Refine
Year of publication
- 2021 (5) (remove)
Language
- English (5) (remove)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (5) (remove)
Keywords
- Big Five (2)
- German (2)
- attitude (2)
- conscientiousness (2)
- explicit attitude (2)
- grading practice (2)
- implicit attitude (2)
- mathematics (2)
- preservice teacher (2)
- secondary school (2)
Institute
- Strukturbereich Bildungswissenschaften (5) (remove)
When it comes to teacher attitudes towards teaching and learning, research relies heavily on explicit measures (e.g., questionnaires). These attitudes are generally conceptualized as constructivist and transmissive views on teaching and learning with constructivism often considered to be more desirable. In explicit measures, this can have drawbacks like socially desirable responding. It is for this reason that, in this study, we investigated implicit attitudes as well as explicit attitudes towards constructivism and transmission. N = 100 preservice teachers worked on a questionnaire and two Single-Target Implicit Association Tests (ST-IAT constructivism and ST-IAT transmission) before (T1) and after (T2) a single master’s semester. One group (n = 50) did student teaching while a second group (n = 50) took master’s courses. We evaluated preservice teachers’ views on teaching at the end of their masters’ studies. Participants agreed with transmission and constructivism (T1) on both an explicit and implicit level. Implicit measures seem to exceed explicit measures in differentially assessing constructivist and transmissive views on teaching and learning. After student teaching (T2), there was no overall effect of attitude development but changes in rank indicate that participants’ implicit attitudes towards constructivism and transmission developed differently for each individual.
When it comes to teacher attitudes towards teaching and learning, research relies heavily on explicit measures (e.g., questionnaires). These attitudes are generally conceptualized as constructivist and transmissive views on teaching and learning with constructivism often considered to be more desirable. In explicit measures, this can have drawbacks like socially desirable responding. It is for this reason that, in this study, we investigated implicit attitudes as well as explicit attitudes towards constructivism and transmission. N = 100 preservice teachers worked on a questionnaire and two Single-Target Implicit Association Tests (ST-IAT constructivism and ST-IAT transmission) before (T1) and after (T2) a single master’s semester. One group (n = 50) did student teaching while a second group (n = 50) took master’s courses. We evaluated preservice teachers’ views on teaching at the end of their masters’ studies. Participants agreed with transmission and constructivism (T1) on both an explicit and implicit level. Implicit measures seem to exceed explicit measures in differentially assessing constructivist and transmissive views on teaching and learning. After student teaching (T2), there was no overall effect of attitude development but changes in rank indicate that participants’ implicit attitudes towards constructivism and transmission developed differently for each individual.
As competition over peer status becomes intense during adolescence, some adolescents develop insecure feelings regarding their social standing among their peers (i.e., social status insecurity). These adolescents sometimes use aggression to defend or promote their status. The aim of this study was to examine the relationships among social status insecurity, callous-unemotional (CU) traits, and popularity-motivated aggression and prosocial behaviors among adolescents, while controlling for gender. Another purpose was to examine the potential moderating role of CU traits in these relationships. Participants were 1,047 (49.2% girls; Mage = 12.44 years; age range from 11 to 14 years) in the 7th or 8th grades from a large Midwestern city. They completed questionnaires on social status insecurity, CU traits, and popularity-motivated relational aggression, physical aggression, cyberaggression, and prosocial behaviors. A structural regression model was conducted, with gender as a covariate. The model had adequate fit. Social status insecurity was associated positively with callousness, unemotional, and popularity-motivated aggression and related negatively to popularity-motivated prosocial behaviors. High social status insecurity was related to greater popularity-motivated aggression when adolescents had high callousness traits. The findings have implications for understanding the individual characteristics associated with social status insecurity.
The Big Five personality traits play a major role in student achievement. As such, there is consistent evidence that students that are more conscientious receive better teacher-assigned grades in secondary school. However, research often does not support the claim that students that are more conscientious similarly achieve higher scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests. Based on the Invest-and-Accrue Model, we argue that conscientiousness explains to some extent why certain students receive better grades despite similar academic accomplishments (i.e., achieving similar scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests). Therefore, the present study examines to what extent the relationship between student personality and teacher-assigned grades consists of direct as opposed to indirect associations (via subject-specific standardized test scores). We used a representative sample of 14,710 ninth-grade students to estimate these direct and indirect pathways in mathematics and German. Structural equation models showed that test scores explained between 8 and 11% of the variance in teacher-assigned grades in mathematics and German. The Big Five personality traits in students additionally explained between 8 and 10% of the variance in grades. Finally, the personality-grade relationship consisted of direct (0.02 | β| ≤ 0.27) and indirect associations via test scores (0.01 | β| ≤ 0.07). Conscientiousness explained discrepancies between teacher-assigned grades and students’ scores in domain-specific standardized tests to a greater extent than any of the other Big Five personality traits. Our findings suggest that students that are more conscientious may invest more effort to accomplish classroom goals, but fall short of mastery.
The Big Five personality traits play a major role in student achievement. As such, there is consistent evidence that students that are more conscientious receive better teacher-assigned grades in secondary school. However, research often does not support the claim that students that are more conscientious similarly achieve higher scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests. Based on the Invest-and-Accrue Model, we argue that conscientiousness explains to some extent why certain students receive better grades despite similar academic accomplishments (i.e., achieving similar scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests). Therefore, the present study examines to what extent the relationship between student personality and teacher-assigned grades consists of direct as opposed to indirect associations (via subject-specific standardized test scores). We used a representative sample of 14,710 ninth-grade students to estimate these direct and indirect pathways in mathematics and German. Structural equation models showed that test scores explained between 8 and 11% of the variance in teacher-assigned grades in mathematics and German. The Big Five personality traits in students additionally explained between 8 and 10% of the variance in grades. Finally, the personality-grade relationship consisted of direct (0.02 | β| ≤ 0.27) and indirect associations via test scores (0.01 | β| ≤ 0.07). Conscientiousness explained discrepancies between teacher-assigned grades and students’ scores in domain-specific standardized tests to a greater extent than any of the other Big Five personality traits. Our findings suggest that students that are more conscientious may invest more effort to accomplish classroom goals, but fall short of mastery.