Education research: SATA results (Cuesta College, Fall Semester 2007)

Student attitudes were assessed using the Survey of Attitudes Towards Astronomy (SATA), a 34-question, five-point Likert scale questionnaire that measures four attitude subscales (Zeilik & Morris, 2003):

• Affect (positive student attitudes towards astronomy and science);
  
• Cognitive competence (students' self-assessment of their astronomy/science knowledge and skills);
  
• Difficulty (reverse-coded such that high-difficulty corresponds to a rating of 1, low-difficulty assessment of astronomy/science corresponds to a rating of 5);
  
• Value (students' assessment of the usefulness, relevance, and worth of astronomy/science in personal and professional life).

The SATA was administered as a pre-test on the first day of class, and as a post-test on the last day of class.

Cuesta College
Astronomy 10 Fall Semester 2007 section 0135
(N = 24, matched pairs only)
        Affect       Cogn. Comp.  Difficulty   Value
Initial 3.6 +/- 0.6  3.6 +/- 0.6  3.6 +/- 0.5  2.8 +/- 0.4
Final   3.8 +/- 0.7  3.7 +/- 0.7  3.8 +/- 0.5  2.9 +/- 0.6

Cuesta College
Astronomy 10 Fall Semester 2007 section 1073
(N = 42, matched pairs only)
        Affect       Cogn. Comp.  Difficulty   Value
Initial 3.6 +/- 0.6  3.6 +/- 0.6  3.6 +/- 0.5  2.7 +/- 0.5
Final   3.7 +/- 0.7  3.5 +/- 0.6  3.7 +/- 0.6  2.9 +/- 0.7

There were no statistically significant differences between the pre-test and post-test results for each section. So why keep administering the SATA to students at Cuesta College in future semesters? First is that due to the small class sizes, it would be encouraging to gather more consistent data while accumulating a sizeable data population. Second is that there appear to be statistically significant post-test differences in cognitive competence and value attitudes when dividing a class into populations that self-report expert versus novice behavior when answering clicker questions (Len, 2006); there are probably other statistically significant differences in sub-populations that can be data mined in future studies.

Zeilik, M. & Morris, V. J. 2003, "An Examination of Misconceptions in an Astronomy Course for Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Majors," Astronomy Education Review, 2(1), 101.
Development of the SATA, a 34-question, five-point Likert scale questionnaire that measures four attitude subscales.

Len, P. M., 2006, "Different Reward Structures to Motivate Student Interaction with Electronic Response Systems in Astronomy," Astronomy Education Review, 5(2), 5.
Comparison of student populations divided by self-reported behavior when answering clicker questions, measured by the SATA and other surveys.