Relations of mathematics mindset, mathematics anxiety, mathematics identity, and mathematics self‐efficacy to STEM career choice: A structural equation modeling approach

Abstract

Several key factors have emerged from the literature contributing to the explanation of STEM participation (or lack of), including mathematics mindset, mathematics anxiety, mathematics identity, and mathematics self-efficacy. Despite the research on the relations of these variables to career interest, few studies have integrated them and examined their intertwined relations in one model. The purpose of this study was to use a structural equation modeling approach to answer the central question: To what extent are the factors of mathematics mindset, mathematics anxiety, mathematics identity, and mathematics self-efficacy related to each other and a STEM career choice? The results highlight a key finding that mathematics identity serves as a full mediator between mathematics mindset and STEM career interest as well as between mathematics anxiety and STEM career interest. K E Y W O R D S mathematics anxiety, mathematics identity, mathematics mindset, mathematics self-efficacy, STEM career choice | 285 CRIBBS et al.

Examining relationships between chemistry anxiety, chemistry identity, and chemistry career choice in terms of gender: a comparative study using multigroup structural equation modelling

“…A direct and significant correlation between chemistry anxiety and chemistry career choice was not found in the present study. This finding is also in line with a study that there was no significant direct correlation between math anxiety and career choice (Cribbs et al, 2021). Regarding the relationships between chemistry anxiety and chemistry identity, the current research found that female and male students' higher chemistry learning and test anxiety were linked with lower competence/performance beliefs, which are in line with Li et al's (2021) investigation.…”

“…In short, high levels of anxiety is an important factor that hinders adolescents' identity development. In addition, Cribbs et al (2021) also demonstrated that mathematical anxiety was a significant predictor of mathematical identity.…”

“…Although there are few studies conducted to examine the relationship between chemistry anxiety and chemistry career choice, studies in other fields have shown that anxiety is associated with a person's career choices. For example, studies conducted in math fields showed that math anxiety has an impact on students' math and STEM career choices (Ahmed, 2018;Cribbs et al, 2021). Given that chemistry anxiety is closely related to math anxiety (Eddy, 2000), this study provides information to examine the relationship between chemistry anxiety and career choices.…”

“…Research on understanding the relationship between anxiety, identity, and career choices is mostly in math fields, while these variables are domain-specific (Hosbein and Barbera, 2020;Daker et al, 2022). Secondly, previous studies examined identity and anxiety as unidimensional variables (Huang et al, 2018;Cribbs et al, 2021). However, as mentioned earlier, chemistry identity and chemistry anxiety are multidimensional variables (Hazari et al, 2010;Senocak and Baloglu, 2014).…”

The effect of teaching conceptual knowledge on students’ achievement, anxiety about, and attitude toward mathematics

“…Students often have mathematics anxiety, and they think mathematics is a dreaded subject (Capinding, 2022). This anxiety impedes students' development and improvement in their mathematics competence (Cribbs et al, 2021;James et al, 2013). A study conducted by Capinding (2022) on students in high school, the results found that there was a negative relationship between anxiety and mathematical performance.…”