Gender Differences in Class-related Emotional Experiences: A Study of Mathematics Course

Abstract

In education, students experience different emotions, which affect their academic performance, engagement, and achievement. In the classroom, these emotional experiences of students are called academic emotions (Lei & Cui, 2016). This paper holds two-fold aims: to inquire about class-related emotions; and to find gender differences in the emotional experiences of undergraduates of a math course. The theoretical framework was grounded in control value theory. The purpose of the study was achieved by adopting a positivist paradigm, and applying a quantitative research method. The achievement emotions questionnaire (2000) was adapted as a data collection tool for class-related emotions. The data were collected from 162 undergraduates. The descriptive analysis was run for comparing group means on SPSS v. 23. The findings reported more positive emotional experiences: pride and enjoyment, and less negative emotional experiences: anxiety, anger, hopelessness, shame, and boredom in learning math in students. Moreover, interesting differences were found in class-related emotions between males and females. Future researchers direct focus on assessing test-related, learning-related, and teacher-related emotions of students learning science courses, and uncover underlying factors of negative emotions and environmental inciters of emotions from an interpretivist's perspective.