An exploratory study of examining students’ expectations of training in a laboratory class: Factor analysis of affective heuristic features

Abstract

When developing effective training programs, it is important to know students’ expectations of laboratory classes. The authors collected 170 surveys from students in one laboratory class to investigate the underlying dimensions of their expectations of training. Factor analysis identified the following six dimensions of students’ expectations: climate, courtesy, credibility, entertainment, relevance, and structure. These dimensions of training expectations were used to cluster students into two groups: serious and enthusiastic. Thereafter, these two clusters were compared using chi-square tests to determine whether there were statistical differences among them. The findings suggest instructors should consider students expectations to improve students’ learning from laboratory classes.

Keywords:

• Expectation
• training
• laboratory class

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, N. Park, upon reasonable request.