Math SelfEfficacy Interest and Perceived Support Differences by

Math Self-Efficacy, Interest, and Perceived Support: Differences by Gender and Race Gabrielle D’Lima NSF # 0624724 PI: Marie F. Shoffner

Role in Research • Summer Undergraduate Research Program Internship with the Risk Prevention in Education Sciences at Curry School, University of Virginia Ø Activities • 25 Hours weekly lab time • Workshops & GRE tutorials • Meetings with faculty • Beliefs, Behavior, & Belonging Project: STEM Interests funded by the National Science Foundation with Marie Shoffner as primary investigator Ø Focus Group scribe for teacher and parent focus groups Ø Coding team member for qualitative analysis Ø Student researcher analyzing quantitative data

Rationale • Science and math careers pursued by small numbers of students (Fox, 2004) • Underrepresented by females, members of minority groups and people with disabilities (NSF, 2000) • Few published studies looking at children’s career development in STEM • Most career studies done with high school students or adults (Lent et al. , 2000)

Construct Definitions (Meece, Gleinke, & Burg, 2006; Shoffner, 2008) • Math Self-Efficacy Ø The belief an individual has about his/her ability to plan and execute steps to do well on certain tasks or goals in the academic area of math • Support Ø What do I perceive as the potential support from my teacher(s) [parents/peers] for my goals, plans, dreams, and interests? • Math Interest: Ø The degree to which a student expresses an enjoyment in math and plans to incorporate it into future experiences like career and life experiences.

Previous Findings • Parental involvement has been shown to improve student’s math performance. » (Mathews, Carpenter, Lindquist & Silver, 1984 as cited in Der-Karabetian, 2004) • Positive effects of parental involvement can be affected by factors such as grade level, gender, and ethnicity. » (Jimerson, Egeland & Teo, 1999, Friedman, 1994, Mathews et al, 1984 as cited in Der. Karabetian, 2004) • Mathematics performance is affected by factors such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, gender, environmental factors, and family involvement. » (Keith et al. , 1993; Tissot, 1997 as cited in Der. Karabetian, 2004) • Greater emotional support in 5 th grade classrooms predicted enhanced math achievement in fifth grade. » (Pianta et al. , 2008)

Previous Findings • A student’s engagement in an interest-related activity is associated with positive affect, persistence, and favorable learning outcomes. » (Csikszentmihalyi & Schiefele, 1993 as cited in Trautwein et al. , 2006). • Perceived support from parents and teachers had a positive but weak relationship with the math self-efficacy measures. » (Cooper et al. , 1991) • Perceived parent support (r =. 31) and teacher support (r =. 22) demonstrated stronger relationships with child self-efficacy in math than perceived support of classmates (r =. 05). » (Bouchey & Harter, 2005) • Students have high levels of perceived support from parents and teachers. » (Cooper et al. , 1991) • European American students scored significantly higher than African American students on teacher/parent involvement. » Der-Karabetian, 2004

Research Questions 1 Are there relationships among math selfefficacy, interest and perceived support? 2 Are there differences between boys and girls on math self-efficacy, math interest and perceived support? 3 Are there differences between races on math self-efficacy, math interest and perceived support? 4 Does perceived support explain variance in interest?

Study Participants Ø Elementary, Middle and High School students from Southeast public schools. Ø Gender (N = 181) • 100 Females (55%) • 81 Males (45%) Ø Race (N = 183) • 72 African Americans (39%) • 82 European Americans (45%) Ø Grade (N = 183) • 77 Fifth Grade (42%) • 44 Seventh Grade (23%) • 64 Ninth Grade (35%)

Mixed Methods Study • Quantitative Ø Instrumentation • A packet of measures assessing belonging and engagement, outcome expectations, math selfefficacy, interest, teacher, family, and peer involvement distributed to students and their parents and teachers. • Qualitative Ø Focus groups • Teachers, parents, and students

Correlation Results • Are there relationships among math self-efficacy, interest and perceived support?

Gender Differences in Math Self-Efficacy, Interest and Perceived Support • Girls reported higher teacher support, maternal support, and peer support.

Racial Differences in Math Self-Efficacy, Interest and Perceived Support? • African American students reported higher perceived teacher support and maternal support, but lower perceived paternal support compared to European American students.

Does perceived support explain variance in interest? • Perceived Teacher Support explained 16% of the variance in math interest. • Perceived Mother Support explained an additional 3% of the variance in math interest.

Qualitative Themes • Math Difficulty Ø “Everyone expects us that everyone will do bad in math, because math is math, so like when people do good in math, it's like well, they're smart. ” Ø “You expect math to be your hardest subject. ” • Competition Among Classmates Ø “I just don’t like showing people my grades. ” Ø “If they beat me they gloat a lot. ” • Sources of Achievement Ø “I don’t think it (race) has anything to do with it. ” Ø “It's just where you live and what - what your surroundings and everything. ”

Acknowledgements Marie Shoffner, Mentor Cindy Miller, Co-mentor

Questions or Comments?

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