US: Peers, not profs, influence student views

On issues such as abortion, gay marriage and religion, college students shift noticeably to the left from the time they arrive on campus through their junior year, new research shows, reports Justin Pope for Associated Press. The reason, according to the University of California in Los Angeles' Higher Education Research Institute, isn't indoctrination by left-leaning faculty but rather the more powerful influence of fellow students. And at most colleges, left-leaning peer groups are more common than conservative ones.

After college, students - particularly women - move somewhat back to the right politically.
The research is the latest of several efforts by academics to lend analytical rigour to an emotional debate. Overall, college faculty lean left politically, but there's sharp disagreement on whether they impose their views on students. The UCLA researchers are among several social scientists who have tried to undermine the argument that students respond strongly to their teachers' opinions.

Overall, students were nearly as likely after three years of college to call themselves 'conservative' or 'far-right', according to findings, and only somewhat more likely to call themselves 'liberal' or 'far left'. On specific policy questions, they moved to more liberal positions.
Full report on the Yahoo News site