Page 113 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

Chapter 4
4.3.2 Sample
Eight secondary schools in di erent geographical regions in the Netherlands were contacted to determine their interest in participating in our research on self-e cacy related to university preparation. Five schools were willing to do so. From these schools, 759 pre-university students in grades 10 and 11 completed two questionnaires that measured the variables of interest, a er we had obtained parental consent (22 students were ill at the time of data gathering, and three students did not have parental consent to participate). e sample was balanced in gender (50.5% girls) and grades (51.9% grade 10). A small majority of students (54.9%) did science coursework; the other students took humanities/social sciences coursework. Of all Dutch pre-university students, 53% are female and 60% undertake science coursework (Platform Bèta Techniek, 2014), so our sample reasonably resembles the population. e ages of the participants ranged from 13 years and six months to 20 years and two months, with an average age of 16 years and nine months. We also asked students if one or both of their parents had attended university; most of them indicated that neither parent had attended university (65.4%), 21.3% of students noted that one parent was educated at a university level, and 13.3% had two university-educated parents.
4.3.3 Measures
Need for cognition was measured with the e cient version of the Need for Cognition Scale by Cacioppo, Petty, and Kao (1984), using an 18-item 5-point Likert questionnaire. Sample items included, “I would prefer simple to complex problems” and “ inking is not my idea of fun” (both reverse-coded). is questionnaire was translated into Dutch, using a back-translation procedure. Previous research a rmed that this scale consists of one factor and has good internal consistency (Sadowski, 1993). Similarly, we found α = .83.
Academic interest was de ned as a desire to gain academic knowledge in one’s eld of interest and to conduct research-based activities because the person nds it inherently interesting or enjoyable. e items were based on the Scienti c Attitude Inventory II (SAI II; Moore & Foy, 1997). Academic interest was measured with six items, a er removing redundant items, identi ed in a pilot test. Sample items were “I like the idea of gaining academic knowledge in the eld of my interest” and “I hope to one day get a job that includes doing research”. To ensure the items were not skewed in the favour of people who were interested in pursuing a science career, as opposed to students with humanities or social
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