed into a composite structure of ideas which have implications for education in a technological world.

Based on linear models, this study demonstrated that the psychological and social structures of the classroom, viewed as a naturalistic human system, impact learning outcomes. To operationalize learning outcomes, final grades in the course and a subject self report scale tapping perceptions of utility of material taught were used. The social and psychological structures of the classroom-as-a-human-system were operationalized through the following variables: the degree of social integration of each student, based on network analytic procedures; communication apprehension of students; dimensions of perceived credibility of instructors; dimensions of interpersonal attraction to instructors; perceived satisfaction with task demands of the course; and adjusted orientation to communication, based on communication apprehension scores and network data. Data were obtained from five sections of a multi-section communication course of a large state institution of higher learning in the southwestern region of the United States. Differences in sex were not found.