A Cross-Cultural Study of the Connection between Students' Attitudes toward Statistics and the Use of Constructivist Strategies in the Course

Figures & data

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for the US and Zimbabwean samples.

		Preferred		Actual		Congruence
CLES		Zimbabwe	United States	Zimbabwe	United States	Zimbabwe	United States
	n	120	95	120	95	120	95
Personal Relevance	M SD	3.75 0.57	3.50 0.99	3.11 0.94	2.96 0.92	0.75 0.82	0.96 0.83
Uncertainty	M SD	3.00 0.83	2.62 0.80	2.56 0.96	2.22 0.81	0.57 0.65	0.76 0.64
Critical voice	M SD	3.62 0.80	3.40 1.24	3.34 0.87	3.64 1.20	0.58 0.78	1.21 1.26
Shared control	M SD	2.67 0.83	3.10 0.97	2.06 1.00	2.10 1.02	0.75 0.86	1.33 1.05
Student negotiation	M SD	3.98 0.67	3.42 1.01	3.71 0.82	2.95 1.09	0.51 0.69	1.06 1.06

Table 2. Effects of location on students' perception of the environment.

	Preferred form			Actual form			Congruence
	F	p		F	p		F	p
Personal Relevance Uncertainty Critical voice Shared control Student negotiation	5.40 11.06 2.36 11.78 23.40	0.02 0.00 0.13 0.00 0.00	0.03 0.05 0.01 0.05 0.10	1.47 7.91 4.66 0.09 34.37	0.23 0.01 0.03 0.76 0.00	0.01 0.04 0.02 0.00 0.14	3.57 4.53 19.80 20.05 21.24	0.06 0.03 0.00 0.00 0.00	0.02 0.02 0.09 0.09 0.09

Table 3. Descriptive statistics for the US and Zimbabwean samples.

ATS		Zimbabwe	United States
	n	120	95
Course	M SD	34.9 6.04	28.9 8.0
Field	M SD	79.5 8.9	74.0 13.1
Total	M SD	114.4 13.5	103.0 18.8

Table 4. Effects of location on students' attitudes toward statistics.

	ATS
	F	p
Course Field Total	22.55 15.37 22.22	0.00 0.00 0.00	0.10 0.07 0.10

Table 5. Summary of stepwise multiple regression analysis (combined samples).

	B	β	R	R^2	F	p
Personal relevance Student negotiation	5.05 2.69	0.28 0.16	0.35	0.12	14.57	0.00

Criterion variable: attitude

Table 6. Correlations between the CLES scales and the ATS scales.

CLES	Combined Samples			Zimbabwe			United States
“actual” form scales	Course	Field	Total	Course	Field	Total	Course	Field	Total
Personal relevance Uncertainty Critical voice Shared control Student negotiation	0.16*  0.11  0.09  0.05  0.25**	0.36**  0.21**  0.23**  0.12  0.16*	0.31**  0.19**  0.19**  0.11  0.22**	0.04  0.11  0.12  0.06  0.25**	0.26**  0.19*  0.14  0.06  0.22*	0.19*  0.17  0.15  0.07  0.26**	0.24* −0.02 0.19  0.08  0.03	0.45**  0.16  0.36**  0.20 −0.01	0.41**  0.10  0.34**  0.17  0.01

* p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01

Table 7. Summary of stepwise multiple regression analysis (Zimbabwean sample).

	B	β	R	R^2	F	p
Student negotiation	4.21	0.26	0.26	0.07	8.18	0.01

Criterion variable: attitude

Table 8. Summary of stepwise multiple regression analysis (US sample).

	B	β	R	R^2	F	p
Personal relevance	8.48	0.41	0.41	0.17	19.26	0.00

Criterion variable: attitude

Table 9. Pearson correlations of person-environment fit with attitude.

Congruence in the CLES scales	Attitude
Personal relevance Uncertainty Critical voice Shared control Student negotiation	−0.18**  0.05 −0.18** −0.32** −0.17*

* p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01