2008 - Marketing Educators' Association

SOCIOLOGY, ECONOMICS, POLITICS, AND RELIGION: SUCCESS OF MARKETING STUDENTS
Gregory S. Black, Leon F. Dube, and Sue Wingfield, Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi,
College of Business, 6300 Ocean Dr., Corpus Christi, TX 78412; gblack@cob.tamucc.edu
ABSTRACT
As marketing educators, we are facing more
challenges than ever as accrediting agencies are
increasing the pressure to assess learning outcomes
and allegations of dishonest business practices are
increasing. Are our students receiving our best efforts
to prepare them for the real marketing and ethical
challenges they will face on the job? Before we can
ensure we are providing the best education possible,
we must do our best to understand our students more
fully. This study identifies factors related to sociology,
economics, politics, and religion/spirituality in a
comprehensive model to help explain student
performance. The results indicate that sociological
factors, such as a student’s charitable involvement,
professional ambition, and materialism are significant
contributing factors. In addition, the study shows
political party affiliation, academic major, and
religiosity/spirituality to be contributing factors to a
student’s academic performance.
INTRODUCTION
The view that business education needs to be
revised and revamped has become more noticeable
since the turn of the century, with much attention
being focused recently on business education due to
the rash of businesses being exposed for engaging
in unethical business practices (e.g., Leavitt, 1989).
Business schools must adjust their curriculum to
deal with an environment that requires employees to
ethically maximize profits. In addition, the curriculum
must equip students with strong communication
skills, flexibility, and decisiveness. Students must be
taught to maintain the highest ethical standards
while they analyze and synthesize information from
multiple sources, make decisions and implement
courses of action. They must also be prepared to
apply knowledge in diverse situations, remaining
ethical as they implement key programs within their
companies.
Marketing professors today must therefore accept
the responsibility of providing students with the
necessary skills, and focus on teaching methods
that emphasize and include the most effective
elements for student learning. Faculty must concern
themselves with a dual purpose: imparting
knowledge and developing the skills required in
today’s dynamic business environment. Identifying
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characteristics of our students that lead to outstanding
academic performance is essential for us to have the
greatest and most permanent impact on business
students during the few short months when we may
have an influence upon them.
Various recent studies show the positive impact of a
person’s religiosity and/or spirituality on his/her ethical
inclination, leadership effectiveness, and success of
entire organizations (e.g., George, 2006; Reave, 2005;
Sheep, 2006; Steingard, 2005; Terpstra et al., 1993). In
fact, employees are reported to have a need for, and
even yearn for, spirituality in the workplace (Hart &
Brady, 2005; Marques, 2005). Though bringing religious
and/or spiritual ideas into the classroom may not be
appropriate, it is important to examine these concepts’
impact on the academic performance of our marketing
students. In fact, in the face of mounting evidence that
business students are among the most unethical of all
university students (e.g., Blalock, 1996), understanding
the impact of these concepts may even be critical. Thus,
the purpose of this paper is to identify factors from
sociology, economics, and politics that may impact the
level of student religiosity/spirituality, and then to assess
the impact of religiosity and spirituality upon academic
performance.
LITERATURE REVIEW
There is great variation regarding the concepts of
religiosity and spirituality in the literature. In fact, many
writers urge academic counselors and advisors to
recognize the need to assess and ascertain the role these
variables have in predicting the future academic success
of students (Cook et al., 2000). Also, many studies claim to
demonstrate a distinction between religiosity and
spirituality, resulting in differences in how they influence
people’s behavior. Religion is often defined as an
institutionalized system of attitudes, beliefs, and practices
through which people manifest their faith and devotion to
an ultimate reality or deity (Kelly, 1995). It is expressed in
such world religions as Judaism, Christianity, Islam,
Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism. As an
extension, religiosity is defined as a person’s degree of
adherence to the beliefs, doctrines, and practices of a
particular religion (Jagers & Smith, 1996; Mattis, 1997).
The reasons for a person to be devoted to such an
organized religion may be social, ambition, etc., and may
have nothing to do with a person’s actual spiritual beliefs in
a greater power.