title: Assessing Academic Self-Efficacy, Knowledge, and Attitudes in Undergraduate Physiology Students.
abstract: Academic self-efficacy affects the success of students in the sciences. Our goals were to develop an instrument to assess the self-efficacy and attitudes toward science of students in an undergraduate physiology course. We hypothesized 1) that our instrument would demonstrate that students taking this course would exhibit greater self-efficacy and more positive attitudes toward science than students in a non-science undergraduate course, and 2) that the physiology students' self-efficacy and attitudes would improve after completing the course. A 25-question survey instrument was developed with items investigating demographic information, self-efficacy, content knowledge, confidence, and attitudes regarding science. Students in either an undergraduate physiology course (Group P) or a history course (Group H) completed the survey. Forty-eight students in Group P completed both PRE- and POST-class surveys, while 50 students in Group H completed the pre-class survey. The academic self-efficacy of Group P as assessed by the PRE-survey was significantly higher than Group H (p=0.0003). Interestingly, there was no significant difference between groups in content knowledge in the PRE-survey. The self-efficacy of Group P was significantly higher as assessed by the POST-survey, when compared to the PRE-survey (p<0.0001) coincident with an improvement (p<0.001) in content knowledge for Group P in the POST-survey. This study established a survey instrument with utility in assessing self-efficacy, attitudes, and content knowledge. Our approach has applicability to studies designed to determine the impact of instructional variables on academic self-efficacy, attitudes, and confidence of students in the sciences.
authors.affiliation: Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN.
authors.forename: Andrew D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Woolcock
authors.affiliation: Department of Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Georgia, Athens, GA.
authors.forename: Kate E
authors.initials: KE
authors.lastname: Creevy
authors.affiliation: Department of Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Georgia, Athens, GA.
authors.forename: Amanda E
authors.initials: AE
authors.lastname: Coleman
authors.affiliation: Department of Large Animal Medicine and Surgery, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Georgia, Athens, GA.
authors.forename: James N
authors.initials: JN
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Georgia, Athens, GA.
authors.forename: Scott A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Brown
keywords: cardiovascular; physiology; self-efficacy