Hong Kong secondary school students’ attitudes towards science: a study of structural models and gender differences

ABSTRACT

This study explored two under-researched areas on students’ attitudes towards science, that is, the structural models representing these attitudes and the role played by school bands in moderating the gender differences in such attitudes. The participants were 360 ninth graders in Hong Kong from 3 school bands. The structural equation modelling method was adopted to compare four hypothetical models for students’ attitudes towards science. Results reflect that (i) the data supported the three-factor structure of the behavioural domain of students’ attitudes towards science; (ii) the four lower level dimensions of the attitudes towards science (i.e. value of science to society, self-concept in science, anxiety towards science and enjoyment of science) could be further integrated into broader categories; (iii) male students demonstrated significantly more positive attitudes towards science in five dimensions (i.e. self-concept in science, enjoyment in science, learning science in and outside the classroom and future participation) and (iv) school bands played a prominent moderating role in gender differences in students’ attitudes towards science. Implications for studying and developing students’ attitudes towards science are discussed in the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Zhi Hong Wan is an assistant professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the Education University of Hong Kong. Before starting his research in science education, he had taught middle school physics for five years. His current research interests include nature of science, science learning, and high-order thinking. He has published papers in a number of international journals, including Science Education, Studies in Science Education, Research in Science Education, Science & Education, Teaching in Higher Education, Science Education International and Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching.

John Chi Kin Lee is Vice President (Academic) and Chair Professor of Curriculum and Instruction, the Education University of Hong Kong. He is also the Co-Director of the Centre for Excellence in Learning and Teaching (CELT). He has served as the Editor-in-Chief of Cogent Education, Regional Editor (Asia Pacific) of Educational Research and Evaluation and Executive Editor of Teachers and Teaching: Theory and practice. His recent co-edited publications are: Class Size: Eastern and Western Perspectives (with Peter Blatchford, Maurice Galton et al, 2016, Routledge), Educational Development in Western China: Towards quality and equity (with Yu Zeyuan, Huang Xianhan and Edmond Law, 2016, Sense Publishers) and Quality and Change in Teacher Education – Western and Chinese Perspectives (with Chris Day, Springer, 2016). He has been awarded as Changjiang Chair Professor, a distinguished national chair professorship conferred by the Ministry of Education, the People's Republic of China.

Notes

1. Self-concept and self-efficacy are two related but different constructs in attitude area. Although both are related to one’s competence perception, they reflect different time orientations. Self-concept tends to orient towards past accomplishments, while self-efficacy focuses on future expectation (Wigfield & Eccles, 2000). In addition, the assessment of self-concept is normally measured at more general levels, while self-efficacy is usually assessed at more specific levels (Bong & Skaalvik, 2003). For example, in Kind et al. (2007), only seven items were used to probe students’ self-concept of science in a general sense. On the contrary, Lin et al. (2013) used a total of 32 items to investigate students’ self-efficacy of five aspects of learning science. In this study, all the other six dimensions of attitudes towards science were assessed in a general sense and a limited number of items were adopted to assess each of them. In order to make all the dimensions of attitudes towards science included in the same survey consistent and compatible, this study chose to include self-concept in science as one of the constructs covered in this research.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Education University of Hong Kong [CI/ADRF/13-14/020;RG102/14-15].