► Interest in engaging further with particular science topics provides an effective task related measure of student interest in science. ► Personal value, enjoyment and interest in science are ...predictive of students’ interest in engaging further with science topics. ► Enjoyment of science is not dependent on high levels of science knowledge. ► Relations between science knowledge and enjoyment of science vary across countries with different cultural traditions.
Recent research has expanded understanding of the contribution of emotions to student engagement and achievement. Achievement emotions can be conceptualized as general ways of responding to achievement settings or specific emotional states aroused during a specific learning activity. Emotion processes can be distinguished as positive or negative, activating or deactivating. Using data from an international survey of science achievement (PISA 2006;
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400,000 15-year-old students from 57 countries), relations between the positive, activating achievement emotion of enjoyment and a number of variables that combine with enjoyment to define students’ engagement with learning science are examined. Previously, we reported that enjoyment is central to relations between interest in science, value and knowledge, and students’ reported current and future engagement. The embedded attitudinal items from PISA 2006 allow testing of how enjoyment contributes to a more direct measure of engagement with science by assessing students’ interest in finding out more about the specific topics used to measure their science achievement. In this investigation, structural equation modeling is used to test predictions based on
Hidi and Renninger’s (2006) four-phase model of interest development, and
Pekrun’s (2006) control-value theory of achievement emotions.
The present study explored the omitting behaviour of a sample of 15-year-old Italian students participating in a large-scale assessment, in relation to their scientific self-efficacy, scientific ...self-concept, enjoyment of science, general interest in science and instrumental motivation, taken as dimensions of their overall motivation to learn science. Statistical analysis was applied to the PISA 2006 data set collected from 21,773 15-year-old Italian students. The research aim was to evaluate the relation between missing responses and the Italian PISA 2006 science scores and to identify the presence of homogeneous subgroups of students displaying distinctive omitting behaviours. Cluster analysis identified three sub-groups of omitters: low, leavers and jumpers. Group membership was significantly related to a) different patterns and levels of student motivation to learn science and b) gender. The results also showed that Italian students' science achievement on PISA 2006 was negatively predicted by their rate of omissions. Furthermore, multinomial logistic regression analysis suggested that students' scientific self-efficacy and enjoyment of science had a significant effect on their omitting behaviours. In light of these findings, the implications for education and the value attributed to the PISA assessment are discussed.
•Motivation toward science in students omitting behaviour•Omitting behaviour and students' science achievement in PISA 2006•Individual differences in Italian students omitting behaviour
This paper explores the degree of educational poverty in European countries using data from OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). This research adopts the class of additive ...multidimensional poverty measures proposed by Alkire & Foster (2011) and investigates the degree of educational poverty in terms of incidence, breadth, depth and severity. Also, we analyse the impact of students’ characteristics and school-level factors on the probability of being educational poor in various learning dimensions. The findings reveal that between 2006 and 2015 the incidence of educational poverty became more relevant in many European countries, while most of them experienced a reduction of poverty depth and severity. Therefore, several policy scenarios are simulated in order to highlight the school factors that can be activate to alleviate the risk of educational poverty in the European countries that experienced the highest incidence of educational poor student.
This study investigated how affective factors like attitude and motivation contribute to science achievement in PISA 2006 using linear structural modeling. The data set of PISA 2006 collected from ...4942 fifteen-year-old Turkish students (2290 females, 2652 males) was used for the statistical analyses. A total of 42 selected items on a four point Likert-type scale were initially subjected to Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) resulting in seven factors with total variance of 64.82%. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was later performed for cross-validation of factor structures of PISA 2006 data. Furthermore, Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was also utilized to test the proposed model representing the relationship among affective factors and Turkish students' science achievement scores in PISA 2006. The results indicated that the hypothesized model fits data well. The results also revealed that, in general, affective factors contributed significantly either positively or negatively to 15year-old students' science achievement. In addition, affective factors were observed to be predictors of the science achievement based on PISA 2006 Turkish data set, but they are not good predictors due to their low magnitude. In light of the findings, implications are presented for further studies.
► Affective factors with respect to PISA 2006 have not been widely studied. ► PISA provides a unique data to examine the relationship between affective factors and achievement. ► Affective factors contributed to 15 years-old students’ science achievement to some extent.
Position effects (PE) cause decreasing probabilities of correct item responses towards the end of a test. We analysed PEs in science, mathematics and reading tests administered in the German ...extension to the PISA 2006 study with respect to their variability at the student- and school-level. PEs were strongest in reading and weakest in mathematics. Variability in PEs was found at both levels of analysis. PEs were stronger for male students, for students with a migration background (science and mathematics), and for students with a less favourable socio-economic background (reading). At the school level, PEs were stronger in lower school tracks and in schools with a high proportion of students with a migration background. The relationships of the test scores with the covariates partly reflected the covariates' relationships with PEs. Our findings suggest that PEs should be taken seriously in large-scale assessments as they have an undesirable impact on the results.
Este artigo incide na análise das atividades de aprendizagem e avaliação formativa da unidade curricular "Gestão Sustentável dos Recursos" (GSR) em manuais escolares de Ciências Naturais do 8º ano. ...Tem o objetivo de verificar qual a sintonia entre o modelo de desenvolvimento de competências proposto nos manuais e o promovido pela avaliação em literacia científica do PISA 2006.Assente numa investigação de caráter qualitativo, o fundamento teórico acorda com a estrutura conceptual do PISA 2006. Os manuais foram selecionados segundo o critério "manual mais adotado num distrito". Os resultados revelaram uma ênfase no desenvolvimento de competências assente na aquisição de conhecimento factual como verificação da capacidade de ler ecompreender o contexto, desligado das ideias e conceitos que complementam as competências. Revelam ainda ausência de situações de aprendizagem que promovam o conhecimento e a compreensão da ciência. Palavras-chave: Currículo; Manuais escolares; Competências; PISA 2006
In order to bridge the existing gap between biology curricula and students' interests in biology, a strategy for identifying students' interest based on their questions and integrating them into the ...curriculum was developed. To characterise the level of generalizability of students' science interests over 600 high school students from Portugal, Turkey, England and Israel, who chose biology as an advanced subject, their interest level was ranked in 36 questions that were originally raised by Israeli students. Results indicate that students from four different countries show interest in similar science questions. The most intriguing questions were the ones that dealt with human health and new developments in reproduction and genetics. Religious affiliation had the strongest effect on students' interest level, followed by national affiliation and gender. The findings suggest that students' interest in one context is relevant to the development of interest-based learning materials in a different context. However, despite these similarities, cultural and sociological differences need to be taken into account. Author abstract
The purpose of this study was to apply two types of Differential Item Functioning (DIF), net and global DIF, as well as the framework of Differential Step Functioning (DSF) to real testing data to ...investigate measurement invariance related to test language. Data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA)–2006 polytomously scored science items for four countries with different test languages were used, where French and English represented the reference languages. The findings showed that many items exhibited both types of DIF, although, in most cases, the results were inconsistent for the two source languages. In addition, net and global DIF tests did not always yield the same results depending on the DSF effect pattern. Furthermore, the DSF analysis provided valuable information over and above that provided by the net DIF analysis concerning the nature and the location of the DIF effect.
In today's world, scientific literacy has become essential to full participation of citizens. Certainly, important components of scientific literacy include resource use and environmental quality. ...The 2006 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) centered on scientific literacy and included resources and environments as two contexts for the test and student questionnaire. The article first introduces PISA 2006, and then provides a general overview of results. Using two released units from PISA 2006, I then turn to results and a discussion of students' science competencies and attitudes relative to environmental and resources issues. The article concludes with a discussion of educational policies for science education programs and teaching practices.
The results of the 2006 PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) study of reading comprehension, mathematical ability, and science understanding administered to 15 year olds in 56 ...countries OECD (2007). PISA 2006: Science Competencies for Tomorrow's World. Paris: OECD. are examined to assess the predictive validity of the national IQs presented by Lynn and Vanhanen Lynn, R., & Vanhanen, T. (2002). IQ and the wealth of nations. Westport, CT: Praeger., Lynn, R., & Vanhanen, T. (2006). IQ and global inequality. Augusta, GA: Washington Summit Books., and to assess the contributions of national differences in IQ and educational variables to national differences in educational attainment. It was found that national scores in reading comprehension, mathematical ability, and science understanding are correlated with Lynn & Vanhanen (L & V) national IQs at 0.84; corrected for attenuation, 0.935. This establishes the high validity of Lynn & Vanhanen national IQs. The contribution of national differences in IQ and education variables to national differences in educational attainment obtained in the 2006 PISA 56 nation study showed that the predictive validity of IQ alone was 0.84, and that national IQs together with one economic and two education variables had the validity 0.90 in predicting PISA 2006 results.
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