Attitudes related to students’ performance in statistics in university programs in Argentina

Abstract

Students from non-statistics degree programs often perceive statistics as a burden, underestimating its usefulness and encountering difficulties that cause them anxiety and stress, among others, which leads many of them to fail the course. Students’ attitudes can hinder their learning and development of useful skills associated with statistical thinking, which should be later applied outside the classroom. The aim of this study was to analyze students’ attitudes towards statistics in introductory courses in three schools of Argentina, grouped in Agricultural Sciences and Biological Sciences. We analyzed students’ attitudes at the beginning and at the end of the course, the differences between pre- and post-course attitudes and the relationship between these changes and students’ performances. The sample consisted of 436 students and their attitudes were measured using the Survey of Attitudes Towards Statistics (SATS-28), considering four components: Affect, Cognitive Competence, Value and Difficulty. Students’ performances were classified as: passed (and exempt from final exam), intermediate (but not exempt from final exam), and failed. Difficulty was not related to students’ performance, as opposed to what was detected with the other components. Cognitive competence was the only component that classified students’ performance in the correct order. Students who failed the course differed from the rest in that they developed more negative feelings towards statistics at the end of the course; in contrast, students with good performance showed an increase in the value given to statistics. Biological Sciences students presented higher average in the four components studied.