Comparison of the Effectiveness of In-Person and Remote Labs for Undergraduate Physics Students at an HBC

Abstract

Policy reports have identified unique changes in undergraduate physics laboratory course arrangements that will better serve the demands of a diverse and expanding student body. To achieve this, we remotely incorporate a hands-on device laboratory option and contrast it with the conventional devices utilized in classroom lab settings. A quasiexperimental, observational quantitative study was conducted to measure students' epistemological views as well as their beliefs about socialization and help-seeking in remote, i.e., experiment-centric pedagogy (ECP), and in-person (non-ECP), modes of experimentation, to ascertain whether students using this hands-on device had similar perspectives to the usage of the traditional device in terms of select attitudinal measures. Here, we present a comparison of the efficacy of a hands-on integrated mode of conducting physics experiments via experiment-centric pedagogy (ECP) with the traditional laboratory mode (non-ECP) of teaching undergraduate students enrolled in the Introduction to Physics Experiment. We conclude that these two approaches are complementary to one another. Undergraduate students who were enrolled in the Introduction to Physics laboratory practical (N = 30) were a case study to elicit their epistemological beliefs about physics laboratory work and their views on social engagement and academic anxiety. Parametric and nonparametric comparisons of central tendency were employed to measure the mean differences between students using the ECP mode and non-ECP laboratory mode. It shows that the overall percentage mean experience of the students with the use of the ECP lab method was more than that of the non-ECP method. The paired sample t test result shows that there is a high significance value of <5% p value, which signifies the positive effect of the hands-on lab via the ECP approach. The instructor-student action reveals an enhancement in the students' engagement via COPUS and feedback analysis.