In the present study, the four dimensions of the learning
environment were measured through the students’ perceptions,
which were aggregated to a class level
There is indeed some
evidence that student perceptions are more important than
objective measurements of the environment (e.g., Bennet & Ward,
1993; McDowell, 1995; Van Damme et al., 2004). A study of De
Jong and Westerhof (2001) demonstrated that aggregated student
ratings provide a good assessment of teacher behaviour.