Impact of curriculum satisfaction on core and major competency: Focusing on differences based on types of university life adaptation

The purpose of this study is to classify university students' adaptation to university life using latent profile analysis and analyze whether there are differences in the impact of satisfaction with liberal arts, major, and extracurricular curriculum on core and major competencies by type of university life adaptation. To this end, 576 students from A University were surveyed regarding their adaptation to university life, satisfaction with the curriculum, and core and major competencies. Latent Profile Analysis, Crosstab analysis, MANOVA, and Regression analysis were conducted. The findings of the study are as follows: First, university life adaptation was classified into five types: Type 1 (Severely maladapted type), Type 2 (Borderline type due to game addiction), Type 3 (Borderline type due to game dependency), Type 4 (Mild adaptation type), and Type 5 (Perfect adaptation type). Types 4(34.4%) and 3(30.3%) were the most common, followed by Types 5(18.8%) and 2(14.4%). Type 1 was found to represent about 2.4% of the students. Second, the impact of curriculum satisfaction on competencies varied by type of university life adaptation. Students in Type 1 showed no significant impact of curriculum satisfaction on any competencies. Students in Types 2 and 3 were positively influenced by satisfaction with major curricula on all competencies. Students in Type 4 and 5 showed positive impacts from satisfaction with major and extra curricular on communication & collaboration, creative & integrative, and major competencies, Based on these findings, it is recommended that universities diagnose first-year students' adaptation to university life, classify them into types, and provide customized educational strategies accordingly.