Psychometric Evaluations of Eight Attitudes Toward Quantitative Methods Measures

Abstract

Student attitudes and abilities are both important when predicting success in a quantitative methods course (Harlow, Burkholder, & Morrow, 2002; McCutchen, Jones, Carbonneau, & Mueller, 2016). It is therefore essential to have reliable and valid ways of measuring student attitudes toward quantitative methods so instructors can best tailor their lessons to meet the needs of their classrooms. Unfortunately, many existing measures are difficult for instructors to access, have limited evidence for validity, or do not tap into constructs of interest related to quantitative attitudes. The purpose of this study was to validate 8 brief quantitative attitudes measures: quantitative attitudes, quantitative anxiety, quantitative usefulness, quantitative influences, quantitative success factors, quantitative hindrances, quantitative self-confidence, and quantitative self-efficacy. All 8 measures showed evidence for dimensionality, reliability, and validity. These measures provide instructors with brief measures of different attitudinal domains that may be useful for research, quick in-classroom assessments, and tailoring of lessons to promote student success within the quantitative methods classroom. All measures are available for download at https://osf.io/6uydk/.