Psychological predictors of physics learners’ achievement: The moderating influence of gender

Abstract

Psychological factors like motivation and self-efficacy have been found to have significant predictive powers on learners’ achievement in physics but literature is silent on how gender influences their predictive powers. Based on this premise, the researchers sought the predictive powers of motivation and self-efficacy on physics learners’ achievement based on gender. A correlational survey research design was adopted for the study with a sample of 375 senior secondary 3 physics learners. Learners' Psychological Factors scale was used for data collection. The internal consistency reliability indices of the items of the two clusters of the instrument were obtained as 0.78 and 0.81 using the Cronbach alpha method. Data were analyzed using regression analysis and t-test of independent samples. Results showed that gender had a significant moderating influence on the predictive powers of motivation and self-efficacy on learners' academic achievement in physics in favor of male physics learners. This implies that male physics learners had higher motivation and self-efficacy than their female counterparts, thereby having higher achievement in physics than later. It was recommended that a favorable academic environment should be provided for female learners to promote their motivation and self-efficacy.