Hsieh Ta-Yang, Liu Yangyang, Simpkins Sandra D
School of Education, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, United States.
Front Psychol. 2019 Feb 22;10:380. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00380. eCollection 2019.
Science motivational beliefs are crucial for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) performance and persistence, but these beliefs typically decline during high school. We expanded the literature on adolescents' science motivational beliefs by examining: (1) changes in motivational beliefs in three specific science subjects, (2) how gender, immigrant generation status, and perceived support from key social agents predicted differences in adolescents' science motivational beliefs, and (3) these processes among Latino/as in the United States, whose underrepresentation in STEM is understudied. We used hierarchical linear modeling to estimate the changes in 104 (40% female) Latino/a high school students' physics, chemistry, and biology motivational beliefs from 9th to 11th grade. Subject-specific ability self-concept, interest, and utility were regressed on gender, immigrant generation status, and perceived science support while controlling for family income, parent education, and adolescents' school. Adolescents' utility declined from 9th to 11th grade whereas their interest remained stable for all three science subjects. Adolescents' ability self-concept increased for biology, decreased for physics, but remained stable for chemistry. Gender differences in adolescents' motivational beliefs at 9th grade only emerged for physics utility as well as physics and chemistry interest; yet, there were no gender differences in how adolescents' science motivational beliefs changed over time. Contrary to expectations, immigrant generation status was not significantly associated with adolescents' science motivational beliefs at 9th grade or in terms of how they changed over time. Adolescents who perceived higher science support generally had higher motivational beliefs in 9th grade, but did not differ on their rate of change. Our findings highlight the need to examine specific science subjects, and that typical gender differences in adolescents' motivational beliefs discussed in the literature may not generalize to all racial and ethnic groups.
科学动机信念对于STEM（科学、技术、工程和数学）成绩及坚持学习至关重要，但这些信念在高中阶段通常会下降。我们通过研究以下内容扩展了关于青少年科学动机信念的文献：（1）三门特定科学学科中动机信念的变化；（2）性别、移民代际身份以及来自关键社会主体的感知支持如何预测青少年科学动机信念的差异；（3）在美国拉丁裔群体中的这些过程，该群体在STEM领域的代表性不足问题尚未得到充分研究。我们使用分层线性模型来估计104名（40%为女性）拉丁裔高中生从9年级到11年级在物理、化学和生物动机信念方面的变化。在控制家庭收入、父母教育程度和青少年就读学校的同时，将特定学科的能力自我概念、兴趣和效用对性别、移民代际身份以及感知到的科学支持进行回归分析。青少年的效用从9年级到11年级有所下降，而他们对所有三门科学学科的兴趣保持稳定。青少年对生物的能力自我概念有所提高，对物理的能力自我概念下降，而对化学的能力自我概念保持稳定。9年级时青少年动机信念的性别差异仅在物理效用以及物理和化学兴趣方面出现；然而，随着时间推移，青少年科学动机信念的变化不存在性别差异。与预期相反，移民代际身份在9年级时与青少年的科学动机信念并无显著关联，在其随时间的变化方面也无显著关联。在9年级时，感知到更高科学支持的青少年通常具有更高的动机信念，但在变化率上并无差异。我们的研究结果凸显了研究特定科学学科的必要性，以及文献中讨论的青少年动机信念方面典型的性别差异可能并不适用于所有种族和族裔群体。
