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Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 18, Issue 1, Article 10 (Jun., 2017) |
Attitude toward physics and physics achievement
There were some studies investigating the relationship between learners’ attitude towards physics and physics achievement. While some researchers found significant relationship between the two variables, some did not. For example, Papanastasiou and Zembylas (2002) investigated the effect of students’ attitude towards science that composed of liking for science disciplines physics, chemistry, biology and earth science on the students’ TIMSS science scores. They found that students’ positive attitude towards science positively affected their science achievement. Çapri (2013) also found that university students’ attitude towards physics lesson predicted their physics achievement. However, this explained only a small portion of the variance in students’ academic achievement. Moreover, Chang and Cheng (2008) found that 11th-grade students’ physics achievement was positively and significantly correlated with their interest in science.
Differently, significant relationships could not be found between students’ attitude towards physics and their physics achievement in some studies (e.g., Gungor, Eryılmaz & Fakıoglu, 2007; Willson, Ackerman and Malave, 2000). The study of Gungor et al. (2007) showed that freshmen physics students’ attitude towards physics did not significantly explain their physics achievement. In their study they also found that there were positive relationships between dimensions of attitude towards physics except the dimension ‘aspiring extra activities related to physics’ and physics achievement. Willson et al. (2000) also investigated the relationships between college freshmen engineering students’ attitude toward science and their physics achievement. Their results revealed that there was no significant relationship between them. Consequently, in the literature there are contradictory results in terms of the relationships between physics achievement and attitudes towards physics.
Self-efficacy of learning physics and physics achievement
The relationship between self-efficacy in physics and physics achievement was also explored. For example, some scholars (e.g., Çapri, 2013; Yerdelen-Damar & Peşman, 2013) found close relationships between learners’ self-efficacy and their physics achievement. For example, Yerdelen-Damar and Peşman (2013) studied with high school students and they found that students’ self-efficacy of learning physics was directly and significantly related to their physics achievement. They also found that 12% of the variance in physics achievement was explained by self-efficacy of learning physics. In this regard, they believed that increase in self-efficacy might result in increase in physics achievement. In a study of Çapri (2013) with university students, it was also found that 15.7% variance of university students’ physics achievement was explained by their self-efficacy of learning physics. Marsh et al. (2015) found a positive correlation (r=.300) between students’ physics homework self-efficacy and physics achievement. In this study, physics homework self-efficacy measured the capabilities about achieving physics homework. In contrast, Gungor et al. (2007) found that there were slightly negative and insignificant relationship (r=-.004) between freshmen physics students’ self-efficacy in physics and their physics achievement. They discussed that the reason of this result might be inconsistencies in students’ thoughts. To summarize, in many of the studies (e.g., Marsh et al., 2015; Yerdelen-Damar & Peşman, 2013) self-efficacy in physics was positively related to physics achievement.
Physics achievement and mathematics achievement
Some studies (e.g., Marsh et al., 2015; Veloo, Nor & Khalid, 2015) revealed that learners’ physics achievement was closely and positively related to their mathematics achievement. For example, Marsh et al. (2015) compared the relationships among the students’ achievements in different disciplines. They found a positive correlation (r=.318) between students’ mathematics and physics achievement. Veloo et al. (2015) also found a high and significant correlation (r=.740) between high school students’ additional mathematics achievement and physics achievement. Similar to these studies, Jiar and Long (2014) studied with students to investigate the relationships between their mathematical thinking and physics achievement. All the sub-dimensions of mathematical thinking including intellectual skills, verbal information, mathematical attitudes and cognitive strategy were significantly correlated with physics achievement. Furthermore, each of these variables separately, significantly predicted physics achievement. These variables also together explained the 38% of variance in physics achievement.
In his study Meltzer (2002) also studied on the relationships between students’ mathematics skills and their learning gains in physics course that was designed considering interactive-engagement methods. He found that the students’ learning gains in physics were not correlated with their success in physics concept test but these were significantly correlated with their mathematics preparation. Finally, Eryılmaz and Tatlı (1999) found that there was almost no relationship (r=.02) between pre-service physics teachers’ mathematics aptitude and mechanics achievement. However, more recent studies (e.g., Marsh et al., 2015; Veloo et al., 2015) showed that there were high and positive correlations between mathematics achievement and physics achievement. As a conclusion, there can be positive and significant relationship between mathematics achievement and physics achievement as indicated in most of the studies (e.g., Marsh et al., 2015; Meltzer, 2002)
