Evidence of halo effects in student evaluations of communication instruction

The halo effect is a construct reserved to explain individual rater's failure to discriminate among conceptually distinct aspects of a stimulus person's behavior. One hundred twenty-eight students from three communication courses evaluated a college professor by completing items measuring nonverbal immediacy, teaching effectiveness, and attitudes toward course content. Students also completed two items considered irrelevant to teaching effectiveness: vocal clarity and physical attractiveness. Significant inter-correlations were found (ranging from 0.28 to O. 72) among arrive measures indicating the presence of a halo effect. Moreover, relationships between the two irrelevant measures and nonverbal immediacy, teaching effectiveness and course affect were somewhat stronger when the two irrelevant items were placed at the end of the survey. The results were discussed and implications for halo effects in student evaluations of communication instruction were considered.