Gender differences in test anxiety and self-efficacy: why instructors should emphasize low-stakes formative assessments in physics courses

Abstract

Many prior studies have investigated female and male students’ self-efficacy (SE) in physics courses. However, test anxiety (TA) is rarely studied in the physics context, despite prior work suggesting it may play a detrimental role in the development of SE. In this study, we explore the relationships between SE, TA, and gender differences in introductory calculus-based physics performance. Although there has been research that uses TA and SE to predict student grades, no study to our knowledge has investigated this in the context of low- (e.g., homework and quizzes) and high-stakes (e.g., traditional exams) physics assessments. Using validated survey data and grade information, we compared the predictive power of SE and TA on student performance on a variety of assessment types. We found that there are gender differences in both SE and TA, as well as in high-stakes assessment outcomes. There were no gender differences in low-stakes assessment scores. Further, we found that models that control for SE and/or TA eliminate the predictive power of gender for high-stakes assessment outcomes. Finally, we found that SE partially mediates the effect of TA on high-stakes assessment outcomes. From these results, we make several suggestions for instructors that may alleviate the adverse effects of TA and make physics assessments more equitable and inclusive.

Investigating the Relations between Students’ Chemistry Mindset, Self-Efficacy, and Goal Orientation in General and Organic Chemistry Lecture Courses

“…The implementation of more frequent, low-stakes assessments for first-year students can provide them with more opportunities to learn from their mistakes and improve their study skills. 49 These frequent low-stakes assessments can also give students an increased sense of mastery, which can lead to increased self-efficacy and growth mindset beliefs. Other authors have noted that this type of formative feedback may increase self-efficacy 49 and that interventions that involve increased feedback can increase mastery-approach goal orientation.…”

Gender gaps in Mathematics and Language: The bias of competitive achievement tests

“…This condition is strongly and negatively related to self-efficacy and self-esteem and is more pronounced in high-stakes test contexts and perceived test difficulty [ 64 ]. It predominantly affects women [ 49 , 65 , 66 ], is strongly related to mathematics anxiety [ 67 ], and develops early in school [ 68 ].…”

How inclusiveness of learning environment predicts female and male students� physics grades and motivational beliefs in introductory physics courses

“…Some prior research suggests that individuals' course enrollment and performance in STEM can be influenced by their motivational beliefs such as self-efficacy, interest and identity in that domain [1][2][3]5,7,9,[14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. For students from underrepresented groups, these motivational characteristics might be undermined due to lack of encouragement, negative stereotypes, and inadequate prior preparation, leading to withdrawal from STEM fields [21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. Hence, investigating students' motivational characteristics is critical to understanding and addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion issues in STEM disciplines.…”