Instructional Language Fluency and Self-Efficacy in College. Alexis R Georgeson Simon Fraser University Vancouver, BC

Transcription

1 Instructional Language Fluency and Self-Efficacy in College Alexis R Georgeson Simon Fraser University Vancouver, BC

2 Outline 1. Background and Purpose of Study 2. Methods 3. Results 4. Discussion

3 Background The Well-Being of college students is an important issue for universities. Distress is common and has been shown to negatively affect academic performance. Well-being has various facets which are usually measured using questionnaires

4 Wellness and Well-being

5 Well-Being and English Fluency Previous work has shown differences on measures of well-being across English fluency, though it is not clear whether these are true differences or related to measurement error. CES-D is a tool measuring emotional wellbeing which we have examined. We found interaction effects between item features and English fluency on CES-D

6 Self-efficacy Self Efficacy is broadly the ability to perform tasks and is related to well-being. For college students, self-efficacy concerns the ability to complete tasks specifically encountered in a university context Lower levels of English fluency were related to lower ratings of college self-efficacy

7 CES-D vs. CSES There are some notable differences in the constructs being measured as well as the items on these scales. The CES-D has more variation in the way items are written. The content of CES-D items, as it is related to mood, involves feelings. The scale itself is 4-points and has quantitative and qualitative descriptors The CSES, in contrast, includes more behaviors, items are similar in structure and length, and has a 7 point scale with qualitative descriptors. Thus, we focused on more on the content of items, rather than linguistic features, given the homogeneity of the items.

8 Research Question Do items with certain features show different patterns of responses across levels of English Fluency? Features of interest: Concreteness, social desirability, cultural loading, task requires use of written communication, task requires verbal communication Note about features

9 Current Paper We used a modified version of the College-Self Efficacy Instrument (CSEI) This scale asks individuals to rate their confidence from 1=not at all confident to 7=Very confident on various tasks The modified scale has two subscales: Course- Related tasks and Social Tasks. We did not include the roommate subscale.

10 Participants 1272 Undergraduate students from Simon Fraser University completed a battery of questionnaires for course credit. Mean Age 19.8 (SD: 2.9) Males: 431 (34%); Females: 822 (65%) 51% of Asian Descent, 33% Caucasian, 9% Other, 3% Multi-racial Non-Metis, 1% African American

11 English Fluency Participants were asked to self-report their English Fluency, given four options. They responded as follows: -Very Fluent in English: 53% -More Fluent in English than first language: 22% -Same Fluency in English and First language: 13% -Less Fluent in English than First Language: 10%

12 Measures English Fluency- Self reported English Fluency. Options are: Very Fluent in English, More Fluent in English than Native Language, Same Fluency in English and Native Language, and Less Fluent in English than in Native Language. This was treated as a continuous variable in the Analysis College Self-Efficacy Inventory-15 items, Individuals rate their confidence in completing various tasks related to college using a 7-point Likert scale from 7=Very Confident to 1=Not at all Confident. There are two subscales we included: course and social.

13 Coding Features Items from CSEI were coded for various features. The coding was done individually and then concensus coding determined how the items would be coded for the analysis.

14 Feature Definitions Concreteness: Item represents something well-defined or clearly observable (e.g., Research a term paper), as opposed to something that is more abstract or less clearly defined (e.g., Manage time effectively). Nonconcrete items serve as the reference category for concrete items in the analyses. Cultural Loading: Western cultural values are inherent in item (e.g., Ask a question in class) Socially desirable-prioritizing academic success Socially desirable-prioritizing social life Task Requires written communication Task requires verbal communication

15 Analytic plan Using Linear mixed effects modeling, we explored the effects of linguistic and cultural features, as well as self-reported English fluency. This would allow us to do an item-level analysis where individuals were a random effect After completing analyses on the overall questionnaire, we then split the analysis by course subscale vs. social subscale to see if there were any differences

16 Results The results have been graphed Since English Fluency and Feature interactions are most salient to our research question, we will focus on discussing those results.

17 CSE Response Results-English Fluency =Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

18 Results-English Fluency by Subscale Social Subscale Course Subscale =Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

19 CSE Response CSE Response English Fluency Social Subscale Course Subscale As the graphs illustrate, there was a large difference in the average ratings on the social subscale compared to the course subscale, motivating us to split our analyses by subscale. There is a significant effect of English Fluency, though it seems that course items received consistently higher ratings. 1=Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

20 CSE Response Concreteness Concreteness and English Fluency, Interaction Model Social FP Social FA Course FP Course FA FP= Feature Present FA=Feature Absent; 1=Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

21 CSE Response Culture 6 Culture English Fluency, Interaction Models Social FP Social FA Course FP Course FA FP= Feature Present FA=Feature Absent; 1=Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

22 CSE Response Social Desirability: Academic Success 6 Items Related to Academic Success and English Fluency, Interaction Model Social FP Social FA Course FP* Course FA* *All Items on the course Subscale were coded as related to academic success FP= Feature Present FA=Feature Absent; 1=Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

23 CSE Response Communication Written Communication and English Fluency, Main Effects Models Verbal Communication and English Fluency, Main Effects Social FP Social FA Course FP Course FA FP= Feature Present FA=Feature Absent; 1=Very Fluent 2=More fluent 3= Equally Fluent 4= less fluent

24 Discussion

25 Takeaways-Measurement and Methods Results highlight importance of separating analyses by subscales when analyzing results from questionnaires given the different patterns depending on whether items were on the social or course subscale Concreteness, cultural loading, and items related to academic success showed different patterns depending on English fluency, but only for the social subscale. Importance of being inclusive when doing research on wellness in a university setting; excluding non-native English speakers will only limit our understanding of university students as a whole.

26 Takeaways-Applications The less fluent an individual is in English, the lower their ratings are for self-efficacy. These individuals perceive themselves to be less efficacious in social or course-related tasks in comparison to individuals who are more fluent. Individuals who are less fluent were least confident in completing that tasks which are social and unrelated to academics-perhaps this is an area for universities to focus, in addition to academic

27 Limitations As we mentioned, there is not a great deal of variability in the scale. Many of the students who were less fluent in English are likely to be international students, which means they have different challenges they encounter.

28 Future Work This scale needs to be coded in other ways Run similar analyses on other scales Qualitative work to understand: 1. how individuals who are less fluent in English interpret and respond to questionnaires, 2. Their experience as university students-unique difficulties they encounter