DOCTORAL DISSERTATION SERIES titleM m m k c o m m factih ^ u m k f m s m m nm a Mic emu msi a m k W m m u xa ife AUTHOR L0&/C£ MMVLL COlM_ _ _ _ _ UNIVERSITY WCH!6M m u tOLL, Ed,D- PUBLICATION NO. DEGREE DATE Ill m 1 UNIVERSITY MICROFILMS A NN A M O I • M ICHIGAN - fj .1. *~)1 O O i* •‘i'U ..-.lJ ‘— > t i l l r. I1 - - ..> -oiC Cl.' 1 ^> i i. ij .4 i !X C O i. , i ,'ii11 i1 OOvf) 1 oi J-A_>1_iV.- L j.i/I u L'ur e nc e Samuel Cooke A ili-bdS Sabmitte.s to Liio Scnool ol' Gracu-iie Stir.-ieo of ificiii^an State Co lie -^e of Aj-ricai tiue aim Apollo .. Science in partial fulfillment of the r e u i rorr.ents lur tiie oecree of DOC TO it Or I DuCATiCA Department of iiduc a Lion lyfi AOKI'jG w LjaDGMnldTS In any investi --ration invoivinr the appraisal of a large number of students the investigator must rely upon the assistance of many people without whom suet; a study would oe impossible. To these persons, both named anc unnamed, the writer offers grateful acknowledgment. To his advisor, Dr. d-alter F. Johnson, the writer wishes to express his gratitude for the patient an-.i wise counsel whicn he has offered; To Dr. Leo r. . Laak, Professor an.i Mean of the Department of Effective Living, by whos-..: permission this investigation was unuortaken! To the other members of the Guidance Committee Dr. Cecil V. Millard, Dr. Clifford E. Erickson, and Dr. Leonard o. Luker for their helpful suggestions anu in­ spiration! To Dr. £.dwaro B. Blackman for nis careful reading and editing of the thesis* To the members of the-Effective- Living staff for their kina assistance in collecting the d a t a . I i ii v i t ;. L>iOi'Jiii'jCjj SL-iMuEL COO Kill Car/di ,iato fur th.. Do cto i’ o 1' E l,jc >itio n Final examination: Dissertation: fia_; 1 1 , 19^2. An analysis of Certain Factors Vhich /iffcot Student Attitudes Toward a Basic College Course, Effective Living, . Outline of Studies: Major subject: tinor suoject: Education Sociology Biographical Items: Born, October f, 190 t>, Linioti County, _Lowa . Undergraduate Studies, Simpson College, 1925-30, B .A ., 1930 Graduate Studies, horthwestorn University, 1936-1)0, id .A ., 19l)0; Michigan State College, 19l)b-52 . Experience: high School Principal, coach and teacher, Bayard, Iowa, 1930-31; high School coach ana teacher, Creston, Iowa, 1931-hO; Teacher of Distributive Education, Kansas City, Missouri, 19l)0-l;5; Director of Counseling, East Lansing Public Schools, East Lansing, Michigan, September, 19U5 to Decemoer, 191)5; Counseling, Michigan State Counseling Center, January, 191)6 to July, 191)6; Instructor, Depart­ ment of Effective Living, Michigan State College, July, 19l)6 to July, 19US; Assistant Professor, Department of Effective Living, Michigan State College, 191)6-52. f l :iv TABLF OF CONTENTS CHAPTBR, I. II. F A OF THf PitOBLrii.................................................... Intro auction................................................ 1 Statement of the Prooiem................................. heed for the Stuoy....................................... Definition of T e r m s ...................................... Limitations of the Stuay................................. Plan of Organization.......... 1 U 5 o f OF ThL LITFhATL'iuii..................................... 10 Part I .. Review of the Literature Concerning Attitudes of College Students............................... 11 Course Content a m Attitude Changes...... .............. Teaching Techniques ana Attitude Change ................. Student Attitude Towards Teachers....................... Intelligence and Student Attituue....................... Student Professed Attitudes and Student Behavior....... Student Attituae Towara a Course ......................... Summary of Part I ......................................... 11 12 lh 1U IB 16 19 Part II . Review of the Literature Concerning the Influence of the Home on Student Attitude...... 20 Summary of Part I I ....................................... 22 Part III. Review of the Literature Concerning the Thurstone Method of Attitude Scale Construction Summary of Part I I I III. 1 ............................ 22 30 Summary of Chapter I I ...................................... 30 MLTHODOLOGX AND DESIGN....................................... 32 Nature of the Parent Group............................... Instructors and Section in the Study.................... Selection of Samples within the Parent Group............ Nature of the Instruments................................ Method Useu in the Collection of the Data. ............. Procedures for Analysis of the D a t a ..................... 32 33 33 38 hP itl V TABLR OF CONTENTS - C nntinued CHAPTER P.. Gii. Procedures Usou in Determining tne Significance of Differences Between the lixpressea Attitudes of Two Groups.............................. JjA Evaluation Methou Used for the Toaener Evaluation Sheet.... L5 Summary of Chapter II I . . .................................... [g-. IV. THE CONSTRUCTION AND ANALYSIS OF THE ATTITUDE SCALE......... Part I. b9 The Development ana Construction of the Attitude Scale by the Michigan State College Board of Examiners........................................... 1x9 Method Used in Collecting the I t e m s ...................... Selection of Items for the Attitude Scale................ Establislmient of the Attitude S c a l e ...................... h9 50 52 Part I I . Measurement ana Findings on the Reliability of the Attitude Scale................................ 53 Test-Retest for Reliability . ............................. Item Analysis.............................................. 5b 5b Part I I ] . Establishing the Validity of the Attitude Scale. 5b Validation by Means of the Interview Technique........... Validation by Comparison of Known Groups................. 56 dl Summary of Chapter I V ........................................ 63 V. THE EFFECT OF STUDENT BACKGROUNDS ON THEIR ATTITUDE TOWARD EFFECTIVE LIVING............................................. 65 The Size of the Home Community Factor. ............... Fathers1 Educational Achievements Fa c t o r ................. Fathers* Occupation Factor................................ o5 66 66 Summary of Chapter V ......................................... 70 VI . ADMINISTRATIVE F..CT0AS WHICH MIGHT AFFECT STUDENT ATTITUDE ... 7b The Effect Which the Person in Charge of the Adminis • tration of the Scale Has Upon the Results.............. Effect of Signing Ones Name to the Attitude Scale....... 7h 76 TABLE OF COiM'jiNT£> - Continued CH-fdPTEh i a QE i' VII. INSTRUCTIONAL r iCTOr.h AFFECTING STUDuNT ATTITUDE........... I'xie The The The lean in College Factor.................... Instructor Factor .................................... Class Size Factor.................................... Male-Female Factor................................... Summary of Chapter V I I .............. VIII . THE KELAT10 N Sh IP OF Trln COLLEGE nAJOjh. TO ATTITUDE TGV.AitDS EFFECTIVE LIVING. . . ........................................ The The The The ,9 yy -I yi 93 9h yr Social Science and natural Science Factor ........... 9b Natural Science and won-Preference Factor ........... yy Social Science and won-Freference Factors........... yy Preference and Non-Preference Factor................. 100 Summary of Chapter V I I I ......................................101 IX. A COMPAitlSON OF STUDENT ATTITUDii VvITH FINjiL UrtADKS AND ACE SCOFFS........................................................ 102 Part I. A Comparison of Student Attitude with Term-Encl M a r k s ............................................... 102 Term—End Grade Sample......................................102 Method of Analysis........................................10 3 Part I I . An analysis of the ACE Scores of the Upper and Lower 25^ of the First-Term Fresiimen on the Attitude Scale.....................................103 Method of Analysis......................................... 105 Quantitative Factor........................................ 105 Linguistic Fa c t o r .......................................... 106 Summary of Chapter I X ........................................ 107 X. SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH . . 109 The Proolem.................................................. 109 Methodology................................................. 110 Findings................................. 113 Conclusions and Implications for Further Research.......... 118 BIBLIOGRAPHY.......................................................... 12U APPENDIX A 127 VJ . 2 LIST OF TAoLES TABLE I i-*_J 1. Teacher and Section Distribution. n II. ^-Values ol Attitude Scale Items...... ...................... o'i III. Analysis of Items....................... -........... ,........ IV. Percentage of Student Responses for Each Item onthe Scale.. G7 V. Comparison of Scale Scores for GroupsKnown by tho Instructors to be Favoraolo and bnfavoraole Toward Effective Living............................................ o2 VI. Relationship of Size of Students* Home Communities to Attitudes Toward Effective Living.......................... Go V I I . Student attitude Toward effective Living Compared with Their Fathers* Educational Achievements.......................... 67 VIII. A Comparison of Student Attitude 'Towards Effective Living with Their Fathers* Occupation............................. 69 IX. X. Effect on Attitude by Person Administering the Sc a l e ...... 76 Effect of Signing and hot Signing the Attitude Scale...' 76 XI. A Comparison of Frestimen Student Attitude Toward Effective Living with the Attitude of Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors..................................................... 60 XII. XIII. Student Rating of Course, oy Instructors................... Student Rating of Instructors on Teacher Evaluation Sheet... 86 67 XIV. Comparison for Each Instructor of the Mean Scores of Their Students on the Attitude Scale with Their Mean Scores on The Teacher Evaluation Sheet............................... 89 XV. Rank Correlation Between the Students* Attitude Toward Effective Living and Their Rating of Their Instructors.... 90 XVI. Attitudes of Students in Large and Small Sections Toward Effective Living............................................ 92 LIST 01' TABLES - Continued TA dLn. p., pE XVII. Comparison of dale and Female Attitudes Toward mf f sctive Living...................................................... >3 XVIII. Social Science majors Compared with Watural Science majors on Their Attitude Towards Effcctiv ■ Living ................ it XIX. Natural Science Majors Compared with Non—FreTerenc« Students on Their attitude Towards Effective Living................ 99 XX. Social Science Majors Compared with won-Prwference Students on Their Attitude Towards Effective Living................. 100 XXI. Preference Students Compared with Non-Preference Students on 1O0 Their Attitudes Toward Effective Living........ X X I I . A Comparison of the A-B Students with the D-F Students on Their Attitude Towards Effective Living.....................103 XXIII . ACE Scoring Method at Michigan State College................. 10U XXIV. Student Attitude Towards Effective Living Compared with Their ACE Quantitative Scores............................... 10$ XXV. Student Attitude Towards Effective Living Compared with Their ACE Linguistic Scores................................. 106 1 CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM Introduction Since the close of vvorld Mar II, more and more young people are extending their education beyond the twelfth grade. Educators are increasingly concerned, not only with housing and teacher shortage problems, but also with a curriculum which meets the needs of our young people today. To meet this curriculum need, educators Tor the past several years have conducted studies designed to ascertain, if possible, which areas of study should be required of all students in order that they may better meet the demands levied upon them as dynamic , democratic citizens in an ever-changing world. In the past, and unfortunately in some institutions today, students entering college have been confronted with a rigid curriculum which, supposedly designed to meet the needs of all, actually benefited only a few. Educators in these institutions have not been particularly con­ cerned about student attitudes toward the college or the courses they took. Statement of the Problem The present problem developed in this investigation is concerned with an analysis of certain factors which seem to affect student attitude towards Effective Living. 2 As a possible answer to the curriculum problem, Michigan State College, in 19hli, inaugurated The basic College. Since the Basic College was an experiment, it was admitted at the outset that certain changes would be made when the occasion arose. The original structure consisted of seven basic courses, of which each student was required to take five, and in some cases, six courses. How successful The Basic College ap­ proach to this curriculum problem will be, only time will tell. It is difficult to evaluate an educational program without first evaluating its product, the student. One of the Basic College courses is Effective Living. This course deals primarily with human relations and personal adjustment, and one of the problems confronting the department has been to instill into the students a feeling of need for such a course . Some of the students have expressed a favorable attitude toward the course and others have been unfavorable toward it. It is the opinion of the writer that a student who likes a course receives more benefit from it. The problem, therefore, was to determine what factors affect student attitude toward Effective Living. It was not intended that this investigation be a ''popularity contest" in which the attitude of students towards Effective Living be compared with the attitude of the same students toward other Basic College courses, but rather to determine what factors present influenced student attitude towards Effective Living. factors present. It would be impossible to analyze all of the Therefore it was decided to formulate fifteen hypotheses which seemed to cover some of the more important factors which could be 3 analyzed. Murphy, Murphy, and Newcomb (27) felt that a study of the various factors could be made and that such a study could, orove ^uite valuable. Kretch and Crutchfield (19) stated that it was very difficult to isolate factors which caused people to have certain attitudes but that it could be done. The problem of measuring the attitudes of students toward a college course was two fold: (l) the selection of an instrument which would meet the needs of the investigation, and (2) the analysis of some factors wliich seem to determine a student*s attitude towards of the college courses . The study as outlined is defined in terms of fifteen specific hy­ potheses: (1) Students from rural and rural non-farm communities and students from cities of 100,000 population or over express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (2) Students whose fathers have attended college two or more years and students whose fathers dropped out of school before the eleventh grade express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (3) Students whose fathers are engaged in professional, semiprofessional, official and managerial occupations or who own their own businesses other than agriculture, and students whose fathers are in the skilled, semiskilled, and unskilled trades express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (U) Students who have the attitude scale administered to them by their instructor and students who have the attitude scale administered to them by a student from their own class express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (5>) Students who sign their names to the attitude scale and students who do not sign their names to the attitude scale express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (to) Students who are freslimen in college and students who are sophomores, juniors, and seniors express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (7) The students of one instructor and the students of other instructors will express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (6) Students in small, discussion classes and stuaents in large lecture classes will express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (9) Male students and female students will express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (10) Students majoring in social science and students majoring in natural science express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (11) Students majoring in natural science and students who are non-preference express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (3.2) Students majoring in social science and non-preference students express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (13) Students who have chosen their major and non-preference students express similar attitudes towards Effective Living. (ll±) Students who receive A or B term—end marks in Effective Living and students who receive D or F term-end marks in the course express similar attitudes towards Effective L i v i ng. (1$) Students who are in the 25% most favorable group towards the course and students who are in the 25% least favorable group have similar abilities as measured by their ACE scores. Need for the Study Most educators agree that no two students are exactly alike. They come from different environments, have different social and economic backgrounds, differ sexually, do not learn at the same rate, have different life goals and values, and are unlike in many other respects. Differences in attitude towara many tilings may be attributed to these physical, psychological, and environmental factors. It is assumed that some relationship does exist between a student*s attitude towarcis a course and his achievements in that course; e.g., if a student has a favorable attituee towards a course, he will probably show more interest in the content, study harder, retain more of the material, and receive a higher mark than if he held an unfavorable attitude. If this favorable attitude is aesirable, then an instructor should attempt to ascertain those factors which tend toward the develop­ ment of a favoraole attitude towards his course. He not only will be increasing his understanding of the student but will be more able to aid the student in gaining a better understanding of the course content. Definition of Terms Attitude. in this field. Many definitions of attitude are found in the literature The nest definition which the investigator found was the one stated by Allport He defined attitude as, . . . . a mental and neural state of readiness, organized through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic in­ fluence upon the individual*s responses to all objects and situations with which it is related. Opinion. An opinion is merely the verbalization about an attitude. Course. The course referred to in this investigation is Effective Living, one of the seven basic courses offered at Michigan State College. 1. Allport, Gordon W. "Attitudes'*. In Murchison, Carl. (Ed.) Handbook of Social Psychology. Clark University Fress, Worcester, Mass., 193k, Chapter 17, p. 810. Student Orientated Classes. These are classes or about fifteen students who meet with their instructor around a large table. The dis­ cussion method is useu in these classes with the instructor emphasizing the student-centered approach. Large Classes. These classes are composed of seventy-five to ninety students who meet with their instructor in a large room. Tiie lecture method is used almost exclusively in these classes. Social Science ^ ajo_rs. fields as: Those students who are majoring in such economics, sociology, political science, social service, history, and all other courses dealing with human relations. Natural Science Majors . Those students majoring in the biological and physical sciences such as: biology, physics, anatomy, chemistry, mathematics, engineering, medicine, etc. Non-preference Students. Those students who have not as yet chosen their major field and who have until their junior year to make such a choice. Kural and Kural Non-farm. Those students who come from farms or from small towns of 2,500 population or under. The Large Sample Group. Those 850 students who took the attitude scale and in addition filled out the Census Data Sheet. Census Data Sheet. An information sheet constructed by the writer to gather personal information about the student. Limitations of the Study (l) The first limitation of tliis study was the size and nature of the group to be studied. Fifteen hundred and seventy-nine students, { enrolled in the first tt^rm oi Effective Living , were selectod as the parent population and from this "roup certain snail sample groups wore chosen for particular investigations. A large number of the stuoents in the parent group were first—term freslimen who had only recently arriveu on the campus and had hac* little time to formulate any opinions or attitudes towards the college in general or any course in particular. If it had oeen the desire of the investigator1 to measure attitude alone, more time would have necessarily been given to the student to make judg­ ments and to form attitudes. Progressive checks coula then have been made upon his change in attitude towards the course. (2) It was also recognized that factors which seemed to affect a student*s attitude toward Effective Living would not necessarily affect the same student*s attitude toward some other course. For example, students who reacted favorably or unfavorably towards a human relations course in which there were many individual problem-solving situations would not necessarily react in a like manner to a laboratory course or a military course. (3) There are many factors which affect student attitude towards a course. This stuc$r is limited to f'ive main factors* (a) certain home and family background factors; (b) factors in the administration of the scale which might affect attitude; (c) classroom factors, such as, instructor, size of class, etc.; (d) college major factor; and (e) the students* scholastic ability and achievement factor. Plan ■- ol- Organization — In the chapters which are to follow the investigator has attempted to give a clear and concise report of his investigation. Chapter II presents a report on tiie literature in the field.. a very few studies similar to tiie present one have been made, Only host of these studies iiave been at the elementary and secondary levels. Chapter III is concerned with tiie design and methodology employed in tiie investigation. It explains tiie methods used in the selection of sample groups, and points out the controls and variables and how they were imposed. Chapter methods used Ciiapter this ciiapter IV explains the construction of the attitude scale and tiie in establishing its reliability and validity. V introduces tiie first of tiie hypotheses to be tested. In an attempt was made: (l) to compare the attitudestowards Effective Living of students coming from rural and rural non-farm com­ munities with tiie attitudes of students coming from cities of 100,000 population and over; (2) to compare the attitudes toward Effective Living of students wiiose fathers had attended college two or more years with the attitudes of students whose fathers had dropped out of school prior to the eleventh grade; and (3) to compare tiie attitude towards Effective Living of students whose fathers were in professional, semi-professional, etc. occupations with tiie attitude of students whose fathers were in the skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled trades. Ciiapter VI reports the findings from two administrative experiments* (l) a comparison of tiie expressed attitudes towards the course of y students who had the attitude scale administerod to them by ons of the students in their class with the attitudes of students who had the scale administered to them by their instructor; (2) a comparison of the ex­ pressed attitudes towards tiie course of students who were asked to sign their names to the attitude scale and students who were asked not to sign their names to the scale. Chapter VII reports the results of testing some classroom factors: (l) the student*s year in college; (2) the student*s instructor; (3) the size of the class in Effective Living; and (1+) the studentfs sex. Ciiapter VIII reports comparisons of student attitudes towards Effective Living and their college majors. Three groups were studied: (l) social science majors; (2) natural science majors; and (3) non­ preference students. Chapter IX reports the findings when the students* attitudes are compared with their final marks in the course and their linguistic and Quantitative ACE scores. Chapter X contains the summary and conclusions with recommendations for further research. 4 Cn..Fr.mt ii libVIEvv OF Triiii LITiiliATUidi. ilis literature wliicn has been reviewca has been chosen because oi‘ its pertinence to the particular aspects of this investigation, -ri-n enormous amount of research, some good and some bad, has been done in tiie field of attitude testing. Much of the research, however, has been done in the testing of attitudes towards Negroes, war, communism, C. C. Camps, church attendance, and political issues. To attempt to review all of the literature in tiie field of attitude testing would involve a considerable amount of time ana space. Furthermore, periodic reviews of tiie literature on attitudes (1 3 ,2ii,31,32 ,3M which bring together and summarize tiiese studies makes such a procedure unnecessary for the present study. In order to facilitate clarity in tiiis review of literature, tiie reviews were divided into tnree separate areas. Part I is a review of the literature concerning attitudes of college students. Part II is a review of the literature concerning the influence of the home on student attitudes. Part III is a review of the literature concerning tiie ,,Thurstone,, method of attitude scale construction. 11 Part i» tteview of the Literature Concerning Altitudes of College Stiidcnts Course Content and Attitude Changes Educators nave suspected for some time that course material has some eflect on student attitude changes. Barkley (2) found that students taking commercial courses, when tested on their attitude toward evolution and retested after a period of time, showed little or no change in their attitude. Students who had taken biology and chemistry showed a more favorable attitude toward evolution than diu the commercial students. All science students were more favorable toward evolution than were com­ mercial students. He also found that those who had studied biology and chemistry were more favorable toward evolution than those who had studied only biology, or chemistry, or mathematics. In another study, Telford (36), in 1932, undertook an investigation to determine to what extent a semester's training in certain courses at the University of worth Dakota had made measurable changes in the avowed attitudes of liil students towards the treatment of criminals. The courses chosen were general psychology, educational psychology, introductory sociology, and criminology. Form A of the Vang and Thurstone Scale for measuring attitude toward criminals was given in February, 1932, and Form B of the same scale was given in May of the same year. The results showed that students taking a semester's course in criminology became more humane. Students taking introductory sociology, educational psychology, and general psychology 12 showed only slight changes in the humane direction, the size of these shifts decreasing in the order listed. On the high school level, Smith (35) found that there was little evidence in his study of California students that social studies in­ struction was succeeding in developing in our high-school seniors intelli­ gent attitudes and opinions toward issues basic to citizenshi p and social betterment beyond those which the seniors share with their parents as a group. Newcomb (28), in his Bennington College study, found that there was a slight tendency for those students initially least conservative to choose their major work in the social sciences, and for those most con­ servative to major in science and music. V7hile Major (23) reported, in 19^ 6 , that on the measurement of conservative-progressive tendencies of college students after one semester of introduction to education, he found that there was a swing toward progressivism and a tendency on the part of the student to lose some of his personal convictions. Teaching Techniques and Attitude Change Billings (U) , in 1939, chose 26 Colby College women students who were enrolled in sociology, economics, and religious classes. group was chosen at random from the same student body. Another Both groups were given a scale of beliefs before and after field trips to relief housing projects, health centers, slums, etc. Three, years after graduation, Billings administered the same test to the same group. He reports that there was no lasting change and that the experiment did not prove significant. 13 Discussion sessions are frequently held in human relations courses. The results of such discussions are not consistent among the students. Castore (8) in his study of attitudes of students towards the case method of instruction in a human relations course founc that individual in­ structors do not arouse consistent attitudes in the course of discussion. He found some of the variations to be remarkably great. Edwards (13) formulated a hypothesis that experience which harmonizes with an existing frame of reference will tend to be learned and remembered better than experience which conflicts with the same frame of reference. Student attitude toward the hew Deal was tested. Out of the 321 students studied, U8 were chosen as in favor of the hew Deal, U8 were opposed, and U8 were considered as neutral. to them. The students were then rated. A ten-minute speech was read Twenty-one days later the same test was administered to the same students without previous notice. Tiie results showed that the speech resulted in little or no change in the subjects* attitudes towards the New Deal. In fact, there was very little apparent change in attitude after a period of three weeks. The speech itself was neutral in that it contained an equal number of favorable and unfavorable statements about the New Deal. Graham (15) , in 19U6, reports a study of the relationship between the use of democratic methods in the classroom and democratic attitudes developed. His results showed* (l) the present school cliildren are woefully lacking in many of the attitudes needed in a democratic society} (2) "typical" teaching procedures, even though employed by "superior" teachers, do virtually nothing to develop democratic attitudes; and (3) there was e:xperim&ntal evidence to support the conclusion that "superior1' teachers, using democratic procedures, have a m e a s u r e of success in establishing democratic attitudes. Student Attitude Towards Teachers It is sometimes thought that students who receive high marks in a course have a favorable attitude toward the instructor in the course . Michael, Herrold, and Cryan (26) found no systematic relationship between the scholastic averages of students and their attitude toward the teacher. Hemmers and Drucker (31) , in their study of how alumni and students differ in their attitudes toward their instructors, found that there were positive relationships between the relative average rating of in­ structors by students and alumni. I'hey also found that there was a tendency for present students to rate their instructors a little higher than did the alumni. Their final conclusion was that there was evidence to show that the judgments made by undergraduates of their instructors were valid ones in terms of permanence and maturity. Intelligence and Student Attitude Carlson (7), in 193^, reported his study on attitudes of college undergraduates. investigation. He used 215 University of Chicago students in his He tested them on their attitudes towards prohibition, God, pacifism, communism, and birth control. He also studied the rela­ tionship between their intelligence and their attitudes towards the same areas . 15 Carlson round that seniors in the University of Chicago, on the average, were opposed to prohibition, sympathetic toward pacifism and birth control, and neutral toward communism and God. He also founa that women were more favorable than men toward prohibition and God but differed little in the areas of pacifism, communism, and birth control. Undergraduates in social science were found to be more favorable to com­ munism and pacifism than majors in physical science. He also found that intelligence was not correlateo. with attitude toward prohibition, but positively correlated with sympathetic attitudes towards communism, birth control, pacifism, and atheism. Student Professed Attitudes and Student Behavior One of the criticisms leveled at attitude testing is that there is no relationship between what a person says and what lie does. In 1937 Corey (9) reported on a study which he made concerning the relationship between professed attitudes and actual behavior. Corey gave the students in his introductory course in educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin five weekly quizzes of UO to true—false questions each. student cheating. He also gave them an attitude scale on After each of the weekly quizzes, he would collect all the test papers, score them himself, record the grades, and then return them to the students with a statement that he had not been able to cor­ rect them. He would then ask the students to correct the papers and give him their scores. This gave the students an opportunity to cheat, if they wanted t o . He then compared the scores which he had obtained for each of the students with the scores which they reported to him. 1he difference between the score wliich Corey had recorded originally and the score wiiich the student reported was called the student* s cheating score. For example, if Corey found that the student had answered 35 -iuestions correctly and the student reported that lie had found I4.3 questions answered correctly, the student*s cheating score would be eight. Corey found that 2h% of the students had no cheating score. One student raised his score on the average of 12 points per test or approxi­ mately 25%. In summarizing iiis findings, Corey stated that the overt behavior of the students, as measured by their own grading, is not re­ lated to their attitudinal scores on cheating. In other words, a student who says he is opposed to cheating might cheat if given an opportunity. Student Attitude Toward a Course Very little research has been done in measuring student attitude toward a course. The following study was reported by Bee (3) and con­ ducted by two of tiis students, Alice dfcnith and Elmer Knowles. The investigation was conducted at Utah State College and at the University of Kansas in 1950. The central purpose of the study was to administer a series of attitude scales as a projective medium to study some basic personality characteristics of students enrolled in a courtship-marriage course; and to seek to relate these patterns to selected cultural, social, and psychological factors in the students* formative experiences. The courtship-marriage course was open to all students at Utah State but restricted to upper-classmen at Kansas. given as formal lectures. Class presentations were The course contained considerable advanced 17 theory Irom anthropology, sociology, psychology, psychiatry, and other fields . After taking the course, the students were then given an attitude scale which was intended to measure their attitude toward the course. Bee found that there was no student whose general attitude fell on the unfavorable end of the scale, though some students responded unfavorably to some aspects of the course. About one-third of the litah students and one—half of the Kansas students were "strongly favorable" toward the course. Bee felt that tliis difference between the one—third Utah students and one—half Kansas students was probably due to the fact that the Kansas sample was made up of upper-classmen who haa brought more liberal arts background to the course. Bee also found that students* attitudes toward such a complex experience as a marriage course were not closely related to any one of the many areas of experience that were taken into consideration. In other words such factors as, religious background and degree of orthodoxy alone, or sex experience and orientation alone were not found to be re­ lated to acceptance-rejection of the course . Bee also reported that a large number of the students from these two institutions strongly favored education for courtship, marriage, and family living; and of those who reported that their parents were aware of their taking the course, nineteen out of twenty reported that their parents were favorable. Bee recommended that the size of the classes in courtship and marriage courses should be held down in order to provide students a 15 greater opportunity for more reflective and integrating classroom experiences. He also felt that the lecture methods were of limited Value in this field. While Bee's study was on the college level, another study by riemmers and Ryder (3^) was at the secondary school level. This investigation was made of pupils taught by 12 supervised student teachers during the first semester of the academic year, 1936-37. The instrument used for obtaining the data on student attitude toward a course was the Scale for Measuring Attitude Toward Any C o u r s e . Form A , developed by Silance and Remmers (33). The scale was administered twice: the first time, after the student teachers had taught for a few days, and the second time, shortly after the student teachers finished the course, approximately seven weeks later. The student teachers had taught the course every day in the interval. Five student teachers taught classes in English, four in which were in grammar and composition and the fifth in American Literature. There were three classes in American history, one in European history, and one in civics. There was also one class in first semester biology and another class in second semester algebra. In all, there were 2k2. pupils in the experimental group and 2hl in the control group. Using the Purdue Rating Scale, Remmers and Ryder found that the attitude of the pupils toward student teachers improved significantly during the training period. It was also found that the students felt that the student teachers had improved during the period of training. Pupils* attitude toward the regular teachers improved during the same period, but not so much as toward the student teacher. I 19 The Silance-liemmers attitude scale was administered to 200 pupils by the student teachers ano to the same number of pupils in parallel classes taught by the regular teachers. The scale was administered at the beginning and at the end of the supervised student teaching period of seven weeks duration in order to measure any change in attitude that may have taken place. The results showed first, that the pupils' attitudes toward the subject were no worse at the end of the training period than at the beginning. measured. They were, in fact, slightly higher for the group of students Approximately the same amount of improvement occurred in the parallel classes. however. Neither difference was statistically significant Secondly, the results showed that high school pupils have about the same attitude toward the subject under student teachers as under the regular teachers. In the final rating, there was a tendency for the pupils to have a slightly better attitude toward all subjects, except algebra, when taught by the regular teachers than when taught by the student teachers. Summary of Part I , The findings in Part I were concerned primarily with classroom experiments on attitude change. Various techniques were used, such as, field trips and ten-minute speeches given by the instructor. It was found that students majoring in the scientific fields were more favorable towards evolution than were commercial students; and students taking a semester's course in criminology became more humane than did students who had just finished a course in introduction to sociology, educational 20 psychology, or general psychology. It was farther reported that students who said that they diet not believe in cheating were not necessarily honest themselves. Much research has been done by iiemmers and his collaborators. They found that high school students taught by supervised student teachers held attitudes toward their teachers and toward their courses similar to those of students wtio were taught by regular teachers. Part I I . Heview of the Literature Concerning the Influence of the Home on Student Attitude The influence of the home on student attitude has been the suDject of some research. Probably the most dominant factor in formulating student attitude has been the student*s home environment. Smith (35) in his study of California high school students, reported that if schools are to promote and develop social attitudes in harmony with those held by persons best informed on social questions, recognition must be taken of parental attitudes. He advocated the development of coordinated classes for parents and their children to study and discuss public affairs under the guidance of the schools in order that intelligent opinions and unbiased attitudes toward social problems may be developed. Peterson (29) agreed with Smith when he reported that correlations between parents* and ctiildrens* attitudes were all positive and indicated that childrens* attitudes were much like those held by their parents. Bee (3) reported that attitudes were not statistically significant when compared to any one experience, while Krech and Crutchfield (19) f l 21 felt that most attitudes and belief's are part of a 11constellation” of other attitudes and beliefs ana that few beliefs ana attitudes can be thought of in a state of isolation from other beliefs and attitudes. Thus it seems that while the attitudes which students hold may be the result of their relationships with their parents, it is also probable that some of their attitudes and beliefs are formulated as a result of contact with other segments of their environment. Hirschberg and Gilliland (17) in their study on parent-child re­ lations in beliefs and attitudes provided some information on the limiting factors which exist between the child and his home environment. These investigators administered three attitude scales to 200 North­ western University students. the students* parents. tions* Copies of the same scales were sent to I'hey found the following parent-child correla­ attitude toward God, / .29; toward the New Deal, / .59; about the depression, / M 2 . It was noted that although all the correlations were positive and thus indicated some relationship between the attitudes of the parents and the attitudes of their ciiildren, none of the correla­ tions were very high. Particularly significant was the degree of variation between the attitudes (from /.29 to / .59). Other factors enter into the formulation of attitudes. Cantril (6) found that parents and ciiildren differed between economic, education, and age groups. In his study of the Negro problem and government regula­ tion of business, he found that there was a tendency for people who are better educated, better off financially, arid who are older to hold their attitudes with greater intensity than those less educated, less secure economically, and younger. 22 Summary of Part II In summarizing Part I I , the findings seem to indicate that although the parents exert a tremendous influence on the child and his formulation of attitudes and beliefs, there are many other factors which are also important. Such factors as economic security, age, and educational achievement seem to affect the stability and intensity of attitudes. Part III. Review of the Literature Concerning the Thurstone iiethod of Attitude Scale Construction The Thurstone method of scale construction was used by the Board of Lxaminers in the construction of the attitude scale which was used in the present investigation. Therefore, it seemed advisable to review the literature concerning Thurstone*s technique of scale construction and to become more familiar with its strengths and weaknesses. A pioneering study of scale construction was performed in 1928 by Thurstone and Chaves (37) . The aim of scaling was the development or construction of a "measuring" device which woula distribute individuals along a continuum running from a higlily favorable, through neutral, to a highly unfavorable attitude. The scale to be constructed was expected to measure the attitude of people toward the Church. In setting up the scale, it was first necessary to formulate a number of statements concern­ ing the Church. Some of the important criteria to follow in the formula­ tion of these statements werei (1) The statements should be as brief as possible so as not to fatigue the subjects who were asked to read the whole list. (2) The statements should be such that they could be I 23 endorsed, or rejected in accordance with their agreement or disagreement with the attitude cf the reader. (3) Avery statement should be such that acceptance or rejection of the statement would indicate something regarding the readers1 attitude about the issue. (U) "Double-barreled" statements should be avolde^. .a.cept possibly as examples of neutrality. (5) The statements must belong to the attitude variable that was to be measured. One hundred thirty statements were collected about the Church and the subjects were asked to sort these statements into eleven piles, ranging from those statements which were extremely hostile to the Church to those which were very much in favor of the Church. The 130 state­ ments were mimeographed on small slips, one statement on each slip. After all of the slips had been sorted into piles from A to K (eleven piles) , the subjects were asked to return them to the investigators with each pile marked as to its position on the scale . Graphs were con­ structed for each statement in order to determine the $0% level and the W-value. It does not seem advisable to give at this time a detailed description of the methods used in arriving at the >4-value. It is sufficient to say that the *-value was twice the ^uartile deviation- of the distribution of each opinion. The smaller the •*—value , the better the statement; thus, those statements with a high ^i-value were eliminated from the scale. In addition to the *-value, Thurstone and Chaves set up some other criteria for selecting statements for the scale* (l) The opinions should reflect the present attitude of the subject rather than his attitude in the past. (2) ■Double—barreled" statements should ue avoided as ambiguous. (3) Statements which are evidently applicable to a very restricted range of endorsers should not ce used. (1) bach opinion selected for the attitude scale should be such that it would not oe possible for subjects from both ends of the scale to endorse it. (5) As far as possible, the statements should be free of related and confusing concepts. (6) Slang should be avoided except where it serves the purpose of describing an attitude more briefly than it could other­ wise be stated. After eliminating all the items which did not meet the requirements of the criteria stated above , the investigators came out with forty-five "best" statements. The experimental scale was presented to several hundred subjects, bach statement was assigned a scale value, and the mean scale value for an individual was his "score" . Although Thurstone and Chaves used a Ujp-item scale as their experi­ mental instrument, Kchemar (2h) felt that from twelve or fourteen to twenty possible gradations would be sufficient. Droba (11), in his equal—appearing interval scale, used a different method of marking the items. Thurstone and Chave had suggested that each subject check the items with wltf-ch he agreed; Droba asked his subjects to mark a plus if they agreed, a minus if they disagreed, and a question mark if they were neutral. Likert (20) proposed a method of measuring the intensity of an attitude by constructing a "Likert Scale" which gave the subject a choice of 1 to 5 degrees of intensity of feeling toward any one statement. Hinkley (16) was concerned with the influence of individual opinion on the construction of a Thurstone type attitude scale. problem was; C D His the construction of an attitude scale on Negroes, and (2) to test the extent to which this scale was influenced by the opinion o1 the subjects in the construction of the scale. ninkley contended that the attitudes of those constructing the scale should not be re­ flected in the scale value of the items in the scale, Each subject in the construction of the scale must judge as to the degree to which each statement reflects the attitude variable. Two-hundrect students from the University of Florida along with twenty-five Florida professors were asked to submit statements on their opinion of the social position of the Negro. From this list of state­ ments, 230 were chosen, ranging between the two extremes of opinion. The original list was then reduced to 150 statements and sent to Professors Thurstone and Kingsbury, of the faculty of the University of Chicago (1932), ana also, to two graduate students, all of whom were thorouglily familiar with the problem of sorting. From the 150 statements, 11U remained after close scrutiny by the people at the University of Chicago. Eight hundred and fifty subjects were then recruited from nine schools; six hundred white students and 250 Negroes. Practically all of these students were enrolled in some class in psychology, sociology, or education. They were asked to sort the llli statements into eleven piles, ranging from the most favorable opinion concerning the Negro to the least favorable opinion. The Negro responses were set aside for further 2 b study and the white responses were divided into three groups; most favorable, least favorable and neutral. and only the two extremes were used. The neutral group was eliminated From the two extreme groups, 32 statements were selected according to their low m-value. Among the results which need not be reported because of their irrelevance to this study were the scores of the various groups which took the test, however, an interesting result was the reaction of the Negro group and how it effected their sorting of the statements. Hinkley reported that one of the Negro colleges became emotionally wrought up concerning the sorting task, but that their sorting was about the same as that of the white subjects. This might indicate further evidence in favor of the fact that emotional prejudice does not influence the differentiating judgment of the sorter. Hinkley concluded that any scale of attitudes, carefully constructed in accordance with the Thurstone method, will not be affected in its measuring function by the position which the sorters occupy on the scale. In a follow-up study of Hinkley*s, Ferguson (Ik) reported that at least for the attitude variable (war) , a confirmation of Thurstone and Chaves (37) and also of Hinkley' (16), that the scale values of the state­ ments in an attitude scale are independent of the attitudes of the judges who are selected to sort the statements which are to make up the scale. Pinter and Forlano (30) also agreed with Ferguson and others concerning the reliability of the sorters. Pinter and Forlano used a scale for measuring patriotism which had been developed by' Thurstone and Theile. Their sample consisted of ii.ll 27 students enrolled in educational psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University. They round that when a small numoer of items are to be u s e a , say 20, it is not necessary to put them on separate slips of paper as Thurstone and Chave (35) did, but on one sheet of paper and then have the judges rank them. In arranging the items in an attitude scale, it was found by Dunlap and Kroll (12) that a serial order of scale value does not affect the mean, the standard deviation, or the reliability coefficient. Also it facilitates the checking of the scale . In reference to any single item or statement on the Thurstone attitude scale, Krech and Crutchfielc. (19) reported that the separate items are not customarily of interest in themselves. That is to say, one is not interested in the reaction to a specific, single item, but only in how the reaction of tliis item can be summed with those many other equivalently weighted items to derive a final scale position. They further stated that nothing is to proliibit the analysis of reactions to a single item, but the usefulness of a scale does not stand or fall on the basis of validity of any single statement. Remmers and Silance (3U) constructed an attitude scale based upon student attitude toward any school subject. statements were collected from tiiree sources* In 193ii, they reported that (1) One-hundred college freshmen themes on school subjects liked and disliked. on methods of teaching and other educational literature. written by Ella B. Silance. (2) Text books (3) Statements In order to sort these statements, the authors called upon ley college and high school students to do the work, nfter careful sorting, 150 items were selected, and from these 150 items, two forms, A and B, were constructed. Subsequently they adininistereo the two forms in a variety of situations and with different school subjects (33) . Form A correlated with Form B brought a range of .61 to .90. Both high school and college students were involved in these measurements. toward high school subjects varied Attitude in reliability from ,6U to .66 for one form, and for college subjects from .61 to .90. It seems evident from these results that the scale might be applied at both the high school and college levels. Watson and Hartmann (3£>) in reporting on rigidity of a basic "attitudinal frame", used as their subject, "Belief in a Personal God." Ten students of varying denominational beliefs were selected from the graduate student body of Union Theological Seminary, the Jewish Theo­ logical Seminary, and the department of Religious Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. To match them, ten atheists were chosen from different divisions of the Advanced School of Education at Teachers College . These students were presented with a check list containing forty items pairing theist values with other commonly held values, and ten items pairing active anti-theist values against common values. • Since this check list was intended to measure the spread of the subjects* attitudinal frame over a variety of choice situations, it was necessary to include more items for the theist group; because of differing church 29 affiliations "they were expected to have varying concepts of the values inherent in their frame. Seven steps were followed in collecting the data for ttiis investi­ gation: (1) A check on the original position of each student was made to establish, by the use of a Thurstone scale, any changes from it at the end of the experiment. (2) During the period of "free recall", the subjects were told that they would be given 15 minutes to list as many as possible of the arguments for and against a belief in God. student was given the same instructions for this step. (3) Each He was presented with cards which contained ten pairs of arguments for and against the existence of God. After examining the cards he was asked to evaluate each argument on a three point scale; one, for little or no importance; two, middle position, average effectiveness; and tliree, for very essential for your position, or which are the opposite, i.e., very disturbing and hard to answer. (U) The subject was given the same twenty arguments, each on a separate card, and asked to rank the arguments from one to twenty. This process gave additional time for fixation of material on the basis of effectiveness and allowed a rough check on individual con­ sistency . (5) A previous check list was included at this point in the procedure to allow for the passage of an interval between the presenta­ tion of the arguments and the attempted recall. (6) In this step, the subject was asked to recall as exactly as he could and in complete detail each of the twenty arguments he rated and ranked a few minutes before. (7) The students were then given their original Thurstone sheets to re­ check with detailed instructions to indicate their new positions, if any. 30 Briefly, the results showed no appreciable change. The opposed groups appeared to be just as far apart as oefore . Summary of Part III In summarizing Part III, it appears that the Thurstone technique produces a valid instrument of attitude if administered carefully. McNemar (2lt.) and others have pointed out some of its weaknesses, but a survey of the other teclini^uas of attitude measurement does not reveal any other method which is not without some weakness. Summary of Chapter II A review of the literature in attitude measurement, because of the large number of investigations which have been made, had to be confined to those areas pertinent to this study. literature were reviewed. Three major aspects of the Part I dealt with a review of literature concerning attitudes of college students. Part II was a review of the literature pertaining to the influence of the home on student attitudes. Part III was a review of the literature on the Thurstone method of atti­ tude scale construction. The following points briefly summarize the conclusions which may be drawn from these reviews* 1. Students majoring in the scientific fields and students major­ ing in the social science fields appear to have measurable differences on the progressive-conservative scale. The science students seem to be more conservative than the social science students. 2. There appeared to be some evidence both for and against the effect which college and high school courses exert toward the formation of desirable attitudes. 31 3. Certain teaching techniques employed by teachers in oraer to change student attitude were only partially successful. b . Student attitude toward their 'teachers was ooth permanent and mature but was not positively correlated with their scholastic averages. 5. There were some positive correlations between intelligence and attitudes. 6. Overt behavior and professed beliefs did not appear to be positively correlated. 7. When measured by an attitude scale, students in courtship and marriage courses appeared to be favorable toward the courses . 8. High school students taught by student teachers held similar attitudes towards their instructors and towards their courses as did students who were taught by regular teachers. 9. Parents exert a tremendous influence on the child and his formation of attitudes and beliefs, but there appeared to be other factors which were also involved. 10. The Thurstone teclinique of scale construction in the measure­ ment of attitudes appears to be valid. Other techniques have been devised and have proved to be equally as good. The following chapter deals with the selection of the students to be studied and the methods of analysis used in measuring the significance of those factors which affect the attitude of college students towards a course. i i I CriAJrTErt III METHODOLOGY AND DESIGN Nature of the Parent Group Effective Living is one of the seven basic courses offered at Michigan State College. teaching this course. The investigator is a member of the staff Effective Living deals with human problems, and the department head, as well as all the members of the staff, has been interested in research concerned with human relations. Because of these factors, it was decided to use the students in Effective Living classes as the subjects to be studied in this investigation. Effective Living is divided into ttiree terms. The first term of the course is known as Basic 151J the second term as Basic 152; and the third term as Basic 153. ing the Fall term. Students generally enroll in the course dur­ Only a few students start the course during the Winter or Spring terms. After discussing the problem of selection of students to be studied with members of the staff and other persons trained in educational research, the author decided that Basic 151 of the Fall, 1951, group would be the most representative. Basics 152 and 153 are generally composed of students who are accelerating their program or students who are repeating the course and, therefore, could not be considered as a good sample. Basic 151 also represented the largest group of the three terms and thus presented a more valid cross-section of the student body enrolled in the Basic College . 33 This group of stuaents in Basic 151 is referrec. to as the parent group in this study. From it smaller samples nave ueen select-a .Hr special study in specific areas. An investigation of the parent group revealea that 01 the 1,579 students studied 58.li# were fresiimen, 3 1 .2# were sophomores, 9.3# juniors, ana 1.1# were seniors. Instructors and Section in the Study In addition to the 1,579 stuaents in the study, sixteen instructors teaching forty-seven sections of the first term of the course partici­ pated. These forty-seven sections met at six different hou^s of the aay and on tiiree different day-combinations of the week. TABLE I TEACHER AND SECTION DISTRIBUTION Days of the Week Tu.-Th . Vv. — F . M. - W . Tu.-Th . Tu.-Th. W. - F. Tu.-Th. M . - W . Time of Day 8 8 10 12 2 2 U 6 to to to to to to to to 10 10 12 2 h I 6 8 -a- Total Sections - hi Number of Section*’ Inst rue to rs*~"" 7 7 7 3 7 7 7 2 J,B ,M,D,A,K,G D,B ,F,E,A,B,G J ,C ,F ,0 ,A ,P ,N M,A,I D,C ,K ,H,G,P,N C ,0 ,K .H,G,P,N L,C,K,H,I,D,N -M-KTotal Instructors - 16 Selection of Samples within the Parent Group Although a more detailed analysis of each sample selected in the various parts of“ the study will be dealt with in the following chapters, a brief statement, concerning the method of selection and the nature of each group is given here. The number of students in Basic 151 who checkeu the attitude scale ( N =1,579) was considered too large for the analysis of most of the factors. It was deciaed that a smaller group should be used. Classes which met on different days of the week and on different hours of the day were selected. Also, care was taken that each of the sixteen instructors was representea oy at least one of his classes. This group (referred to in the remainder of the study as the '’large sample group") was found to include 850 students. It was necessary' for the investigator to obtain certain information from the students concerning their home and family' background, their year in college, and their college majors. The stuaents represented in the large sample group (i\T=850) were used for this purpose. From the information received from the data sheet and from the attitude scale it ^as found that equal ratios of male ana female students existea when compared with the parent group. Also, that there was a corresponding number of freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors between the parent group and the large sample. This would seem to indicate that the large sample group was representative, at least with respect to these variables, with the parent group. Further analysis sliowed that the mean score of the weighted values on the attitude scale for the two groups had a difference of .002 . Tliis would seem to indicate that the difference between the means was not significant and consequently that the large sample group was representative of the parent group. 36 In establishing the reliability and validity of the attituce scale several tests were maae . Two tests Tor reliability were perfomeas (l) a test-retest, and (2) an item analysis to determine the variability of the statements. Two tests for validity were inaae: (1) valiaation by means of the interview technique, and (2) valiaation by means of known groups. A more detailed report of the findings will be pressenteo in Chapter IV . In Chapter V, an analysis is made of the family background of the student. This information was taken from the census sheet which was filled out by' the large sample group (650 stuaents). In Chapter VI, one of the hypotheses to be tested was: "students who sign their names to the attitude scale will express the same favorability towards the Effective Living course as those students who do not sign their name." Two controls were imposed. The instructor variable was controlled by using only those students taught by one instructor. The second variable of time and day was controlled by' selecting an in­ structor who had the widest possible schedule of classes. The result was that the sample consisted of those students taught by Instructor - D. The classes met on Tuesday-Thursday, 8 to lO; Tuesday-Thursday, 2 to Wednesday-Friday, 8 to 10; and on Tuesday-Thursday, U to 6. The second hypothesis in Chapter VI was: "students who have the attitude scale administered to them by their instructor will express the same favorableness towaras the Effective Living course as those stuaents who have the scale administered to them by one of the students in the class." The same controls were imposed as in the preceding hypothesis. 3o Instructor - C*s classes were chosen. They met on Monday-Wednesday, 10 to 12; Tuesday—Thursday, 2 to L; Wednesday-Frioay, 2 to I4; and on Tuesday-Thursday, 4 to 6 . Several small samples were usea in Chapter VII. However, in com­ paring the attitude of frestunen with the attitude of students in the upper three years the entire large sample was used. It was found that there were U96 fresiimen and 351 sophomores, juniors, anu seniors. The hypothesis was that "fre?limen would express an attituoe towards Effective Living similar to that of sophomores, juniors, ana seniors." In studying the hypothesis that, "students of one instructor would express similar attitudes toward Effective Living as the students of any of the other instructors," the entire Basic 151 group of 1,579 students was used and their attitudes toward the sixteen instructors were analyzed. Another hypothesis reported in Chapter VII stated that, "students enrolled in small and large sections in Effective Living express similar attitudes toward the course." During the Fall term, 1951, the department set up two small classes whose combined enrollment totaled thirty-two students. The expressed attitudes of these students toward Effective Living were compared with the expressed attitudes of students who were enrolled in two large classes (N-107) . Although these samples were not conpared with the entire parent population on such variables as scholastic aptitude, the assumption of representativeness has been made. This assumption is based upon the fact that the students who enrolled in the two small sections and the two large sections were not informed of the 37 iact that these were to be small or large classes and that the names of the instructors who were to teach these classes were not known to t h e students. Another hypothesis in Chapter VII stated that: "male students and female students express similar attitudes towaro effective Living." The sample used in this investigation was composed of u9t> male- students and female students (the entire large sample group used in Chapter V) . In Chapter VIII , the sample group used in making comparisons of attitude toward the course was the same large sample as used in Chapter V. The students had been askea to indicate their majors, and if they had not as yet selected a major, to so indicate by identifying themselves as non­ preference students. Upon investigation it was found that there were 193 social science majors; 205 natural science majors; and 21*9 non—preference students. hypotheses tested in this chapter were: The (l) '•’Natural science majors and social science majors express similar attitudes towards Effective Living," (2) "Natural science majors and non-preference students express similar attitudes towards Effective Living," (3) ""Social science majors and non-preference students express similar attitudes toward Effective Living," and (U) "Students who have chosen their major and non-preference students express similar attitudes toward Effective Living." The large sample group was used again in Chapter IX. to be studied first was: The hypothesis '"Students who receive high marks in Effective Living express the same favorable attitude toward the course as those who receive low marks." Students who received A*s and B*s for their term-end marks were comparea with the students who received D*s and F 1s . Upon examination it was found that 265 students were in the ..-d category and that 161 students were recipients of D's and F's at the end of the fall term. The second hypothesis in Chapter IX stated that: “’Those students who rate Effective Living very high on the attitude scale and those who rate the course very low have similar scores on their aCe test.” The large sample group was also used in this study. The upper 2l J>% on the scale was found to be llpL students and the lower 25a came out at li+9 students. The Michigan State College Counseling Center administers the American Council Psychological Examination (commonly called the ACE) to all entering students. The aCE scoring process was changed by the Counseling Center for the fall term, 1951. The ratings from 10 to 1 formerly on the decile basis, were retained but the distribution of individuals in each of the ten categories was changed to more nearly fit the normal curve. It was necessary, therefore, that the writer use only those students who came under this "new" system. Mean scores were determined for each student- group by computing their quantitative scores together and their linguistic scores together. The total or "T" score was no€ computed because it was not used in the study. Nature of the Instruments A more detailed report on each instrument used will be found in the chapters wliich deal with that particular instrument. Only a brief description is given here. I One of the first problems which the investigator encountered was that of selecting an instrument which could be used in measuring stuccnt attitude toward a college course. The Board of Examiners at Michigan State College had constructed such an instrument. known as: The instrument is A Scale to Measure Attitude Toward Any College Course.'*' an analysis of the instrument will be found in Chapter IV which follows. It might be noted here that the scale consists of twenty—one e^ualappearing items and was constructed by the use of the Thurstone method. The method of establishing the reliability and validity of this scale is described in Chapter IV along with the results obtained. Another instrument used was the Michigan State College Teacher O Evaluation Sheet. The evaluation sheet is a product of the Mictiigan State College faculty and has been in use at the College for a number of years. Seven criteria are used in evaluating the instructor. Each criterion has a five-point scale, and students are asked to check the instructor somewhere along this scale(A,8,C,D,e ) . The Census Data Sheet, referred to previously in tiiis chapter was constructed by the writer to aid in the collection of personal data about the student. It was attached to the Board of Examiners* attitude scale and filled out when the students checked the scale . Information re­ quested included the student*s name, age, sex, occupation of liis father, 1. The attitude scale was constructed by the Board of Examiners but the methodology employed, the statistical procedure and analysis, as well as the findings are those of the investigator. See Appendix A, p. 127. 2. See Appendix A, p. 126. 1.0 his father's educational achievement, size of his home community, the stuuent's college major, and year in school. Method liseu in the Collection of the Data To orient participating staff members, a meeting was helo with the department head and the staff of the Effective Living department. this meeting, the purpose of the study was explained. At A copy of each of the instruments (data sheet, Board of Examiners* attitude scale, and the teachers evaluation sheet) was given to each member of the staff. Direction sheets for the administration of the scale and sheets were handed out and explained. Each instructor wa's given an opportunity to ask questions and make helpful suggestions concerning the administration of the study. No instructor was forced to participate in the study, but each expressed his willingness to cooperate. Dates and times were then set up for the administration of the in­ struments. It was decided to wait until the students had had an oppor­ tunity to read some of the material in the course, to get acquainted with their instructors, take their mid-term examination, and receive back, their grades from the examination before asking them to express their attitude toward the course. All of the information was collected in one week's time so that any variation in attitude due to outside influences would be kept at a minimum. The material for each class was placed in a folder and given to each instructor just before the class meeting. The instructor was asked to read the direction sheet to his students, pass out the attitude scale, read further instructions for marking, collect hi the attitude scales j place them, oack in the folcer, and return them to the writer at the close of the class period. These folders were then filed according to the serial number of the classes. The actual administration period took place two weeks following the mid-term examinations during the Fall term, 1 V 5 1 . This time was selected because enough time had elapsed since the beginning of the term for the student to have formed some kind of opinion concerning the course. Procedures for Analysis of the Data The first problem was the determination of some method of scoring the attitude scale. Each of the twenty-one statements on the scale had a weighted value which had been determined by the Board of Examiners. This weighted value varied with the degree of favorableness expressed by the statement toward the course. stated* For example* item lit on the scale "If I were limited to taking only one course in college, I would select this course as that o n e ." This was considered by the Board of Examiners as a statement which expressed the highest possible degree of favorableness toward the course . value of twenty-one. Item lh was given an arbitrary The least favorable statement on the scale said* •This course should be thrown out of the curriculum," and was given a weighted value of o n e . Each student had been asked to check those items which best expressed his feelings towards the course. In scoring each paper, the items which each student had checked were scored according to the prearranged weighted values for each Item. U2 The items were not arranged in a logical oraer of favorableness bat were liste n in a random c rder. Following are the 21 statements and their weighted value: 1. This course is very beneficial to the majority of the students who take it. (weighted value of this statement is 17) 2 . I am very enthusiastic about this course. (Value - 19) 3. The benefits to be gained from this course hardly justify its existence. (Value - 3) k. This course does not help students much. (Value - 5) 5. hot enough time is spent on each topic to get the full value of it. (Value - t) 6. Some parts of this course are very worth-while. (Value - 13) 7. This course does a goo a job in covering so much material so clearly. (Value 16) 6. This course could be helpful if it were better organized. (Value - 9) 9. There are better courses than tiiis and there are worse courses. (Value - 11; theoretically this woiilc be the neutral item) 1 0 . This is a good course for college stuoents to take. (Value - 16) 11. This course does a fair job. (Value - 12) 12. Students learn very little in this course. (Value - U) 13. This course, no doubt, has some value for some people. (Value - 10) lii. If I were limited to taking only one course in college, I would select this course as that one. (Value - 21; theoretically this is the most favorable of all the statements on the scale) 16. I don*t see how anyone could ever like this course. (Value - 2) lb. This course is too vague. (Value - 6) 17. This course should be tlirown out of the curriculum. (Value - 1; this was intended to express the least favorable attitude) U3 16. The material taught in this course is net detailed enough. (Value - 7) 19. One should have no difficulty devoting attention to the class •fork in this course. (Value - 16) 20. It would be iiara lor anyone to devise a better course than this one. (Value - 20) 21 . Tiiis course makes a valuable contribution to a college educa­ tion. (Value - 18) The total score for eacii student was determined by adding the weighted values of the items which he had checked. His mean score was determined by taking his total score and dividing it by the number items which iie had checked. It was assumea that if his mean score were 11, tie held a neutral position towards the course; but if his mean score were above 11, it was assumed that he held a somewhat favorable attitude toward the course. Conversely, if his mean score was below 11, he was considered to have an unfavorable attitude toward the course. Some other investigators who have used the Thurstone scales have argued that the median shoulc be useu in Determining the student's score for the scale. The attitude scales of seven instructors' classes were pulled at ranaom from the parent group. These scales were scored by the use of the mean and also by use of the median. The results showed that the mean score for the group was 11.685, and that the median score for the same group was 11.657. By inspection, these two measurements do not appear to be significantly different ( .0 31) . Procedures Used in Determining the Significance of Differences Between the Expressed Attitudes of Two Groups In comparing the attitudes towards Effective Living of one group ofstudentswith those of a second group tween themean scores for the groups of students,thedifference was computed. Inoroer be to deter­ mine the significance of this difference, it was first necessary to determine if the variances of the two groups could be considered e^ual. Depending upon whether the two variances coiild be considered e^uai or unequal, the appropriate t-test (two-tailed) was used. The equality of the variances was determined by the F-test which involved calculating the ratio of the larger variance to the smaller variance, and referring to an F table (22:62-5) with the appropriate degrees offreedom. In those comparisons where the F-test was not founa to be significant at the 5> level (that is, where the evidence indicated that the variances could oe considered e^ual), the t-test was made using the formula: t = __________________ \ P w T W V Nx / li, - 2 where Ti-^ = the M 2 = the = the Im 3 = the Sx 2= the S 23* the /i 4 i \ I Nx s j mean of one group mean of a second group number of students in the first group number of students in the second group variance of the first group variance of the second group In those comparisons where the F-test was significant at the 5% level (that is, where there was evidence that the variances of the two groups were not. e^ual) , a t—test involving no assumptions about the equality oT the variances was maae . This test was devisea by Cochran ano. Coxe ^l6s7U~i?) . lated separately. In this test the variance of* each mean is calcu­ A criterion-t is obtained by computing a weighted mean of* the two t—values lor the two samples, the weights being the two variances of the respective means. S The ratio m x -m 2 is then compared with the weighted t-value to judge the significance. If the observed-t was found to be greater than the criterion-t, the writer accepted the premise that the means of the two groups compared were significantly different at the 5% level. On the other hand, if the criterion-t was founa to be greater than the observed-t, the writer accepted the premise that the difference between the means was not significant. Evaluation Method Used for the Teacher Evaluation Sheet The Teacher evaluation Sheet was composed of seven questions con­ cerning a student's opinion of his instructor's ability as a teacher. Questions #1 and #6 pertained to an evaluation of a course more than an evaluation of an instructor and were not used in this investigation. The other five questions were each followed by a five-point -scale ranging from "A" (the most favorable position on the scale) to "E" (the least favorable position). The students had been asked to circle that letter following each question which best expressed their opinion of their instructors ability as a teacher. If tne students circles "A" the instructor was given five points; "B" was weighted, at four points'; "C", tiiree points; "D" , two points; and "M" , one point. The total points for the five questions consioereti the teacher's score from that parti­ cular student . Twenty-five was the most and five the least number of points which an instructor might receive from any single stuuent. The mean "teacher-evaluation" score was determinea by computing the mean score of all the "total scores" from all of that instructor's students. The mean evaluation score was compared to the mean attitude score by means of a rank correlation of all of the sixteen instructors. Summary of Chapter III The attitude scale constructed by the Boara of Examiners of Michigan State College was acministered to 1,579 Basic 151 stuuents during the Fall term, 1951- In the remainder of the study this group shall be referred to as the parent population or group. The entire parent popu­ lation was used when a comparison was made between the stuaents* attitude towards the course and their evaluation of their instructors ability as a teacher. In all other cases smaller samples were used. The largest of the smaller samples was 850 students selected from the parent group. The group referred to in the study as the "large sample group" was selectee on the basis of time and day of meeting corresponding to the large parent group. Care was taken to see that each of the sixteen instructors teaciiing Basic 151 was represented. A census data sheet was auministered to this group in order to gain information concerning their liome and family background, the student's U7 year in college, ana the student's college m a j o r . Tnis large sample group was used in the comparisons of male ana female student attitude towards Effective Living; freslunen attitude com}-.)are i with sophomores* , juniors1, ana seniors'; sLucent attituae towaras the course and. their term-snd grades; ana in comparing stuuent attituue towarus the course with their college majors. Two smaller samples were used in two other studies. Four sections taught by one instructor were used in the study of expressed attitudes toward the course when the students haa the attitude scale administered to them by their instructor and when they had the scale administered to them by another student in the class. The second small sample was com­ posed of students taken from the four sections taught b,y another in­ structor in studying the expressed arttituues towards the course when the students were asked to sign the scale and when they were askea not to sign their names to the attitude scale. Two small classes of and two large classes were used in thecomparison expressed attituaes of students towards Effective Living. These classes were taught by two different instructors, and the instructor variable could not be controlled in this instance. Because of the new system of scoring the ACE installed by the Counseling Center during the Fall term, 1951, it was necessary to limit the number of students compared in this area to the entering freshmen. In addition to the ACE scores furnished by the Counseling Center it was necessary to collect other information about the students. following instruments were used: Ihe (a) A Scale to Measure Attitude Toward Any College Course, Constructed by the Boar or Examiners, Michigan State College. (b) The Teacher Evaluation Shoot, Michigan State College. (c) A census data sheet constructed by tbe investigator. The Board of Examiners* attitude scale is a Thurstone-type scale of twenty-one statements. the least favorable . The statements range from the most favorable to The most favorable statement was given a weighted score of twenty—one and the least favorable, a score of one with the intervening statements receiving corresponding scores according to their favorableness. The "attitude score" of each student was determined by computing the mean of the weighted scores of the statements checker by the student. In determining whether one group of students was more favorable towards the course than another group of students the F-test was useo to determine if the variances of the two groups being compared could be considered e^ual or unequal. If the variances were not found to be significant, the t-test presented on page UU was employe a ’ . If, however, the variances were found to be significant at the %% level, the t—test devised by Cocliran and Coxe was used. On the Teacher Evaluation Sheet the student's score or evaluation of his instructor was determined by totaling the circles which he haa made. Each circle or letter had previously been given a weighted value from five to one (five for the most favorable and one for the least favorable) . In Chapter IV, which follows, a detailed report of the findings re­ sulting from the reliability and validity tests imposed on the Board*s attituae scale will be found. f C h A P T jcI c I V T H b COWSTituC TICIm A N D a N A L I B I B O F T h b This chapter is divided into tliree parts. AlTITUDo SCALE Part I c o a l s w i t h the work of the Michigan State College 8oara of Examiners in the development and construction of the attitude scale. Part II reports methods and findings of the writer in establishing the reliability of the attitucie scale. Part III reports the methods ana findings of the writer in establishing the validity of the scale. Part I. The Development and Construction of the Attituae Scale by the Michigan State College Board of Examiners Methoa Dsea in Collecting the Items During the Spring term of 19B0, the Board of Examiners of Michigan State College solicited the aia of the Effective Living department of the Basic College in the construction of a scale designed to measure student attitude toward a college course . It was proposed that the students taking the course should write statements concerning their attitude toward the course. Over four hundred students were asked to contribute two kinds of statements: Cl) A statement or two which represented their own opinion of Effective Living. (I.t was anticipated that they might be a little reluctant in giving strong statements, particularly, strongly worue^ unfavorable statementsj therefore they were asked to write a seconu statement). (2) The most favorable, and, also, the most unfavorable state­ ment which they had heard someone else make about the course . 50 O n examination, the tioa.ro fauna that the stuaents were not reluctant tc write strong statements about the course . Members of the Board of Examiners ana the staff members of the Effective Living department ware also askeu to contrioute statements which they felt might represent various student attitudes towards a college course. The students* statements anu those submitted by the Board and the departmental staff were then collected ana eaiteu by the Board. A final group of 121 statements was selected for final judging. During the Fall term of 1950, the judging took place. Selection of Items for the Attitude Scale Approximately one-huncired Basic College instructors were askea to judge the statements. 121 statements. A letter of instructions was sent along with the The statements were typed on individual slips ana the instructors were asked to do the following tilings: (1) Sort all statements into eleven different stacks ranging from a stack containing the most favorable comments about a course to a stack containing the most unfavorable com­ ments about a course. These stacks did not need to con­ tain e,4ual numbers of statements. (2) After completing the sorting, the instructors were asked to recora on the slips for each stack the number of the stack in which the slip appeared. For example, all slips which were placed in the stack least favorable to a course should be marked "number one". Slips placea in the most favorable stack were to be markeu "number eleven." Slips which appeared in the intervening stacks should be marked accordingly. (3) After all the slips had been markea, the instructors were askea to return them to the Board of Examiners. 51 In judging whether a stat.ament, was unt‘avorfti/is or favoraole, an ; whether or not it represented a good statement which migiro be used by all students aoout any course, the judges were asked to use the follow­ ing criteria* (1) Is the statement applicable to all basic courses? (2) Can a student respond to th:: statement if i,. has not taken the course? (3 ) Does the statement express an attitude — fact? not state a (U) Can the statement be placea on a scale of f c '/orability? 1 1/ (5) Is the st atement double-barreled or ambiguous? Co) Does the boara nave an adequate sample? (Does the group of statements cover the range of things which might be said about basic courses?) (7) Is there too much auplication of statements? (b) Will a beginning freshmen understand the meaning of the statements? The statements were then collected by the Board and an analysis was made on each item. It was decided that the technique of item selection suggested by Thurstone and Chave (37) would be used. It will be recalled from the review of this technique in Chapter II that this method suggests the estaolisloaent of a mean score for each item by totaling the positions in which it had been placea by the judges and dividing this total by the number of judges . By plotting the distribu­ tion on a chart, the ^uartile ranges were determined and the of each item was determined by subtracting ^3 from <4^. -value Those statements which had a low ^-value were considered as being good statements in that p;U r t OX tliO JUU continuum a: proxiraatuly 21 items on it, ranging from the most favoraul it or: througn a neutral point anu extenoing along the scale to the least .favorable item. -hstaolisiiment of the -uttituoa Scale The following Items were selecteu upon the oasis of .their low value ana their relative position on the seal: TASLii 11 ^-VALUSS OF ATTITUDE SC ALL ITHIS Sc ale hum o or of item 1 2 3 U 5 o 7 6 9 10 11 12 13 1U 13 is 17 18 19 20 21 •^.-Valu. 1 .53 1.53 0 .99 1 ,6b l .55 1.2 A i.ia 1.62 1.63 1.5 h 1.37 1.16 1.93 0 .56 1.55 l.Ac 0.53 1.39 1.68 1.19 1.32i 53 It may oe notea tnat the highest w-value used on the seal ..- is i.33 for item 1 3 j ana the lowest %- v '».1u j used was 0.33 for item 17. If a statement were ambiguous, the different judges wcul^ have places it over a wider range on the scale and the ■%—value woul respondingly higher. j have been cor­ If the statement were interpreted with reeard to the specific attitude variable rather consistently, ana if the state­ ment were concise and uniform in the meaning whicn it conveyed to juugos, then they would have placed it at approximately the same position on the scale, and the ^-value would then oe corresponaingly smaller. Part II of this chapter reports the methods used ana the ultimate findings in the establisliment of reliability for the attituae scale. Part I I . Measurement and Finaings on the Reliability of the Attitude Scale Linaquist (21s577) points out that when giving a test-retest of a measuring instrument the memory of previous responses is likely to be a factor in proportion as (a) t h e ,test is short, (b) the test items are aistinctive and memorable, and (c) the interval between testings is short. He did feel, however, that a second application of the same test at a later date, when the above mentioned short comings were not present, would proviae an adequate correlation of reliability. Two measurements were taken in the establishment of the reliability of the attitude scales (1) A test-retest of the attitude scale. (2) An item analysis of the statements in the scale. Test-ketest .... -for■■—heliaoility ■ V, The writer used 122 of his own stuaents ir. obtaining the correla­ tion between the test and retest. The scale was a.jninistersa for the Tirst "tiroe during ttis initial meeting of the class for the week. The number of items on the scale ana the two days which intervened between the initial testing and the suose-iuent testing tendeo to eliminate some of L i n g u i s t ' s objections to this method. The mean score of each student on his first test was matched with the mean score on the second test. By using the method suggested by KcNemar (25*9<) the product-moment correlation coefficient was founa to bo .62. Although this coefficient is not particularly high it aoes indicate that the scale is fairly reliable. Item Analysis The secona test was an analysis of the items on the scale by the use of the Flanagan "r" method.^- The Flanagan "r" table of correlations is set up on the basis of analysis of any multiple of 50 students. Flanagan suggests that the use of the upper 2 7$ ana the lower 27$ gives a more reliable measure than the usual upper 25$ and lower 25$. The writer selected 370 students at random from the parent group, the upper 27$ would then number one-hundred, a multiple of 5 0 , and the lower 27$ 1. "A Table of the Values of the Product Moment Coefficient of Correla­ tion in a Normal Bivariate Population Corresponding to Given Pro­ portions of Success,1' John C. Flanagan, 193b Manual of Procedures, (mimeo), Cooperative Study of Evaluation of the American Council on Education, Washington, D. C. (Feb. 1, 1951). 5i> would nurnoer one hundrea. The upper ^roup baa marks a the attitude scale most favorably, and an analysis was miue of the items which they hac checkc.j and comparsc with the item which the lower or more unfavorable group) ha a checked . By using Flanagan's table the following results ’were found: TABLE III ANaLl'StS OF IT UTS Item dumber 16 20 2 21 1 7 10 19 6 11 9 13 8 5 18 16 6 12 3 15 17 Number of Responses Upper Lower 21% 27^ lh 11 h2 90 66 3b 9U 56 60 15 61 22 1 Id o 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 1 6 b 0 8 b 81 k2 lh 85 36 55 27 38 35 26 33 10 23 Flanagan-r Coefficient /hb /hi /69 /83--~--/75 /66 /62 /55 o * -35 -35 ** -62 -65 -65 -60 -67 -65 -59 -57 Content Score 21 20 19 16 17 16 15 16 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 -60 -56 * Item #6, the zero or neutral item on the scale ■JH4- Item #9, the theoretical neutral item on the scale ■iHH* The most discriminating item 6 3 2 1 ,0 In this investigation the neutral item was found to oe y c . Although Item rf9 was intended to represent the neutral item, it cannot be said that in any item analysis tne neutral point woulu necessarily Tall at this place. If students were found to be favorable towards a course, the neutral point woulci oe expected tc appear above the theoreti­ cal neutral item ana if they were unfavorable towar is a course, it would be expected to fall below the neutral item. Rather than referring to the middle item as the neutral point, perhaps it would be better tc refer to it as the center of the neutral area. Table IV shows the percentage of students answering each of the 21 statements. The table represents the responses of the 370 student group used in the above analysis. In Table IV most of the students are shewn to have answered item fro most frequently, and items ^ 0 and #1^ the least number of times. Item #5 was checked by many students from both the favorable anu unfavorable groups. This maj indicate a fault which modern educators have overlooked tc some extent— the fact that stuaents are given too little time to absorb a great amount of material. Part III. Rstablisliing the Validity of the Attitude Scale Validity of a scale is determined by whether or not the scale measures that which it was designea to measure. Two tests of validity were usea in an effort to determine whether the attitude scale was really measuring student attitude toward a college course. f l TABLE IV PERCENTAGE OE STL DENT RESPONSES FOR EACH ITEh ON THE SCALE Item Number Content Score 16. 21 20 . 20 2. 21 . 19 16 1. 17 7. lo 10 . 13 19. lii b. 1L. 9. 13 12 11 13. 10 b. 9 5. 6 16. 7 16. 6. 13. 3. b 3 6 3 13. 2 17 . 1 Statement Percent A newering If I were limited to taking only one course in college, I woulu select this course as the o n e . It would be hard for anyone to devise a better course than this one. I am very enthusiastic about this course. This course makes a valuable contribution to a college education. This course is very beneficial to the majority of tne students who take it. Tiiis course does a good job in covering so much material so clearly. This is a good course for college stuaents to take One shoulc have no difficulty devoting atten­ tion to the class work in this course . Some parts of this course are very worth­ while . This course does a fair job. There are Detbet' courses tiian this ana there are worse courses. This course, no doubt, has some value for some people This course could be helpful if it were better organized. Not enough time is spent on each topic to get the full value of i t . The material in this course is net detailed enough. This course is too vague. This course does not help students much. Students learn very little in this course. The benefits to be gained from tliis course hardly justify its existence. I don*t see how anyone could ever like this course . This course should be thrown out of the curriculum. 7.5 5.3 21.3 67 .0 Uo.O 16 .0 51.0 31.0 60 .3 26.5 57.5 53.5 17.5 36.5 13.5 19.0 17.5 13.0 17.5 5.0 11.0 (1) Validation by moans of tiio interview technique. (2) Validation oy moans o±‘ comparisons of known groups. Validation by Means of the Interview Technique Ten students wirs felt tnat, ".affective Living was the best course which students coulu take," and ten students who, "would like to see the course thrown out of the curriculum," were interviewed. Precaution was taken that none of the students to be interviewsu were from the writer's classes. It was felt that students taught by the investigator woulo. be reluctant to respond exactly as they felt. Fifty papers, which represented students who had expresses a very favorable attituue toward Effective Living, were mixed together and every fifth paper was drawn from the group. These ten papers represented the ten high (favorable) students to be interviewed. Fifty more papers, representing those in the most unfavorable group, were also mixed together ana ten papers selected in a similar manner as the high group. dents represented the unfavorable group. These ton stu­ Twenty-minute interviews were then scheduled with the ten favorable and ten unfavorable students. The investigator was not concerned at this point with the students* responses in so far as they reflected their attitudes toward JEffective Living, but rather, whether or not the items checked by the students represented their attitudes toward the course. The investigator was also concerned with the mental processes which the students went through in arriving at the decisions they maae as to wliich items they wished to check on the attitude scale. b> Bloom ana B roc.or (p) lYi their re cent oook state that any person doing research on individual differences who uses tests and question­ naires of various kincs, ana who wishes to interpret the results with any uegree of accuracy, must investigate the nature of trie mental processes underlying the responses themselves. One of the lower items on the attituae seal: appeared to have a disproportionate amount of "favorable1' students checking it. was /fS which has been mentioned before in this chapter. This item This item stateu that, "Mot enough time is spent on each topic to get the full value from it." Also, some of the students checked items which were on the favorable enu of the scale ana then indicated that tire course should be thrown out of tiie curriculum. It therefore appeared necessary to interview these students to determine, if possible, the mental processes which they haa gone through in arriving at these decisions. Careful notes were taken during the interviews so that an accurate report could be mauo . In oruer to get the stuasnts to give their re­ sponses freely, the interviewer openeu the interview with a series of questions and statements which were intended to develop good rapport. An explanation was given concerning the purpose of the interview, and each student was assured that anything he might say about the course or his instructor would be held in the strictest confidence. It was anti­ cipated that some of the students woulu tend to give only those answers which they felt the interviewer wanted to hear. The results showed, however, that the students felt free to express their own opinions and did so willingly. From the notes taken by the writer, these are the findings which to bear upon the investigation* Cl) without exception, the students interviews 1 stated that the instructor played a very important part in determing their attitude towards the course. (2) The students felt that the items on the attitude scale were clear and that they had no difficulty understanding them. (3) Item #5 on the attitude scale stated that, “Not enough time was spent on each topic to get the full value of it.’* This statement appeared at the lower end of the scale and was intended to indicate an unfavorable attitude towards the course, Lhen asked what they meant when they checked this item, the favorable students replieu that while they liked the course, they felt that Effective Living was trying to teach too much in too short a time. They also thought that this was true of many of the other courses which they took. (Ij.) Six of the ten "unfavorable" students reported that they were sophomores and that they felt the course might be more beneficial for freslimen. They also stated that they would like to take more courses during their sophomore year which dealt directly with their college major. One of the sopho­ mores was a transfer student and had taken a course in psychology at another college. -She stated that this course merely repeated what she already knew. (3) One student who had marked the statement which read, "This course is very beneficial to the majority of students who take it, "had also, checked the statement which said, "This course should be tlirown out of the curriculum." ..'hen asked if this discrepency did not seem to show inconsistent think­ ing, he replied that while he liked the course very much, he planned to transfer to another university where he ex­ pected to enter medicine and that this course could not be transferred with credit. (6) Four students from the "unfavorable" group felt that more students would like the course if it were not "required." (Effective Living is an elective subject for some students, but some of the "upper schools" require their majors to take it.) (7) One student, in making his check marks on the attitude scale, misunderstood the directions and checked the scale according to the way he felt about a course in mathematics. (Upon investigation, it was found that 15 other students, or 0 ,9/0 of the 1,579 students in the study had checked their papers in accordance with their feelings about a course other than .offec five Living. These p^apers were set aside and not used in the study.) The investigator believes that the interviews did uncover some of the mental processes through wiiich the students had gone in making their selection of items to be checked on the attitude scale. The interview also pointed up some errors which were made which might be avoided in the future administration of the scale. The results seem to show that the instrument is valid in that the students felt that the scale did measure their attitude toward Effective Living. Validation by Comparison If a student by his of Known Groups actions indicates that he likes a course or dis­ likes a course and, when given an attitude scalewhich is intended to measure student attitude towards a course, marks the scale in accordance with his behavior, one may say that the instrument is valid. Those who have taught school are aware of the fact that some students seem to like their course and others do not. Students make remarks about a course and in many ways display their feelings towards it. The Effective Living staff was asked to hand in to the writer names of as many students as possible who had indicated in some way their attitude toward the course. They were asked to separate the names into two groups, those students who they felt were in favor of the course and those students who seemed to dislike the course. If the students who seemed to like the course had marked their attitude scale accordingly, then it could be said that o2 the instrument was valiu in that it measured what it was supposed to measure. The same was true of the unfavorable group. Nine of the sixteen instructors returned names of students who they felt had expressed themselves in favor of or opposed to Effective Living. TABLE V COMPARISON OF SCALE SCORES FOR GhOUPS KNOWN BY THE INSTRUCTORS TO BE FAVORABLE AND UNFAVORABLE TCWAAD EFFECTIVE LIVING Attitude of Students Towards the Course Number of Students Favorable U nf avo rable Mean 13.923 10.670 39 31 Diff S.D. 1.88 3.28 3.0^3 F-test* 3 .0i± (significant) t-test* U.56 (significant at the 5/® level) (form, p. U^) Table V reports a significant difference between the mean scores of the two groups at the 5>E level. Therefore, it can be said that the group which was considered by their instructors to be favorable towards Effective Living was significantly more favorable than the students who were reported as being unfavorable towards the course. On examination, none of the students who were reported as being favorable had a lower mean score than 9, and ranged upward from 9 to a mean score of 17. The "hunches" which the instructors had about the unfavorable group were not so accurate. The range for the unfavorable students was from a mean score of U to 16, which shows that some of the students who the instructors thought were unfavorable toward the course marked their papers more favorably than some of the so-called favorable students. '-'3 Summary of Chapter IV attempt has been made to give the history surrounding the con­ struction of the Michigan State College, Board of Examiners* Scale of attitudes toward college courses. The scale was developed at Kicliigan State College in 1950 with the aid of the Effective Living department. Several hundred statements were submitted by students enrolled in Effective Living. Other statements were written by the Effective Living staff and members of the Board of Examiners. edited by the Board. These statements were Approximately one-hundred Basic College staff members were asked to judge these statements. They were askea to place the statements into eleven piles ranging from the most favorable comment about a college course to the least favorable comment. These piles were marked and returned to the Board for further analysis. From the 121 statements which had been judged by the Basic College staff, twenty-one were finally selected because of their low ^-value ana arranged on an attitude scale. A test-retest of the attitude scale (N=122) showed a product-moment correlation coefficient of .82. An item analysis showed that the neutral point on the scale was established at item #9, which was on the favorable side of the theoretical neutral point. Two tests for validity were used. (l) Interviews with students who had taken the scale revealed that they understood the items and that the items checked by them represented their attitude toward Effective Living. Students whose mean scores were from both ends of the continuum were interviewed. (2) Instructors in the Effective Living department were asked to hand in to the writer the names of those students whom they considered to be favorable or unfavorable toward the course. The results showed a significant difference between the mean scores of the two groups, which would indicate that there was some correlation between the behavior of the students and the way they marked their attitude test. The results also showed that instructors were more skillful in selecting the favor­ able students than they were in selecting the unfavorable ones. Chapter V, which follows, is the first of five chapters which report the results of this investigation into the factors which seem to affect a student's attitude towards a college course.Chapter V deals with the students' home and family background and its students* attitude toward Effective Living. effect.on the I ' p,. T , 1 Zjix. *T V CHAPTER V THE EFFECT OF STUDENT BACKGROUNDS ON THEIR ATTITUDE TOW Aid) EFFECTIVE LIVING For many years educators have been studying the effect of the family upon the behavior of the child. Peterson (29) found that the correlations obtained between parents' and children's attitudes were all positive and indicated that children's attitudes are much like those of their parents. Smith (35**93), in his study of high school seniors in California, reports: There is little evidence in the present study to indicate that social studies instruction in our schools is succeeding in developing in our high-school seniors attitudes and intelligent opinions toward issues basic to citizenship and social bettei— ment beyond those which the seniors share with their parents as a group. The implication seems clear that if the schools are to promote and develop social attitudes in harmony with those held by persons best informed on social questions, cognizance must be taken of parental attitudes. There is strongly indicated a need for the development of coordinated classes for parents and their children to study and discuss public affairs under the guidance of the schools in order that there may eventuate intelligent opinions and unbiased attitudes toward significant social problems. In the present study three aspects of the student's background were studied* (1) The size of his home community; (2) the educational achievement of the student's father; and (3) the father's occupation. The Size of the Home Community Factor The sample used in this study consisted of those students who had filled out the census data sheet and composed the membersliip of the large sample group referred to in Chapter III. hypothesis jf1 states that sLuaents coming from rural and rural r.on-fann families would express similar attitudes toward inflective Liv­ ing as students comin-; from cities of ICO ,000 population and over. The rural and rural non-Pam* group was conpusei. of students who came to college from farms or communities of 2,500 population or less. An analysis of the group showed that there were li?', or 17.5a> of the students, who came from rural ana rural non-farm homes, and 2 32 , or 2 7 .2/t came from cities of 100,000 population and over, most of them from the Detroit, Michigan area. TABLF V I AnLATIQ N SH I P OF S I Z n OF STUDENTS' HOME COMMUNITIES TO ATTITUDES TOhAKD MFFLCTIVn L IV IN G Size of Home Community Aural and Aural Non-farm Cities of 100,000 Population and Over F-tests t-test: Number of Students Mean 119 IE.107 2.65 232 11.810 2 .81 S.D. Diff. .2^7 1.12 (not significant)' .93h (not significant) (formula,-p. hh) From the evidence found here it can be said that the rural and rural non-farm students, and students coming from communities of 100,000 population and over express similar attitudes toward Effective Living. Fathers1 Educational Acliievements Factor The sample used here was the same as used in the previous s t u d y on home communities. The fathers of the students were grouped in three 67 categories, of which only two were studied. The first group was com­ posed of those fathers who hai attended college and had completed their sophomore year. The second group was made up of those fathers who ha ■ dropped out of school prior to the eleventh grade. The thir group, which was not studied, was those fathers whose educational attainment was between the first two groups. It was found that of the total group in the study, 252, or 29.2,o, of the students bad fathers who had com­ pleted the fourteenth grade or more, and 221, or 25.7y of the group, hah fathers who had dropped out of school prior to the eleventh grade. Hypothesis #2 was, "students whose fathers have completed at least two years of college work express similar attitudes towards Effective Living as those students whose fathers dropp>ed out of school prior to the eleventh grade." It was not known "whether the fathers who ban attended college would have any affect on the students' attitude towards the course. Nor was it known whether the influence of the fathers' education had caused the students to be more or less favorable toward certain college courses, particularly- courses in the field of general education, like Effective Living, which are relatively new. TABLE VII STUDENT ATTITUDE TOWARD EFFECTIVE LIVING CQMFAKED WITH THEIR FATHERS' EDUCATIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS Fathers' Educational Achievements llpth. Grade and Over Less Than the 11th. Grade Number of Students Mean S.D. 252 221 12.202 11.877 2.19 2 .78 Diff. * w v w v • t-test: • o /j . \ •-'J- .3^ ^ .J+U (not significant) (Cochran-Coxe formula, p. Wi) o6 The evidence presented here indicates that the educational achievement of the students* fathers aoes not affect the students' attitudes toward .Effective Living. Fathers* Occupation Factor The same sample as used in the previous two studies was used in this investigation. From the census sheet filled out by the students, information concerning fathers* occupation was collected. The students were then divided into two groups; (l) those whose fathers were engaged in professional, serai-professional, managerial and official, and those who owned their own businesses (other than farming); (2) those whose fathers were engaged in skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled occupations. These classifications were determined with the use of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles.^ The professional, etc. group is referred to as "Group #1", and the skilled, etc. group is referred to as "Group ff2." Hypothesis #3 was that, "students whose fathers are engaged in professional, semi-professional, managerial and official work, or who own their own businesses (other than farming) express similar attitudes toward Effective Living as do students whose fathers earn their living in the skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled trades." It was found that there were 270 students or 31.h% of the group studied, whose fathers were in Group #1, and 138 students, or I6.0;b, whose fathers were in Group #2. 1. Dictionary of Occupational Titles, Part II, Titles and Codes. United States Government Printing Office, Washington, D. C. June, 1939. 330 p. i TABLE VIII A COMPARISON OF STUDENT ATTITUDE TOAA r DS EFFECTIVE LIVING wITH TH r Ir FATHE r S* OCCUPATION Occupation of the Father Group if1 , Professional, etc. Group jf2., Skilled, etc. F-test: t-tests Number of Students 270 138 Mean S.D. 12 .lip 11.14 85 2 .to 2 .66 Diff. .630 1.16 (not significant) 2.17 (significant at the Si* level) The evidence presented here shows that students whose fathers are engaged in professional, semi-professional, official and managerial occupations or who own their own businesses other than agriculture are more favorable toward the Effective Living course than are students whose fathers are engaged in the skilled, semiskilled, and unskilled trades . Hypothesis #3 had stated that there would be no difference between the attitudes of Group /fl and Group #2. Upon examination, however, it was found that there is a significant difference between the means of the two groups. The question then arises, why does the fathers* occupa­ tion affect the attitude of their children towards the Effective Living course? Possible answers to the question which seem to point toward some probable reasons2 (l) The nature of the occupations in Group tfl. Men engaged in these vocations need to develop skill in **person to person** relationships. They recognize the value of good human re­ lationships . They may have imparted this understanding for the need of this skill to their children, who in turn recognize the nature of the course and feel that it is a necessary part of their college education. 70 (2) Business men recognize the need of "goodwill" if they ex­ pect to remain long in business. Goodwill is developed by an adequate understanding of personal problems ano an ability to get along with other people. The first term of this course, which the students in this study were taking when they checked the attitude scale, deals pri­ marily with self understanding and psychological adjust­ ment to one *s environment. Group if2 may have been motivated to answer the attitude scale tlie way they did because of the following reasons: Cl) It is recognized that good personal relations within this group are essential. However, the primary drive is one of economic and social e4uality with the upper economic and social groups. This is also true to a certain extent with Group but the difference lies in the fact that theirs is one of maintaining social and economic prestige wliile in Group if2 it is one of attainment. This drive for ad­ vancement, socially and economically, may be the cause for so many of our stuaents wanting to get their degrees in a hurry and get out of college and get a job where they "can earn some money." Students who feel that way about a college education would be less favorable towards a course such as Effective Living. (2) Students who are in college to develop a skill which they can sell to some future employer frequently can not see the need for a course in human relations. If Group jf2 is from such a group of students, then this may explain their attitude toward Effective Living. Such attitudes may be the result of their home environment wliich is directly re­ lated to their fathers* occupations. The above four statements are assumptions and are valid only as they represent the subjective observations of the writer. Summary of Chapter V Many educators have recognized the influence of the home on the child. This writer lias attempted to isolate tliree factors of the home life of the student and has attempted to analyze their influence on the student's attitude towards affective Living. 71 The first, factor analyzed was that of the size of the home com­ munity. It was found that students who life on farms and rural non- farm communities have about the same attitude towaros Effective Living as do students who corue from citi.es of 100,000 population and over. .hile the size of the high school from which they graduated was not included in the investigation, it might be assumed that there would be a positive correlation between the size of the high school and the size of the community. It might be further assumed that the larger the high school the greater variety of course offered. The greater the number of courses offered, the greater the possibility that a course similar to Effective Living might have been available to the students. And, finally*, it might be assumed that students who hao taken a course in human relations in high school might oe more favorable towards a similar course in college. The results of this study, however, did not show any significant difference between the attitudes of the two groups. The second factor concerning the home life of the student had to do with the educational achievement of the students* fathers. Two groups of students were compared. First, those students whose fathers had attended college and had completed the sophomore year or more, and secondly, those students whose fathers had dropped out of school prior to the eleventh grade. A comparison of mean-attitude scores of these two groups did not show any significant difference. The mean score for the college group was somewhat higher but not significantly s o . It might be assumed that students whose fathers had attended college might have had some influence at home which might cause them to be more favor­ able toward college courses than those students whose fathers had left 72 their formal education prior to college. This did not seem to be the case as far as effective Living was concerned. The third factor concerning the home life of the student had to do with the father's occupation. Here again, two groups were compared. The first group was composed of those students whose fathers were in professional, semi-professional, and managerial and official work, or who owned their own businesses other than farming. The second group was composed of students whose fathers were engaged in skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled occupations. A comparison of the mean-attitude scores of the two groups revealed that the professional, etc. group were signifi­ cantly more favorable towards Effective Living than was the skilled, etc. group. The mean scores were significantly different at the 5/^ In the writers opinion, some of the possible reasons, for this difference might be summed up as follows: (1) The nature of the work done by the professional, etc. group in which their work deals with people. Effective Living deals with human relations. The fathers might have imparted this need for better understanding of human behavior. (2) The professional group, generally speaking, have social and economic prestige and security. The laboring group wishes to attain social and economic prestige and security. The difference may lie between the maintenance and attainment of such prestige and security. (3) Students whose fathers are in the skilled, etc. group might be motivated to get an education by the material gains which they may receive from it. Students taking Effective Living sometimes have difficulty seeing any relationship between human relations and making a living. I 73 C h a pt er VI, which follows, deals with the different tecimi^uGs of scale a d m i n i s t r a t i o n . The purpose of this investigation was to see if there were any differences in the results w h e n the scale was administerin different wa^y s . J.1 vl CHAPTER VI A DM IhiIGT nATIVu FACTORS HHICH MIGHT EFFECT STL DDK T ATTITUDE Three home—environment factors have been discussed in the previous chapter. This chapter presents two new factors for analysis. factors deal with the administration of the attitude scale. ing two administrative factors are studied: These new The follow­ (1) the person who is in charge of the administration of the scale to the class; ana (2) whether the student signs the attitude scale or not. The Effect .hich the Person in Charge of the Administration of the Scale Has Upon the Results Two questions need to be answered: C D Does the instructor affect the students* expressed attitude towards a course If lie administers the scale to his own students? (2) /ill students tend to express a less favorable attitude toward a course if the attitude scale is administered by one of their own group? Hypothesis (#1, #2, and #3 were in Chapter V) stated that "Students who have the attitude scale administered to them by tlieir own instructor will express similar attitudes toward the course as those students who have the scale administered to them by one of the students in their classj* It was felt that the influence which an instructor might have over his students might be reflected in their responses, but that this influence would not be a significant one. The classes "taught b;r Instructor - C were chosen Tor this s t u ^ . i>n attempt, was ma-.e to eliminate two variables; first, the instructor variable; and second, the time and day variable. The first variable, that of the instructor, was eliminated by using only those classes taught by one instructor. It was assumed that each of his classes would show the same favorableness towards the course if the scale were ad­ ministered in the same way. tered by Instructor - C however, two classes had the scale adminis­ and the other two classes had the scale administered by one of the students in the class. The time-day variable was eliminated by using classes which met at different times and on different days. Students meeting at eight o'clock in the morning might not be as favorable towards a course as those meeting at ten o'clock; and students meeting on Monday morning, after a "hard week-end" might not be as favorable towards a course as students meeting on Wednesday. Class #1 met on Monday and Wednesday from ten to twelve and had the scale administered to them by one of the students in the class. Class #2 met on Tuesday and Thursday fron four to six and had the scale administered to them by Instructor - C . Class #3 met on Tuesday and Thursday from two to four and had the scale administered to them by one of the students in the class. Class met on Wednesday and Friday from two to four and had the scale administered to them by Instructor - C . The mean scores of classes #1 and #3 were combined and a total mean score for the group was determined. This represented the group which had had the scale administered to them by a student. Classes #2 and were combined and their aggregate mean score represented the attitude of the total group which hah had the scale administered to them by Instructor — c * TABLE IX EFFECT on attitude Number of Students Administerec By Instructor - C Student in the Class F-test» t-test: BY FEB.SON AHilNIST EKING ITIiii SCALE Mean 12 .602 11.971 68 70 S.D. 2.27 1.59 Biff. .631 2.03 (significant) ~ 1.872 (not significant) (Cochran-Coxe formula) From the evicence presented here it can be said that in this case there was no significant difference expressed by the students when they had the scale administered to them by their instructor or when they had it administered to them by one of the students in the class. E ffect of Signing Ones Lame to the Attitude Scale The question of whether a student will tend to be more honest and less favorable if his identity is not known, was the next factor to be studied. Murphy, Murphy, and Newcomb (27) pointed out in their book that, if in answering an attitude scale, the identity of the subject is hidden, the investigator might expect a freer and more complete expression of attitudes. They were speaking, however, of attitudes towards sex, religion, war, etc. also true of The writer wanted to determine whether this was the expression of attitude towards a course. The following hypothesis was drawn up* Hypothesis «**5, "Students who sign their names to the attitude scale will express similar attitudes 77 toward Effective Living as do those students who are asked not to sign their names." Again, it was necessary to eliminate the instructor and time-day variables. The classes of Instructor "D" were chosen. It was decided that in two of the classes the students were to follow the directions and sign their names to the scale. In the other two classes the students were instructed to ignore the line which said "name" and to leave it blank. A red line had already been drawn through tliis blank. In order to eliminate the time-day variable as much as possible, the following four classes were used: Class #1 which met on Monday and Wednesday from ten to twelve o ’clock, class #2 which met on Tuesday and Thursday from four to six in the afternoon, class #3 met on Tuesday and Thursday from two to four, and class #U met on Wednesday and Friday from two to four. Classes #1 and #3 were asked to sign their names to the attitude scale in the usual manner, while classes #2 and fflx were asked not to sign their names. The mean scores of classes #1 and //3 were combined and represented the attitude of the "signed" group, while the combined mean scores of classes #2 and #U represented the attitude of the "unsigned" group. The evidence presented in Table X shows that students who signed their names to the attitude scale express a more favorable attitude towards the course than did students who did not sign their names. 75 TABLE X EFFECT OF SIGNING AND NOT SIGNING THc. ATTITUDE SCALE Number of Students Students VJho Signed Their Names Did Not Sign Their Names F-test: t-test: 72 O he an S.D. 12 .111 9 ,6Ul 2.57 3.U9 2.270 Diff . l.U£ (significant) I4..02I4 (Significant at the 5A level) (Cochran-Coxe formula) Summary of Chapter VI Two factors affecting students attitude toward Effective Living were studied in this chapter. In summarizing the results of these two studies, the following was founds (1 ) Attitude scales administered by the instructor to his class showed the same degree of favorableness towards a course as did those scales which had been administered by a student from the class. (2) Students who signed their names to the attitude scale expressed a more favorable attitude toward the course than did those students who were asked not to sign their names to the scale. Chapter VII, which follows, deals with four new factors which might affect a student's attitude towards a course. They are: (l) the student's year in school; (2) his attitude toward his instructor; (3) the size of his class; and (!+) male and female factor. '! i CH^pTErt VII INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING STUDENT ATI ITU Do The Effective Living Department has Tor sev ral terns been inter­ ested in the"sectioning" of students. Freshmen-only sections, married- only sections, small sections, and large sections have been formed and studied. The department has made an earnest effort to find out more about its students. hrhy do some students learn more than other students Is it because they have more learning ability? who like a course, learn more in that course? Could it be that student -«hat are some of the factors which seem to affect a student*s attitude towards a course? Four factors are studied in this chapter. The factors ares (l) a stu­ dent's year in college; (2) the instructor whom the student has; (3) the size of the class of which he is a member; and (U) the sex of the student. The Year In College Factcr Hypothesis #6 stated, MStudents express similar attitudes toward the Effective Living course regardless of their year in college." The sample used in studying the year-in-college factor was the en­ tire large sample group used in Chapter V. It was composed of U96 freshmen and 35h sophomore, junior, and senior students taking the first term of Effective Living. Information concerning the student's year in college was taken from the Census Data Sheet wliich they had filled out 80 at. the time they hae taken the attitude scale . In order to fine out whether any marked differences existed between students in certain years in college, it was decided to compare the attitude of the fresiimen group against the attitude of the others. TABLE XI A COMPARISON OF FR&SHMdN STUDENT ATTITUDE TCWiihD EFFECTIVE LIVING ..ITH THE ATTITUDE OF SOPHCMOrtES, JUNIORS, AND SENIORS Year in College Number of Students Freslmen Sophomore s , Juniors Seniors F-testx t-test: Mean S.D. U9L 11.69 h 2.97 3 5k 12 .230 2.10 Diff. .£36 1.23 (significant) 2.913 (significant at t)ie 5>& level) (Cochran-Coxe formula) The evidence presented above indicates that the sophomores, juniors, anc. seniors expressed a more favorable attituae towards the Effective Living course than did the freshmen. If repeated experiments should show this to be true, then the course might well become a course offered in the last three years of college rather than being offered to first< term freslimen. There might be some reasons for students who have been in college for more than one year being more favorable toward the course than first-year students. Effective Living. course. Few high schools offer courses similar to Most people would not consider it as a *'traditional" Because it is new and different from what students have ex­ perienced in high school, they may feel reluctant to accept the course. On the other hand, students who have been in college for more than one 81 year would possibly have hao some ""traditional11 courses, such as, sociology, psychology, pliilo sophy , and economics which would give them a better understanding of human relations and thus lead the way toward a more favoraole attitude toward Effective Living. Thus for them Effective Living might be an integrative course in which they may have an opportunity to relate their knowledge and information gained from the various more academic courses. These are, of course, only assump­ tions and need further evidence and investigation. The Instructor Factor .ttemmers and Drucker (31) found that there was a tendency for student to rate their instructors a little higher than alumni do. However, they found a positive correlation between the student and alumni ratings. This would indicate that the impressions which students have about their instructors are lasting ana change very little tlirough the years. Castore (8) found some remarkable differences between instructors in the way they taught and student reaction to their teaching. Michael and Herrold (2b), on the other hand, found that there was no correlation be­ tween scholastic averages and student attitude toward their instructor. This part of the study has to do with a comparison of the attitude which students have toward the course and its relationship to their attitude toward their instructor. The question arises, do students have a more favorable attitude towards a course if they like their instructor and believe him to be an excellent teacher? Student attitude toward their instructor was rneasureu with the aid oi‘ ti.e 'i'eacher Evaluation Sheet whicn xias oeen used lor many years at i-'iichigan State Ccliche . Consultation witn those who had the responsibility Tor its construction indicated that they were not completely satisfied, with the instrument, out that it had done an adequate joo of teacher evaluation. -an examination of the Sheet revealed that items #1 and y t> were evaluating a course rather than an instructor. These items were not used in this study. The remaining five questions were used in evaluating the student's attitude towards his instructor. These are: Cl) Does the instructor*s presentation of subject matter enhance learning? (2) Is instructor's speech effective? (3) How well doesthe instructor work with students? CTj) Does the instructor stimulate independent thinking? C5) How does this instructor rank with others you have had? The students were asked to check each item or question along a five-point scale. "A" on the scale indicated "superior" while "E" at the other end of the continuum signified "inferior." In oruer to evaluate the student responses and arrive at a total score for each student, a weighted value was arbitrarily assigned to each letter on the scale, as follows: "A" "B" *C" ■D" "E" was was was was was givena givena givena givena givena value value value value value of of of of of 5 ^ 3 2 I If a student rated his instructor as "25" it would indicate that he haa circlea all of the questions at "A" ana consiaereu his instructor1 as being "superior.*' If the student haa rated his instructor as " i y it indicated that he had circlea the "C" on all of the questions, or their equivalent, and considerec his instructor as being average. the student had given his instructor a " y his instructor was inferior. If rating he had indicated that Twenty-five were the most points and five were the least points a student could give as his rating of his in­ structor . The Teacher Evaluation Sheet was administered to the students along with the attitude scale. They were asked to circle the letters which represented their opinions of their instructor as to his ability as a teacher. The "scale" and "sheet" were handed in at the same time Hypothesis ftl stated that "Students of one instructor have the same or similar attitudes toward the Effective Living course as do students of any other instructor." In other words, it was assumed that the instructor variant was not significant. The sample used in this part of the study was the parent group of 1,579 students. instructors. This group of students was taught by sixteen different These instructors were rated by their students on the Teacher Evaluation Sheet. 1. If this study were to be made again, it would seem advisable for the two instruments to be administered separately in order that the students would not in any way relate the two. There is a possibility that administrating them at the same time may influence the results in such a way that there might result a more positive correlation between the results. -H creak—down ci the number of classes taught by these sixteen instructors showed: (1) One instructor taught only one class. (.2) Six instructors taught two classes. (3) One instructor taught tiiree classes . (U) .bight instructors taught four classes . Three of the instructors were teaching the material for the first time and might be classified as part-time teachers. structors was a memDer of the Board of Examiners. also taught in one of the upper schools. One of the in­ One of the instructors The rest of the instructors (ll) were full-time teachers and haa been over most of the material at least once before . The purpose of this analysis is to show some of the back­ ground differences of the group in case any student attitude differences might be attributable to this lack of experience. Also, those instructors who were teaching a small number of students might receive a biased rating due to the size of their sample. The attitude scale and the teacher evaluation sheet were scored and sorted into instructor piles . Table XII reveals that none of the students considered the course ' to be perfect. Five students rated the course Ml6M out of a possible "21" points, wliile at the other end of the continuum, ttiree students rated the course as ,,3,, or very unfavorable. Since the scale has not been administered on any other course, it is not known how favorable "IS’* would be or how unfavorable ny % would be. The mean score for the entire group was found to be 12 .070 . Theoretically, the neutral point on the scale was at. "11" . This might, indicate that, the students expressed a somewhat favoraole attitude towards effective Living, Further study, however, seems to be indicated in order to determine the true neutral point. Instructor 0 received the lowest mean score (10.650). teacher was one of the "part-time" group. This The highest score (13.03b) was received by one of the "full-time" instructors who has been teach­ ing for a number of years and has been associated with Effective Living for about five years. Table XIII reports the findings on the Teaching Evaluation Sheet. The superior teacher was rated "23" by the student and the inferior teacher was rated "5" . Forty-four students considered their instructor to be superior. The lowest rating for any of the teachers was "7" given by one student. One of the criticisms offered against the use of the Sheet as a measuring instrument was that there has been a tendency on the part of the students to rate their instructors too high. cally, the average teacher would be given a rating of "15". Theoreti­ Actually, the lowest rating, which,incidently, was given to Instructor "0", who was the lowest on the attitude scale, was 15.3. This would seem to indicate that all of the instructors were above average as rated by their students on tliis evaluation sheet. This "up-rating" of instructors tends to defeat the purpose of teacher evaluation instruments. As previously mentioned, Instructor — 0 had the lowest rating. Instructor-#, who ranked first on the attitude scale, ranked third on the teacher evaluation. Instructoi— L, another full-time instructor STUDENT nATBIG Of COlnSB, Favorable Raw Score: 21 Instructor-A f B f C f D f £ f F f G 20 19 l£' 15 lli Neutral 13 12 11 1 C 20 25 17 9 2 6 7 10 17 1 f_____________ 2 16 Bl INSTKlCTOnS Infavorable 4 5 3 10 9 b 6 13 10 12 0 5 10 5 5 0 . 9 1 l 1 1 10 22 17 23 12 19 12 11 5 1 2 3 7 9 16 16 15 11 13 16 2 9 10 1 5 6 3 5 3 J0 1 5 1 li 6 7 11 6 5 3 5 k 3 6 1C 22 22 23 21 12 9 2 3’ 19 21 19 hean*11.930 1 11.090 12.230 10 .970 3 11.761 2 3 1 5 C k 1_______________ 12.22/ 2 1 1 1 13.03c. h 3 o ______________ 11.923 11.550 H f 1 t 13 10 13 12 II 10 L h t 7 3 3 1 1 1 ____________ 11.92c i 3 3 1 2 1 I f ______________ 1 L 12 1 5 3 3 2 11 2 2 7 3 3 19 10 17 15 23 lu 12 1 1 1 10 7 7 0 10 17 12 15 lo 11 9 10 6 11 11 13 11 13 1 1 1 3 1 1 1 2 2 2 u 1 13 6 ii lii 11 12 11 23 lo lo 11 0 3 1 5 3 6 15 22 20 11 10 Ju 2 J7 2 7 11 13 r . 11 G r 9 5 3 r 3 1 ' 2 3 10 12 c 7i 1 7 11 12 11 10 11 $ 1 j 5 1 7 11 10 11 19. ) 20.2 1 1 3 /■a c 21.2 1 1 19 .3 21.0 s ' u 1 j 1 i C 9 ? u 6 1 > 2 "I X * nean of the Total Staff - 19.0 Ay 1 7 t. 2 2 15.3 19.7 ranked first (21.l) on the teacher evaluation. The mea n score for the entire staff was found to oe 19 .0h9, or just aoove tne "b" on the continuum. Table XIV presents a composite tabulation of the mean scores on both the attitude scale and the evaluation sheet oy instructor. lists the distribution of the 1,579 students oy instructor. It also It was found that the mean score on the attitude scale was 12.070 for the en­ tire group, a fact which indicated a trend toward the favo r a d e end of the scale away from the theoretical neutral point (11.000). The mean score on the teacher evaluation has been discussed in the previous para­ graph . Each instructor is rankeo with the other instructors in Table XV. Instructor-b who ranked lJ-jtb . in both the Instructor and course ratings, was a part-time teacher. Instructor-F who ranked 13th. in the instructor ratings and 12th. in the course ratings was also a part-time instructor. The average or mean rank for the part-time instructors on the attitude scale was found to be 11.0, while the mean rank for the full-time in­ structors was 7.h. The mean rank for the part-time instructors on the teacher evaluation was 13.0 and the mean rank for the full-time in­ structors on the same test was 6.3. These results seem to indicate that the students in the full-time instructors* classes expressed a more favorable attitude towards Effective Living than students in the parttime instructors* classes. It was also found that the students rated the part-time instructors lower than the full-time instructors on the teacher evaluation. The lone exception was found in the case of 1 TAdLE XIV COMPARISON FOA EACH IN STAUCTOa OF TH il SCOA e S OF THEIR STUDENTS ON THE ATT ITU On, SCALE WITH THEIR kEAN SCO AES ON THE TEACHER EVALUATION SHEET Number of Students Instructor _____________ hean of Course Attitude moan of Teacher Evaluation 4 A 130 11.930 19.6 B 66 11.090 16.7 C 139 12.230 17.6 D 135 10.970 17 .U E 3h 11.76U lo.O F 60 11.550 16.6 G 136 12.227 20.3 H 103 13.036 20 .U I Qh 11.523 18.6 J 56 11.928 19.7 K 91 12.U39 20.2 7h 1 2 ,55k 21.2 M 50 I2 .8I4O 19.5 N 188 1 2 .3U5 21 .0 0 72 10.680 15.3 P 139 12.60U 19.7 Total 1579 Ave. Mean 12.070 L ‘ Avejlean 19.01*9 90 TABLE XV ixAi\iK COidiELATlUN B e TEb b H THE STUDENTS* ATTITUDE TOUAxD EFFECTIVE LIVING ,-ND Tiix^I-i H a TING OF THElE INSTEUCTQE3 __________Student Ea t ing Ins true tor________________Ins true tor A* ____ Course fc 9 a ih ih C* 11 7 D* 12 1> E IB 11 F 13 12 G*- Li 3 H* 3 1 I* 10 13 J* 7 lO K* 5 5 L* 1 M 9 2 N* 2 6 16 16 6 3 O P* Correlation between Ranks - Rho = .76 -a- Full-time instructors Instructor—Hi. This part-time instructor was ranked 9th. on the teacher evaluation and liis students were second highest on the attitude— toward— the—course scale. hsing the method suggested by Lindquist (21s2L7) and mcNemar (2Ls9?) a rank correlation coefficient of .76 was found. This indicates that there exists a positive correlation between a student’s attitude towards the course and his evaluation of his instructor as a teacher. In other words, if a student likes the way his instructor conducts the class and has respect for his anility, he is inclineo to be considerably more favorable toward the course. It is impossible to say which comes first, the favorability towards the course or the favorable attitude towaras the instructor. The Class Size Factor Bee (3) believed that a course in home and family living should be conducted in small classes. He stated that small classes provide stu­ dents with greater opportunity for more reflective and integrative classroom experiences, he also felt that the lecture method of present­ ing the material was of little value when compared with the discussion method. The Effective Living department has conducted classes in both large and small groups. ^ study of class size was conducted in 1950-51, but the results of tiiis study are not yet available. The Effective Living building has one room which will seat about ninety students and large classes are held in this room each term. in this study. Two of these classes are used The building also has a room equipped with a large round 92 table wliich seats approximately eighteen students. During the fall term of 1931, there were only two of these classes in 131. were also used in this study. These two classes It was not possible to eliminate the instructor variable since no one instructor taught both the large and the small classes and this limitation to the study should be recognized here . Hypothesis fro stated, "Students in large formal classes and students in small student-centered classes express similar attitudes toward Effective Living." The more formal lecture method was used in the two large sections and the class discussion method was used in the two smaller classes . TABLE XVI ATTITUDES OF STUDENTS IN LARGE AND SMALL SECTIONS TOWARD EFFECTIVE LIVING Size of Class Number of Students Mean S.D. Small Large 32 107 13.612 11.850 5.2U U .12 F —test* t—test: Diff. 1.962 1.32 (not significant) 2 ,U8 (significant at the 1% level) The evidence presented above shows that students in small classes expressed a more favorable attitude towards Effective Living than did the students in the large sections. A n examination of the attitudes of students in other sections taught by these two instructors showed that there was no significant difference between the instructors (12.^39 for the instructor of the 93 large sections and 1 2 .3U5 for the instructor of the small sections) The Male—Female F a ctor Hypothesis #9 stated that, "Male and female students express similar attitudes toward the effective Living course." During the second term of the course, the subject matter deals mainly with courtship, dating, marriage, and marital problems. «3ome members of the Effective Living staff have suggested that homogenious sectioning of students, such as all male classes and all female classes, might be advisable. This has never been done. However, there may' ae arguments both for and against this suggestion. The problem involved here,however, was do male and female students hold similar attitudes towards the course? The 850 student sample group of Chapter V was used in tliis experi­ ment. It was found from information gained from the Census Data Sheet that there were li7b male students and 37L female students in the group. The mean scores of the two groups were then compared. TABLE XVII COMPARISON OF 1'iALE AND F jiMALE ATTITUDES TOWARD EFFECTIVE LIVING Number of Students Sex of Students L76 37L Male Female F-test: t-testi 1.06 1.2$ Mean 11.735 12.105 Diff . (not significant) (not significant) S.D. 2 .61 2.79 .35>0 The evidence presented here indicates that the male and female students expressed similar attitudes toward the Effective Living course. 9h Summary of Chapter VII 1 iiis chapter was concerned with those factors affecting a student*s attitude toward the course which could be controlled by sectioning or section change and were referred to as “instructional factors." The writer selected four factors and formulated hypotheses for each. Hypothesis #6: "Students express similar attitudes towards the Effective Living course regardless of their year in c o l l e g e T h e fresh­ men students were compared with students w£u> had been in college one or more years. It was discovered that the sophomores, juniors, and seniors we re more favorable towards the course than were the freshmen students. Hypothesis /f’J: "Students of one instructor express similar atti­ tudes towards effective Living as do students of any other instructor." The Teacher Evaluation Sheet used at Michigan State College was the instrument employed to measure student rating of the instructors . Arbitrary values were placed on the different points of the evaluation sheet. A n instructor who received "25" points was considered to be superior and one who received "5" points was considered inferior. tfl and Items on the evaluation sheet were omitted from the tabulation because they were an evaluation of the course rather than of the instructor. The entire 151 group Cl>579) was used in the sample. Sixteen part-time and full-time instructors were rated by their students. A n analysis of the results showed: Cl) None of the students thought the course was perfect. Out of a possible twenty-one points, the highest rating of the course was eighteen by five students. (2) The iiighest rating of the course was given oy students in classes conducted by an experienced, full-time instructor. (3) The lowest rating of the course was given oy students of an inexperienced, part-time instructor. U) The instructor receiving the highest rating as a teacher was an experienced, full-time instructor. (5) The lowest rating received was by an inexperienced, parttime instructor. (6) There was a rank correlation of .76 between the students1 expressed attitude toward the course and their opinion of their instructors* ability as a person and as a teacher. Hypothesis #8: "Students in large formal classes express similar attitudes toward Effective Living as do students in sr/iall student-centered classes." Two small classes of sixteen students each were compared with two large lecture classes of aoout students each. An analysis of the results showed that the students in the small discussion groups ex­ pressed a more favorable attitude toward the course than did the students in the large lecture classes. Hypothesis #9t "Male and female students express similar attitudes towards the Effective Living course." The expressed attitudes of hlb male students were compared with the expressed attitudes of 37L female students. The evidence showed that there was no significant difference between the attitudes of males and females toward Effective Living. Chapter VIII, which follows, reports the "college major factor." Three groups are compared* (l) the non-preference students, (2) the social science majors, and C 3 ) the natural science majors. CHAPTER VIII THu. RELATIONSHIP OF Tri-t, COLLEGE MAJOR TO ATTITUDE T O Anns EFFECTIVE LIVING The writer was unable to find any previous investigations wi:iich dealt with a comparison of attitude toward a course with the student*s college major. Some investigators had done research designed to measure the relationship between college major and attitudes towards political and social problems. Carlson (7) found, in his study of Chicago University seniors, that undergraduates in social science were slightly more favorable to communism and pacifism than were majors in physical science. Barkley (2) reported, in 19U8, on a stuay in which he found that all science students were more favorable toward evolution than were commercial students. Newcomb (28), in his study of Bennington College students, found that the least conservative students selected the social science studies and the more conservative students chose majors in science and music. The purpose for this part of the study is to determine if there exists any measurable difference of attitude toward Effective Living between social science majors, natural science majors, and non-preference students. The students were asked to indicate on the Census .Data Sheet their college major. They were asked to put down "non-preference" if they had not selected their college major. Eight hundred and fifty student responses were tabulated and separated into four pilesj social science, natural science, non—preference, and all others. 97 Group I — Social Sciences Anthropology Sociology Economics History Psychology Philosophy Social Service Political Science Group II - Natural Sciences: Agriculture Forestry Geology Physics Chemistry Mathematics Engineering Pre-medicine Pre—dentistry Medical Teciinician Nursing Veternary Medicine Group III - The Won—Preference Students Group IV — All Others It was found that, of the 850 students in the sample studied, 205 students or 2U% had indicated that they intended to major in the natural sciences; 193 or 23% indicated an interest in the social science fields; and 2h9 or 29% of the group had not decided on a college major and thus composed the non—preference group. Carlson (7) , Barkley (2) , and Newcomb (28) found differences in attitudes between science and social science students. This writer com­ pared social science, natural science, ana non—preference students in the following four ways: (l) a comparison of social science and natural science students as to their attitude towards affective Living; (2) a comparison of natural science students and non—preference students as to their attitude towaras the course; (3) a comparison oi‘ social science students and non-preference students as to their attitude towaras the course; and (U) a comparison of preference students and non-preference stuaents as to their attitude towaras Effective Living. The Social Science and Natural Science Factor Hypothesis #10: "Social science students ana natural science students express similar attitudes towards Effective Living." Although Effective Living is considered a social science, it was not known whether tiiis factor would influence majors in the social science fielo. to be more favorable toward the course. TABLE XVIII SOCIAL SCIENCE MAJORS COMPARED WITH NATURAL SCIENCE MAJORS ON THiiilR ATTITUDE TOWARDS EFFECTIVE LIVING "■—.... . ■--- - — --- College Major Social Science Natural Science ---- Number of Students 193 205 Diff . F-test: t-test: — 1—■ Mean S.D. 12.o21 11.o97 2.36 2 .uk .92b 1.23 (not significant) 3.68 (significant at the li> level) The evidence presented in Table XVIII indicates that social science majors have a more favorable attituae towards Effective Living than do stuaents who are majoring in the natural sciences. It is not known whether the fact that Effective Living is a social science course dealing with human relations had any effect on the results. It does not explain why students who are interested in the natural science fields would be 99 less favorable torfar., a numan relations coarse than students majoring; in the social science fieln. The Natural Science an.l hen—Preference Factor Hypothesis #11: "Students majoring in natural science and .non- preference students have similar attituues towards the effective Living course TAhLo XIX NATlixtAL SCIiiNCH KAdOiiS COhFArtoD WITH HON-PluuFiilcnHJn STUDENTS Oh THdh. ATTITUDE 'I'Gn AIiD S EFFECTIVE LIVING huinoer of College Major______________Stuaents_________________ Mean_________ S .D . Natural Science Non-Preference F-tfest: t-test: 205 2h9 11.097 11.571 2.oh 2.90 Diff. .27h ~~ ~~ 1.21 Tsignificant) 1.01+9 (not significant) (Cociiran-Coxe formula) ~ The evidence presentee in Taole XIX indicates that there existea no significant difference between the expresseo attitudes of the natural science group and the non-preference group. The Social Science ana Non—Preference Factors Hypothesis #12: "Non-preference students and social science students express similar attitudes toward the Effective Living course." The following table reports the findings: 100 1ABLE H SOCIAL SClENC-a MAJORS COMP*ULaD WITH NON-PREFERENCE STUDENTS ON TunlR ATTITUDE TOWAhDS EFFECTIVE LIVING College Major Number of St u;tents Social Science Non-Preference 193 2U9 Mean S.D. 1 C .C’t 1 11.971 A .3c 2.90 Diff. .650 I.I48 (significant) 2.579 Csignificant at the 5a> level) (Cochran-Coxe formula) F-testx t-tests Hie evidence presented in Table XX indicates that social science majors are more favoraole towaras the Effective Living course than are non-preference students. The Preference ana Non-Preference Factor Hypothesis #13* "Non-preference students ana stuaents who have chosen their college major express similar attitudes toward the Effective Living course." The preference group was composed of the social science and natural science students. TABLE XXI PREFERENCE STUDENTS COMP ALED WITH NON -PjxEF ErtENCE STUDENTS ON THEIR ATTITUDES TOWARD EFFECTIVE LIVING College Major Preference Non—Preference Number of Students 396 2ia9 Mean S.D. 12 .114-5 11.971 2.57 2.90 Diff . F-testi t-testi .174 1.27 Csignificant) .773 (not significant) (Cochran-Coxe formula) f l 101 There was no evidence found whicu would indicate that the preference group was more or less favoraole towaras Effective Living than the nonpreference stuaents. Summary of Chapter VIII The question of what effect a stuaent's cnosen major lias upon iiis attitude toward Effective Living was investigated in this chapter. different comparisons were made: (1) Social science majors were compared with natural science m a j ors. (2) Natural science majors were compared with non-preference students. (3) Social science majors were compareu with non-preference students. (L) Non-preference stuaents were compared with preference students. The results showed that: (1) The social science majors were more favoraole toward Effective Living than were the natural science majors. (2) The natural science majors and the non-preference students held about the same attitude toward. Effective Living. (3) The social science majors were more favoraole towards Effective Living than were the non-preference students. (U) There was no significant difference between the attitude of the non-preference group and the preference group towards Effective Living. Chapter IX, which follows, deals with the comparison of student scholastic achievement and abilities with their attitudes toward Effective Living. Four ■r 1Au :A CHAPTER IX A COMPARISON OF STUD ANT ATTITUDu VjITR FINAL GitiDt.J AND ACS SCOr^S This chapter Is concsnie j with the testing oT the nypothesis (#li): . "Students who receive final marks of A —B and D —F in effective Living express similar attitudes toward the course;" and (#13): fresljmen stuaents in the upper 25% an,, lower 25% "First-term on the attitude scale have similar abilities as measured by the ACL." Part I of the chapter will be concerned with the testing of Hypothesis #1L and Part II, with Hypothesis #13. Part I. a Comparison of Student Attituae with Temi-Ena Marks Term-End Grace Sample At the end of the fall term, 1951, the grades for all of the stu­ dents in the large sample group of 830 students were collected. All of the stuaents in this group wno had received A or B for their final mark were put into one group, and all of the students who had received D or F for their final mark were put into a seconc group. It was found that 285 students were in the A-B group and 181 students were in the D-F group. The "C" students were not included in the study since the hy­ pothesis dealt witii only the two extremes of the grade scale . 10 3 Method of Analysis lne attituae scales lor the two groups were anal;, zee in an effort to determine the mean for the A-B group and the mean for the D-F stu­ dents . Since the attitude scale was aaministere^ to the parent group* before the final marks were announced and before the students had taken their term—end test, it may be assumed that the term-end marks did not affect the attitude which the students had expressed on their attituae scale . Whether students receive better markS in effective Living because they have a favorable attituae towards the course is not known. The writer admits that there are many other factors operating which effect student grades. TABLE XXII A COMPAxtl SO In OF THE A-B STUDENTS WITH THE D-F STUDENTS Oh THmlit ATTITUDE TOWARDS EFFECTIVE LIVING Term-End Grade Group Number of Students A-B Students D-F Students Mean 12 M & h 11.1*92 265 161 Diff. F-test* t-test: S.D. 2.1*6 2 .69 .992 1.38 (significant) 3-815 (significant at the 5% level) (Cochran-Coxe formula) The evidence presented here indicates that A-B students are more favorable towards Effective Living than are the D-F students. Part II . An Analysis of the ACE Scores of the Upper and Lower 25# of the First-Term Freslimen on the Attitude Scale As indicated earlier in Chapter III, the ACE scores of entering students were recorded on a decile basis with approximately one—tenth of io U the total group in each decile prior to the Fall or 1951. The distribu­ tion of Students* scores under the revised procedure is shown in Table XXIII . 'iAoLE XXIII ACE SCOicING METHOD AT MICHIGAN STATa COLLEGn1 Derived Score Approximate Percent of Students Receiving Each Score Approximate Percent of Students at or Below Each Score 1 3 e lo 22 22 lb 6 3 1 100 99 9o fed 72 50 28 12 h 1 10 9 6 7 r 5 h 3 2 1 A score oT "10" is considereu the highest score which a student may receive and only 1/t. of the students receive this mark. is "1" and only 1% of the students are at this level. The lowest score The largest number of students will be found around the center of the scale with scores of "5" and "6". The (Quantitative 2 -score) is most significant in measuring abili- ties in scientific and technical curricula and the Linguistic (L-score) is most significant in measuring abilities in language, literature, social sciences, etc. 1. Information prepared by the Michigan State College Counseling Center, Fall term, 1951. 2. I b i d . 3. I b i d . 105 Method of Analysis An analysis of the larg^ sample group of 650 students revealed that there were al9 stunents who haa taken the AC.& test prior to entering college for the fall term, 1951. under the new system. were tabulated. Scores for these stuaents were distributed The attituae scales of this group of cl9 stuaents It was found that there were lhl students in' the upper 25% of the group ana 1L9 students in the lower 25/6 of the group. A mean score was then calculated for each group The Counseling Center furnishes the various aepartments on the campus with the ACE scores of students who have entered the college for the first time . The ACE scores for the upper 25% and lower 25%' on the atti­ tude scale were taken from this list. quantitative Factor Students who have high scores in the quantitative area are considered to be more scientifically minded and have potentialities for the scienti­ fic and technical fields. The 25% of students who expresseo the most favorable attitude towaras Effective Living as measured by the attitude scale were comparea with the 25% who expressed the least favorable attitude as to their quantitative abilities. TABLE XXIV STUDENT ATTITUDE TOWARDS EFFECTIVE LIVING COMPARED T/vITh THEIR ACE QUANTITATIVE SCORES Position on Attitude Scale Upper 25% Lower 25% F-testx t-testx Number of Students iia lh9 Diff. 1.05 (not significant) .lli7 (not significant) Quantitative Mean 5.295 5.312 .017 S.D. 1.7ii 1.70 10 o The evidence presenter in Table XXIV indicates tnat favorable anu unfavorable stuaents have similar quantitative abilities as measured by the ACE. Linguistic Factor Since stuaents who rank high in the linguistic area have demonstrated some ability in the social science fielu, it might be assumea that these same students would be favorable towards a social science course. The same students in the upper 25% and lower 25% on the attitude scale investigated in the preceding analysis in the quantitative area were useu in the investigation of the linguistic area. TABLE XXV STUDENT ATTITUDE TOWARDS EFFECTIVE LIVING COMPARED WITH THElP ACE LINGUISTIC SCOPES Position on the Attitude Scale Upper 25% Lower 25% F-test: t-test: Number of Students 1L1 1U9 Linguistic Mean S.D. 5 .391 5 .000 1 .hi l .bo Diff. .591 1.30 (significant) 3 .OLb (significant at the 5% level) (Cochran-Coxe formula) The evidence founa in Table XXV indicates that students who have expressed a favorable attituae towaras the course liave higher linguistic abilities as measured by their ACE scores than students who express an unfavorable attitude towaras Effective Living. 10 7 Summary of Chapter IX Academic achievement and ability factors which affected stuaent attitude to^arus the Effective Living course were stuaied in this chapter. Part 1 of the chapter devoted itself to a comparison of student attitude towara the course and the stucents final term-end grades. Part II maue comparisons between the student attitude toward Effective Living ana the Students' ACE scores (quantitative and lin­ guistic) . The large sample group was useu in this stuoy. in the sample it was Of the 650 students found that onlycl9 had taken the AC& just prior to entering the college this fall, 1951. This group of cl9 was used in Part I I . A summary of Part I shows that the large sample group of 650 stu­ dents was analyzed in terms of their final marks . Those students who had received A's and B's were put inthe A-B group and those who ha.* received D's and F's were put in theD-F group. It was founu that there were 285 students in the A-B group and 181 students in the D-F group. A mean attitude score for the A-B group was computed and compared with the mean attitude score of the D-F group. The t-test revealed that the A-B group was more favorable towards the Effective Living course than was the D-F group. Since the attitude scale was auministereu to the group before their final grades were distributee, it would appear that the attitude was established without the influence of the grade. P a**t II in this chapter compareci attitude toward Effective Living with ACE scores The Counseling Center at liichigan State College ad­ ministers the ACE to all entering students. ACE was changed for the Fall term, 1951. The methoa of scoring the In the large sample group of 650 students, it was fount that t>19 students hat taken the ACE and hao been scored under the new method. The 25% who expressed the most favor­ able attitude and the 25& who expressed the least favorable attitude towards Effective Living were drawn from this group, and an analysis was made of their ACE quantitative and linguistic scores . An analysis of the data showed that there was no significant dif­ ference in the quantitative area of the ACE between the students who were favorable towards the course and those students who were unfavorable towards the course . Further analysis of the aata revealed that students who were favorable towards the Effective Living course had significantly liigher (5$ level) linguistic scores than students who were unfavorable towards the course. Chapter X, wnich follows, presents the summary, conclusions, and implications for further research. r t- ihi i A CHAPlPAi X SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND EXPLICATIONS FOP. FUATHL.it ixESEAixCK The present chapter presents a summary of the investigations which were made, conclusions drawn, ana some of the implications for further research. The Problem More students are extending their education ueyono the twelfth grade than ever before. Educators have oeen concerned about the kind of edu­ cational experiences these students should have. Much lias oeen done in the way of curriculum change to meet the needs of the students. Other research has been done along the lines of a better understanding of the student as a person. There are many factors which motivate learning in a student. One of these factors is his attitude towards learning and his eagerness to gain knowledge, quite frequently this eagerness is based upon his feel­ ing of n e e d . The Effective Living course might be considered a course in human relations, and one of the problems confronting the department has been to instill into the students the feeling of need for such a course. Some students have appeared to be favorable toward the course and others rather unfavorable. This investigation deals with student attitude 110 toward the course in respect to those factors which seem to affect his attitude . Fifteen factors wliich might affect student attitude toward Effective Living were analyzed* Cl) the size of the student*s home community; the formal educational achievement of the student's father; (3) the student *s father*s occupation; (I4) the administration of the attitude scale by student or teacher; C5) the signing or not signing of the attitude scale by the student; (fc) the student*s year in college; (7) the student's instructor in Effective Living; (6) the size of the student's class in Effective Living; ($?) whether the student was male or female; (10, 11, 12) three comparisons on the student's college major; (13) the final term-end mark wliich the student received in the course; and (111, 15) the student's ACE quantitative and linguistic scores. Methodology With the cooperation of the Effective Living department and members of the Basic College staff, the Board of Examiners of Michigan State College constructed a 21-point Thurstone scale designed to measure student attitude toward a college course. The first major problem was that of establishing the reliability and validity of the Board*s attitude scale. The W-value for each item on the scale had been computed by the Board of Examiners. In testing for reliability a test—retest of the scale itself, was made. A n item analysis of the statements on the scale was also made. Ill Two tests for validity were employed: (l) validation by the use of the interview technique; ana ^2) validation oy comparison of known groups. The second problem confronting the writer was that of selecting students for the stuay. 1951. The data were collected during the Fail term, There were students enrolled in all tliree teriris of effective Living, out the largest group was in Basic 151, the first term of the tlrree quarter sequence. It was found that many of the second—term stu­ dents and third—term students were either taking the course for the second time or were accelerating their program. It was decided that these two groups would not constitute a "typical*1 sample or group and therefore were not used in the investigation. The first-term group of 1,579 students was used and constituted the parent group. In adaition to the attituae scale two other instruments were used by the writer. The Teacher Evaluation Sheet, employed by the college for several years, was used to measure student attitude toward their instructors . The second instrument used by the writer was a census data sheet employed for the purpose of gathering personal data about the students. A "large sample" group of 650 students filled out the census data sheet and checked the Teacher Evaluation Sheet along with the attitude scale. The rest of the students in the parent group filled out only the attitude scale. Sixteen instructors teaching h7 sections of Basic 151 were also included in the study. Each item on the scale had been given a weighted value by the Board of Examiners. The most "favorable statement" was given a value of 21 I 112 points and the "least favorable statement" was given a weighted v a l u e of one. All of the other statements were given weighted v a l u e s in relation to their position on the attitude continuum. it was decided to total the items checked, by their weighted values, and c o m p u t e the mean. This mean score was then said to represent the student’s expressed atti­ tude towara Effective Living. Since the mid—point on the scale was theoretically located at "11", a student whose mean score was found to be larger than "11" was said to be favorable toward the course and those students who had mean scores below "11" were said to express unfavorable attitudes towards Effective Living. The Teacher Evaluation Sheet presented another problem. The sheet •was designed to measure a student's attitude towards his instructor's ability as a teacher, but two of the statements on the scale were not used because they related to an evaluation of the course itself and not the instructor. The result was that the student was presented with a five-itfem scale for teacher evaluation. Each student was asked to circle the statements which he felt best represented his opinion of his instructor's ability as a teacher. Since each statement or question was followed by a five-point scale, ranging from "A" the most favorable to WE" the least favorable position on the continuum, it was necessary to give each of these five positions a weighted value. It was decided that for each "A" circled the instructor would receive five points; for each "B", four points; each "C", three points; each " D " , two points; and for each " E " , one p o i n t . The total number of points received by the instructor from each student was that student*s attitude towards him. The mean score f l 113 °f all "the students was interpreted as the attitude which the stuoents of a particular instructor held towards him. The most points wliicii an instructor could receive from any single student was twenty—five and the least number of points was five . A comparison was made between the attitude of the students towards their instructor and their attitude toward the course. The Michigan State College Counseling Center furnishes the various departments in the college with the ACE scores of incoming students. This information was used when a comparison was made between the student*s ACE quantitative and linguistic scores and his attitude toward the course, as measured by the attitude scale. In determining whether one group of students was more favorable towards Effective Living than another group of students, the F —test was first employed to determine if the variances of the two groups being compared could be considered equal or unequal. If the variances were found to be equal and not significant, the t-test presented on page bb was used. If, however, the variances were found to be unequal and significant at the 5*> level, the t-test devised by Cochran and Coxe was employed. If the t-tests showea a significant difference between the means at the 1% or 5% level, it was then said that one group was more favorable towards the course than another. Findings 1 In order that the findings be more meaningful, the results of the various comparisons made by the investigator are submitted in the same f l llh order in w h i c h they were r e p o r t e d i n the QOdy o f t h e t h e s i s . 1. The test—retest for reliability of the attitude scale revealed a pro due t-moment correlation coefficient of ,o2. v.tiile not exceedingly high this coefficient would seem to indicate that the students responded in about the same manner when given the scale for the second time. An item analysis of the statements in the attitude scale was made with the aid of the Flanagan "r" table. 2. Seven and five-tenths percent of the students checked the item which read: *If I were limited to taking only one course in college, 1 would select this course as the one.” 3. Eleven percent of the students c h e c k e u the item which read: •This course should be thrown out of the c u r r i c u l u m . " h . Students understood the statements in the scale and indicated by the interview tecimi^ue that the items checked by them on the scale represented their attitude toward the course. The instructors were asked to hand in to the writer the names of students who, by their behavior, had indicated a favorable or unfavor­ able attitude toward the course. A comparison of the mean scores of the two groups revealed a significant difference between the means of the two groups. The students who the instructors had indicated were favorable towards the course were found to be more favorable than those students who the instructors said were unfavorable. The results also indicated that the instructors were more accurate in picking the favor­ able students than they were in choosing the unfavorable students. 115 5. I'he size of the home communities of the students was compared in an effort to see if that factor would affect their attitude toward Effective Living. The results showed that there was no significant difference between the expressed attitude of the rural and rural nonfarm students and that of the students who came from cities of LOO ,000 population or over. 6. Students whose fathers had dropped out of school by the time they reached the eleventh grade were compared with students whose fathers had attended at least two years of college. ho significant difference was found between the mean scores of the expressed attitudes of the two groups. 7. Two groups of students were compared in relation to the occupa­ tions of their fathers. Group #1 was composed of those students whose fathers were engaged in professional, semi-professional, official and managerial occupations, and those who owned their own businesses other than agriculture. Group #2 was composed o f -students whose fathers earned their livings in the skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled trades. It was found that the students represented in group #1 were more favorable towards the course than the students in group #2. The difference be­ tween the means was found to be significant at the 5% level. 8. In order to discover if attitudes expressed by students toward Effective Living could be affected by different administrative techni­ ques, two methods of administering the scale were tested. In order that the instructor variant remain constant, students taught by one instructor were used in both experiments . 11c Students who had their attitude scale administered to them ov their instructor anti those who had the scale administered to them by a student from the class expressed similar attitudes towards the course. Two groups ol stuaents were asked to sign their names to the atti­ tude scale and two groups were asked not to sign their names to the scale-. The results showed that those who signed their names to the scale expressed a more favorable attitude toward the course than those who did not sign their names. 9. A comparison was maoe between the expressed attitude toward Effective Living of freslimen students (h=L96) and sophomores, juniors, and seniors (N=37U) . It was found that the freslimen were less favorable toward the course than were the students in the upper three classes. 10. One of the most significant findings in this investigation, in the opinion of the writer, was the relationship between the students' attitude towards the course and their ratings of their instructors. When comparing the 1,579 students' attitude toward the course with the same students* rating of their instructors, it was found that there was a rank correlation coefficient of .76. It was found that the instructor, whose classes were most favorable towards Effective Living and who had ranked their instructor highest when compared with the other instructors, was a full-time, experienced teacher. It was further discovered that the classes who were least favorable toward the course and who ranked their instructor lowest, were taught by a part-time, inexperienced teacher. 117 11. Ihe attitude of two small classes of thirty—two stucerits taught oy one instructor were compared with two large classes of over one hundred students taught by another instructor. The results showea that the students in the two small classes expressed a more favorable attitude toward the course than did the students in the two large classes 12. A comparison of male students' attitudes with female students' attitudes toward the course showed that there was no significant differ­ ence between the two . 13. An investigation was made in an effort to determine if the student's college major affected his attitude towards Affective Living. (,a) It was found tnat social science majors were more favorable toward the course than were natural science majors, (b) -a comparison between the natural science majors and non-preference students revealea no significant difference in attitude towards the course. (c) It was found that social science majors were more favoraole toward the course than were non-preference students. (d) There was founa to be no significant difference between the attitudes of the preference and non-preference students. lU. The attitude scales of all the stuaents receiving "A" and "B" for their term—end marks were compared with the attitude scales of all the "D" and "F" students. The results showed that the A-J3 group were more favorable toward Affective Living than were the D-F students. 15. The quantitative and linguistic scores from the students' ACE were compared with their attitude toward the course. The upper 25% (N =1U1) on the attitude scale were compared with the lower 25% (h=lU9). 11c ihere was no significant, difference found, between tne mean scores of the two groups in the quantitative area on the aCE. i'he upper 25/° were found to have demonstrated a greater linguistic ability as measured by the ACE than the lower 2 5 %. Conclusions and Implications for Further Research On the basis of the findings certain conclusions may be drawn and implications for further research indicated. 1. It should be remembered that this investigation was not conducted in order to determine the "popularity" of the Effective Living course at Michigan State College, but rather to analyze some of the factors which seem to affect student attitude towards a college course. It is also pointed out that the results obtained in this investigation might not necessarily be the same as would result from the study of some other college course. objectives. Student reactions may vary with course content and Other studies of student attitudes towards other Basic College courses might oe conducted and the results compared with the findings of this investigation. 2. The attitude scale constructed by the Board of Examiners at Michigan State College is easy to administer and score and is available for use to other college courses. By using this instrument for measuring attitude toward college courses, other departments might gain a greater insight into the attitude of their students and thus make such changes as might seem advisable in course content and methodology. 3. The size of the home community did not appear to affect the students * attitude towards the course. Some students coming to Mictiigan 119 State College from the Detroit area have attended small private ano parochial schools, while some of the students coming from rural areas have attended large consolidated or community schools. The affect of the size of the high school on the student*s attitude towards the course might be the subject of further investigation. U. After analyzing the influences of the fathers* educational aciiievements and occupations, it was felt, especially in the educational factor, that perhaps the education of the mother might be a more deter­ mining factor than the education of the father. here, seems to be indicated. Further investigation, It was found, that the students whose fathers were in the professions, and related areas were more favorable toward the course than were the students whose fathers were engaged in skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled occupations. It was suspected that the drive for social and economic equality might have oeen a factor. In one case, the students have social and economic status and exert an effort to "maintain** it, while the other group is trying to "attain" this status. A course dealing with human relations appears to affect the two groups in two different w a y s . The "maintaining" group seems to be more favorable towards the course than does the "attaining" group. Further investigation is indicated to determine whether this difference exists. 5. It was suspected by the writer that there might be a difference in expressed attitudes toward the course if the scale were administered in different ways. There was no significant difference found when the instructor or when the student administered the attitude scale, but there was a marked difference in expressed attitudes when the students* 120 identities were and were not revealed. If an investigation were to be made which was intended to measure the attitude of students toward a course, it is recommended that the students* identity remain anonymous in an effort to encourage free response. b. Since the fresiimen students expressed attitudes less favorable to the course than did the sophomores, juniors, and seniors, perhaps the course should be offered in the upper three years. Former students of the writer have indicated to him that they wished that they could have taken the course during their senior year, that it would have meant more to them. The Basic College has made some recent changes in wiiich they have designated two courses for the frestimen year and two courses for the sophomore year. Further investigation, however, seems to be indicated. 7. Many studies have been made on class size. This investigation found that small, intimate, discussion groups produce a more favorable attitude toward the course. the course. sections. This may be due, again, to the nature of Other subject matter may be taught as well in large, lecture There is room for more careful research in this area; particularly, since college enrollments will be increasing in the next few years and most universities will be confronted with a shrinking budget. 8. Since Effective Living is a social science, it might have been anticipated that social science majors would be more favorable towards the course than were the natural science and non-preference students. The big problem for the social science teacher is to interest the science 121- majors as well as the social science majors in human relations problems. It has been observed oy the writer, from his previous experiences in business and industry, that many of our trained technicians are capaole of doing their "job" but nave difficulty getting along with other people, particularly those people with whom they come in daily contact. One of the reasons for the estaolisliment of the Effective Living course was an effort on the part of the educators to answer the criticism frequently put to them by employers in business and industry; "you seem to be aole to train our people well in the skills of their traae, but you don*t seem to be giving them training in how to ’live* A follow-up investigation of Effective Living students might be conducted in an effort to ascertain the effect of the course on their personal living. Further research might also be made to determine whether they get along with their fellow workers oetter than those students who did not take the course. 9. Since the A —b students appeared to be more favorable towara t course than the D -F students, it appears that there may exist some correlation between grades and attitudes toward the course. Since the attitude scale was given before the grades were announced, it might be suspected that the students' attitudes were not affected by their grades, but rather, the grades were affected by the students' attitudes. Further studies might be made in measuring attitude change; before and after an important examination, at the beginning and at the end of a course, and measuring attitude change from the!freslimen year, when the student takes the course, and during the senior year after he has been out of the course for tliree years. I 9 122 As the research project developed, many new investigations sug­ gested themselves to the writer. The hollowing were not a part of this investigation and are presented here as recommendations for further research. 1. The findings in this investigation showed that the students who received A*s and B 1s as final term—end grades were more favorable towards the course than the students who received D*s and F*s. Also, the sophomores, juniors, and seniors were found to be more favorable towards Affective Living than were the freslimen. Further investigation should be made in an effort to determine if' the A and B students were primarily sophomores, juniors, and seniors; and whether the class-incoliege factor was more discriminating than the grade factor. 2. This investigation compared the attitudes of only the A-B students with the D-F students. Further research is suggested, includ­ ing a comparison of the "average" student with these two groups. 3. The Effective Living department has permitted students to pre­ register at the end of each term for classes conducted by their last instructor. Thus, some students have been able to continue tliroughout the three terms of the course with the same instructor, a comparison might be made between the attitudes toward the course of these students with the attitudes of students who have had a different instructor for each term. It. Some Basic College instructors are primarily interested in re­ search. A n investigation might be made of the attitudes toward the course of students in these classes compared with the attitudes of students whose instructors are primarily interested in teaching. 1 123 i?. There appears to oe some divergence of onindon among the members of the Basic College staff as to the value of general education. An investigation might be made by comparing the attitudes of students whose instructor demonstrates an understanding of general education with the attitudes of students whose instructor is openly opposed to general education. The success of such, an inquiry weald depend on the ability of the investigator to ascertain accurately the attitudes towards general education held by Basic College instructors. b XbL IL Gxt: i.c'111 3I3L1G GRAPH Y 1. Allport, Gordon 1 . "Attitudes." I n Murchison, Carl (Ed.) handbook of Social P sychology. Clark University Press, Worcester, Mass'., 193P, Cii. 17, pp. 796-blin. 2. Barkley, Key L. "Influence of College Science Courses on the Development of A t t i t u d e Towa r d Evolution." Journal of A p p l ied P s y c h o l o g y ^ 191.8, 32:200-208. 3. Bee, Lawrence S. "Student Attitudes Towards a Course in Courtship and Marriage: Educational Implications." Piarriage and F amily Living. Vol. XIII, do. 1, Fall, 1931. pp. 1^7-bO. “ h . Billings, Elizabeth L. "The Influence of a Social-Studies Experi­ ment on Student Attitudes." School and Society, 19l2 , 50:557-3dO. 3. Bloom, Benjamin S. and Broder, L. J. Problem-Solving Processes of College Students. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 111., 1950, 109 pp. 6 . Cantril, H. "The Intensity of an Attitude." Social Psychology, 19U6, Ul:129-136. Journal of Abnormal 7. Carlson, Hilding B. "Attitude of Undergraduate Students." Journal of Social Psychology, 1931;, 5*202-212. 8. Castore, George F. "Attitudes of Stuoents Toward the Case Method of Instruction in Human Relations Courses." Journal of Educa­ tional Research, 1951, Vol. XLV, Ho. 3, pp. 201-13. 9. Corey, Stephen M. "Professed Attitudes and Actual Behavior." Journal of Educational Psychology. 1937, 28:271-280. 10. Dictionary of Occupational Titles, Part II, Titles and Codes. United States Government Printing Office, Washington, D. C., 1939, 330 pp. 11. Droba, D. D. "Political Parties and War Attitudes." Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1931;, 28:1;68—1;72 . 12. Dunlap, John and Kroll, A. "Observations on the Methodology of Attitude Scales." Journal of Social Psychology. 1939, 10:U75-U87. 125 lb. Edwards, a . L. ’’Political Frames ol' reference as a Factor Influencing Recognition." Journal o f A b n o r m a l and S o c i a l Ps: chology. 1981, 3 u: 36-5 0 . Id. Ferguson, Leonard W . "The Influence of Individual Attitudes on Construction of an Attitude Scale Journal of Social Psychology , 1935. 6i113-117 . 13. Graham, Alva w. "Do Teachers Who use Democratic Methocs Develop Democratic Attitudes?" Elementary School Journal, 198 o, 67*28-27. lb. Hinkley, E. D. "The Influence of Individual Opinion on Construction of an Attituue Scale." Journal of Social Psychology, 1931', 3:263-296. 17. Hirshberg, G. and Gilliland, A. R. "Parent-Child Relationships in Attitudes." Journal of Abnormal ana Social Psychology, 1982, 37:125-130. ^ 16. Jolinson, Palmer 0. Statistical Methods in Research, Prentice-Hall, Inc., New fork, 19h9, 377 pp. 19. Krech, David ana Crutciifield, R. S. Theory ana Problems of Social Psychology, McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, 198&, o2~2 pp. 20. Likert, R. "A Technique for the Measurement of Attituues." Archives of Psychology, 1932, N o . 160, p p . 1-55. 21. Liria^uist, E. F. Statistical Analysis in Educational Research, Houghton Mifflin Co., New York, 1980, 266 pp. 22. Lindquist, E. F. Educational Measurement, (Ed.), American Council on Education, Washington, D. C., 1951, 819 pp. 23. Major, C. L. "Measuring the Effect of a Semester of College ’ w ork on the Conservative-Progressive Tendencies of Students." School and Society, i9 6 0 , 68*178-175. 2k. McNemar, Wuinn. "Opinion-Attitude Methodology." Psychological Bulletin. 1986, Vol. 63, No. 6 , pp. 289-378. 2 5 . McNemar, ^ u i n n . Psychological Statistics, John "Wiley and Sons, New York, 1969, 366 pp. 26. Michael, William, Herrold, E. E., and Cryan, E. W. "Survey of Student-Teacher Relationships." Journal of Educational Research. 1951, 6u*657-678. 12 o c( . Wurpijy, G ., Murphy, L. B., and Newcomb, T. M . Experimental Social Psycho lory , harper Publishing Co., new Y o r k , 1937 ~1121~pp”. 28. hewcoinO, T. M. Personality and Social Clrun;-e , Dry dan Press, new fork, 193L, 115 p p . 29. Peterson, T. D. "The Relationship Between Certain Attitudes o 1' Parents ana Chil^eri." Stuajes in higher Education, Vol. XXXI, Series II, Bulletin of Furuue University, Lafayette, Indiana, 1936, pp. 127-lLi. 30. Pinter, R . and Forlano, G. "The Influence of Attitude Upon Scal­ ing of Attitude Items.1' Journal of Social Psycholory, 1937 , 8:39-U5 . 31. Remmers, H. H . and Drucker, A. J. "Do Alumni ano. Students Differ in Their Attitudes Towarjs Instructors?" Journal of Edueafcional P syc ho lo g.y , 1951, Vol. h'2 , ho. 3, pp . 129-18-2 . 32 . Remmers, H. H. and Ryder, R. R. "Effect of Student Teacaing on Secondary-School Pupils in Achievement and Attitude." Studies in Higher education, Vol. LI, Bulletin of Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana, 19LU, 155 pp. 33. Remmers, H. H. and Silance, Ella B. "An Experimental Generalized Master Scale: A Scale to Measure Attitude Toward Any School Subject." Studies in Higher Education, Vol. XXVI, ho. 1, Bulletin of Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana, 1 9 3 U , pp. 8L-87. 3U. Remmers, H. H. ana Silance, Elia B. "Generalized Attitude Scales." Journal of Social Psychology, 193^4-, 5:298-312. 35. Smith, M. M. "Comparative Social Attitudes." tional Psychology, 1938, 28:681-693. Journal of Educa­ 36. Telford, C. W. »An Experimental Study of Some Factors Influencing the Social Attitudes of College Students." Journal of Social Psychology, 193^, 5:821-U28. 37. Thurstone, L. L. ana Chave, E. J. The Measurement of Attitudes, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1929, 96 p p . . 38. Watson, W. S. and Hartmann, G. W. "Rigidity of a Basic Attitudinal Frame." Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1939, 3L:31L-336. * ri .. a i A SCALE TO MEASURE ATTITUDES toward ANY COLLEGE COURSE Copyright, 1951 Board of Examiners Michigan State College O n the r e v e r s e side of this sheet are stat e m e n t s about c ollege courses. You are asked to c o n s i d e r these s t atements w i t h reference to a particular course. Read all the s t a t e m e n t s and check ( y / ' ) those that express your feeling about this course. This sc a l e is d e s i g n e d to m easure attitudes and it is not used for any grading purposes. T h e answ e r s w h i c h you give w i l l be rega r d e d as confidential. You are ur g e d to Ju d g e e a c h s t a tement a c c ording to your own personal feelings about i t . B e f o r e b e g i n n i n g work, please r e cord the i n f o r m a t i o n requested below: N a m e _______________________________________________________________ D a t e ___________________ A ge __________ Major field of a c a demic S e x ____________ Class ( F r , Soph, etc.)_______________ i n t e r e s t ___________ _________________________________________ Name of c o u r s e about w h i c h I am e x p r e s s i n g an o p i n i o n _________ _____________________________________________________ I have f i n i s h e d this c o u r s e .......................... ......... I am now tak i n g the_______ term of this c o u r s e . .......... I have never taken t h i s c o u r s e ............................. ________ N a m e of course Check ( ) _____ _____________________________________________________ every statement below that expresses your feeling about this course. ) 1. This cou r s e is v e r y beneficial to the majority ofstudents who take it. ) 2. I am v ery enthusiastic about this course. ) 3. T h e benefits to be gained from this course hardly justify its existence. ) 4. This course does not help students much. ) 5. Not enough time is spent on each topic to get the full value of ) 6. Some parts of this course are very worthwhile. ) 7. This cour s e does a good Job in covering so much material so clearly. ) 8. This course could be helpful if it w e r e better organized. ) it. 9. Th e r e are better courses than this and there are w o r s e courses. ) 10. This is a good course for college students to take. ) 11. This course does a fair job. ) 12. Students learn very little in this course. ) 13. ) no doubt, has some value for some 14. If I were limited to taking only one course in course as that o n e . ) 15. ) This course, college, I wo u l d select this I don't see how anyone c o u l d ever like this course. 16. This course ) 17. people. This course is too vague. should be thrown out of the curriculum. ) 18. T h e m a t erial taught in this course is not detailed enough. ) 19. O n e should have no d i f ficulty devoting attention to the class w o r k in this course. ) 20. It wo u l d be hard for anyone to devise a better course than this one. ) 21. This course makes a v a l uable contribution to a c ollege education. - 2- T E A C H E R EVALUATION SHEET MICHIGAN STATE COLLEGE ________________ Sex Class Gradepointaverage------------ TIONS: It it the deaire of your instructor to achieve the best possible instruction in this course. T o help accomplish the p iluation sheet was devised to obtain a systematic poll of student opinion. Carefully consider each question, then record your ju rcling one of the letters A, B, C, D, E, for each item. A blank space has been provided at the end for adding comments yo i. A RE IMPORTANT IECTIVES M E T ? The course is an important contribution to m y college edu­ cation £S I N S T R U C T O R ’S iSENTATION O F iJECT M A T T E R IANCE LEARNING? Presentation very meaningful and facilitates learning N S T R U C T O R ’S lECH E F F E C T I V E ? Instructor’s speaking skill con­ centrates m y attention on sub­ ject N WELL DOES THE TRUCTOR W O R K rH S T U D E N T S ? I feel welcome to seek extra help as often as needed ES T H E I N S T R U C T O R M U L A T E INDEPENDr THINKINQ? Instructor continually inspires m e to extra effort and thought beyond course requirements GRADING PRO­ CURES GIVE -ID R E S U L T S ? Instructor’s estimate of m y over all accomplishment has been quite accurate to date N D O E S THIS One of the best instructors I have ever had A A A A A A TRUCTOR RANK rH O T H E R S Y O U ifE H A D ? EN TS: bl*0 arable) B C D B c D c D c D c D In general, I do only the usual thinking involved in the as­ signments B c c Satisfactory or about average E I seldom do more the memory work and cram D Instructor’s estimate of m y ac­ complishment is of average ac­ curacy B E I would avoid asking 1 structor for extra help absolutely necessary I feel hesitant to ask for extra help B E Speech usually distractir centration very difficult Speech sometimes invites at­ tention on speaker rather than subject B E Presentation often con seldom helpful Presentation not unusually good or bad, about average B E This course doe s n ’t worthwhile to m e Contributes about as much as the average college course E I feel that the instructoi mate is quite inaccurate D E One of the poorest inst I have ever had