Predicting performance of Middle Eastern female students: A challenge for sustainable education

Abstract

The present research aimed to uncover individual differences that can be used to predict, at the start of a course, performance difficulties in female students of an understudied population who are at the beginning of their academic journey. Measures of active and passive procrastination and general self-efficacy were collected at the start of the semester from students enrolled in one of two courses representative of the general education curriculum at a university in the Middle East. Grades on the first homework assignment and test in each course were used as indices of students' early performance. Measures of procrastination and self-efficacy failed to adequately predict either early performance or attendance rates. Yet, attendance predicted a portion of the variance in assignment performance. This study suggests that class presence, rather than dispositional individual differences, can shape the early academic success of an understudied student population.