Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Measures
The measures included questions about students' demographic characteristics, edu-
cational attitudes and beliefs, academic efficacy, and learning strategies such as
elaboration and control.
Background variables
. For the students' background variables, SES was mea-
sured by using a combination of mother's highest degree of education (1
=
didn't
finish high school
,4
=
graduated from college
) and income (1
=
less than $25,000
,
=
4
more than $75,000
). Two questions assessed students'
prior achievement level
(prior knowledge)
including high-school GPA (
M
=
=
3.13,
SD
0.47), SAT1 verbal
=
=
=
=
score (
M
86.93).
Opportunity to learn
. This construct measured whether students had received
different educational or instructional ingredients that make up quality school expe-
rience. Our questions included “how many semesters of advanced placement (AP)
math did you take in high school?” and “how many semesters of AP science did you
take in high school?” The questions ranged from 1 to 8.
Motivation and attitudes
. The questions about educational attitudes and motiva-
tion were revised from Marsh et al.'s (2006) student approaches to learning (SAL)
instrument.
Academic efficacy
consisted of four items asking students' beliefs in
their capabilities to master the skills being taught and to overcome barriers through
their own efforts. The
Worry
scale was adopted from Spielberger's (1980) test anx-
iety inventory (
455.33,
SD
91.27), and SAT1 math score (
M
462.18,
SD
0.92) and is conceptualized as cognitive concern over failure.
Eight items were used to indicate how they felt while taking the exam and how
they felt anxiety on failing the exam. Students were instructed to select a num-
ber ranging from 1 (
almost never
)to4(
almost always
) for each item of these
scales.
Personal motivational beliefs
. The items from this scale were from Anderman,
Urdan, and Roeser's (2003) Patterns of Adaptive Learning Scale. Three personal
goal orientations were assessed.
Mastery goal orientation
included five items
reflecting students' emphasis on learning and their concern with understanding,
developing competence, and improvement. (
α
=
0.85).
Performance approach goal
orientation
consisted of five items that tapped into students' desire to demonstrate
competence, for example; by outperforming others in their class work (
α
=
0.89).
Four items assessed
performance avoidance goal orientation
, reflecting students'
concern with not appearing incompetent or less competent than others in their class
work (
α
=
α
=
0.74). Students indicated their response to each item on a five-point scale
(1
very much true
).
Learning strategies
. Students' use of different learning strategies was assessed
with items derived from Marsh et al.'s (2006) SAL instrument.
Elaboration
consisted of four items measuring how often students engage in construction,
integration, and transfer strategies when completing class work.
Control
included
five items and measured the extent to which students adopt a self-regulating perspec-
tive during the learning process. This scale asked questions about whether students
engage in activities such as checking that they remember what they have already
learned or what they do not yet understand (
=
not at all true
,5
=
α
=
0.83).
Effort
included four items
