Chemistry Reference
In-Depth Information
whether the feeling is good or bad. For example, like toward lesson is positive,
while anxiety is negative. Specifying the target, intensity, and directionality helps
the assessor understand and communicate to others the affective characteristic to be
assessed.
3.3 What Instruments Are Available
Once the purpose of assessment and the nature of the characteristic being assessed
have been determined, the next step is to examine available instruments. Once a
researcher finds an instrument, Creswell (
2008
) suggests several criteria that can be
used to assess whether it is a good instrument to use. Ask yourself:
• Have authors developed the instrument recently, and can you obtain the most
recent version? [
] To stay current, authors update their instruments periodi-
cally, and you need to find the most recent copy of an instrument.
...
•
Is the instrument widely cited by other authors? Frequent use by other
researchers will provide some indication of its endorsement by others [
and]
may provide also some evidence about whether the questions on the instrument
provide good and consistent measures.
• Are reviews available for the instrument? [
...
] If reviews exist, it means that
other researchers have taken the instrument seriously and seek to document its
worth.
• Is there information about the reliability and validity scores from past uses of the
instrument?
• Does the procedure for recording data fit the research questions/hypotheses in
your study?
• Does the instrument contain accepted scales of measurement? (Creswell,
2008
,
pp. 168-169)
Besides the above criteria, it is also important to consider whether the instrument
was developed in a language or culture that is different than your own.
An example of an instrument designed to measure student attitudes is the Test of
Science Related Attitudes, TOSRA (Fraser,
1981
). TOSRA has been carefully field
tested and has been shown to be highly reliable. It includes seven scales: social
implications of science, normality of scientists, attitude toward scientific inquiry,
adoption of scientific attitudes, enjoyment of science lessons, leisure interest in
science, and career interest in science. TOSRA has been used in many research
applications to track attitudes and evaluate interventions.
Another example of an instrument designed to measure students
...
views on
science-technology-society was reviewed by Osborne, Simon, and Collins
(
2003
). The instrument was developed by Aikenhead & Ryan (
1992
) and is often
seen as offering greater validity than others. It has been adapted most recently by
Bennett (
2001
) to determine undergraduates
'
views of chemistry and develop pro-
files of students who held positive and negative views of the chemistry subject.
'
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