Personal capacity building for the human services : the roles of curriculum and individual differences in predicting self-concept in college/university students

While much research has outlined the importance of intra-psychic factors in predicting workplace success, it is rare that attention is given to the development of these factors in training for human service professions (e.g. psychology, clergy, nursing). Accordingly, the present study explores differences in self-concept, a key intra-psychic factor, between two institutions that train human service professionals. One institution provides a self-concept program as part of its curriculum while the other provides no such program. Structural equation modeling showed that students from the former institution evinced higher scores on 10 of the 13 measured self-concept factors. However, when personality dimensions were included in modeling, only four of the original 10 self-concept differences remained. Taken together, this study demonstrates: (a) some support for the role of curriculum in self-concept development, (b) the predictive utility of personality on self-concept, and (c) the importance of controlling for such individual differences when evaluating institutional effects.