This study examines college students' science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) choices as they relate to high school experiences, parent, teacher, and self-expectations, and mathematics and science efficacy. Participants were 2246 graduates of a STEM-focused public Harmony Public Schools in Texas, Harmony Public Schools (HPS).…

International research shows that primary school teachers don't have the necessary level of self-efficacy to provide high quality science learning and teaching opportunities to their students. The aim of the present study is to validate the Science Teaching Efficacy Belief Instrument (STEBI-B) and to investigate the self-efficacy beliefs of 408…

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has undergone immense transformation since the discovery of oil in the late 1950s, and the educational sector has seen vivid reform. The UAE government is increasingly seeking diversification of its economy and, as a result, the country's goals heavily emphasise education in the development of its Knowledge Economy.…

This non-experimental exploratory survey examined pre-service science teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and professional identity as influenced by their secondary school years learning experiences. A convenience sample of 60 undergraduate science student teachers participated in this study. An open-ended questionnaire on secondary school science…

U.S. national data show that American Indians earn lower math and science scores than other ethnic/racial groups. In the current study, a brief, self-affirmation intervention was aimed at increasing science motivational beliefs in American Indian middle school students (n = 212, M[subscript age] = 12.7 years). Students, each read a biography of a…

Science extracurricular activities are important informal learning forms and have significant effects on science learning. However, the mechanism regarding how informal learning will influence student academic performance is still under-addressed. Through using the secondary data of a national assessment in China, this study is to explore the…

The authors empirically examine the effectiveness of an intervention program designed to facilitate interest in cyber science among high school students (N = 60). Pretest-posttest and mediation designs were used to model self-report data that were collected at pre-camp, during a cyber-related task at mid-camp, and at post-camp. An analysis of…

Preparing a positive attitude toward convergence is essential to help students grow into future generations with the ability to solve various complex problems. This research aims to examine high school students' attitude toward convergence and the relation to gender and track. Responses from 1,186 Indonesian students in tenth (10th) and eleventh…

The purpose of this study was to develop and validate an online contextualized test for assessing students' understanding of epistemic knowledge of science. In addition, how students' understanding of epistemic knowledge of science interacts with learner factors, including time spent on science learning, interest, self-efficacy, and gender, was…

The aim of the study was to discover the contribution of students' interest in school biology, as well as their self-efficacy and attitudes towards different science subjects and mathematics when explaining students' orientation towards biology-related careers at upper-secondary school. The data of 321 K-11 students (49% women) were…

Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) in New Orleans, LA in April 2011. The first study evaluated the level of interest in engineering as students approached the end of high school and explored the degree to which the academic preparation of these students shaped the engineering pipeline over a…

Recent research reveals that students' interest in school science begins to decline at an early age. As this lack of interest could result in fewer individuals qualified for scientific careers and a population unprepared to engage with scientific societal issues, it is imperative to investigate ways in which interest in school science can be…

The loss of talented women from the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) pipeline has been widely recognized within science education as a pressing issue, particularly in the physical sciences. To provide a gender-based perspective of a popular educational device, the present study evaluated undergraduate research experiences…

Background and Context: A continued gender disparity has driven a need for effective interventions for recruiting girls to computer science. Prior research has demonstrated that middle school girls hold beliefs and attitudes that keep them from learning computer science, which can be mitigated through classroom design. Objective: This study…

It has repeatedly been documented that there are cross-sectional gender differences in adolescents' science interest, and these differences are often considered the main factor behind the gap in enrolment rates in higher education STEM programmes. Based on expectancy-value theory and interest theory, this study models interest and tests how…