Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
DOI 10.1007/s11165-007-9075-4
Students’ Attitudes Toward Chemistry
Lessons: The Interaction Effect between Grade Level
and Gender
Derek Cheung
Published online: 8 December 2007
# Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2007
Abstract The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the interaction effect
between grade level and gender with respect to students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons
taught in secondary schools. The sample consisted of 954 chemistry students in grades
Secondary 4–7 (approximately 16–19 years of age) in Hong Kong. Students' attitudes were
surveyed using an attitude toward chemistry lessons scale (ATCLS), and subscale scores
were produced on four dimensions: liking for chemistry theory lessons; liking for chemistry
laboratory work; evaluative beliefs about school chemistry; and behavioral tendencies to
learn chemistry. When the ATCLS data were subjected to two-way MANOVA, the
interaction effect between grade level and gender on students' attitudes toward chemistry
lessons was statistically significant. The interaction effect was attributable to scores on the
theory lessons subscale and laboratory work subscale. Male students in Secondary 4 and 5
liked chemistry theory lessons more than their female counterparts. However, male
students' liking for chemistry laboratory work declined when they progressed from
Secondary 4 to Secondary 7; no such a significant decline in attitude toward chemistry
laboratory work was found in females. Overall, both males and females were just
marginally positive about chemistry lessons during the years of secondary schooling.
Implications of these findings for curriculum design are discussed.
Keywords Attitude change . Attitude measures . Chemical education . Gender differences .
Secondary education
Introduction
Attitudes, like academic achievement, are important outcomes of science education in
secondary school. The development of students' positive attitudes regarding science as a
school subject is one of the major responsibilities of every science teacher. Unfortunately,
D. Cheung (*)
Department of Curriculum and Instruction, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong
e-mail: [email protected]
DO9075; No of Pages
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research has revealed that much of what goes on in science classrooms is not particularly
attractive to students across all ages (Stark and Gray 1999).
It is important to develop students' positive attitudes to science lessons in school due to
two main reasons. Research has confirmed that attitudes are linked with academic
achievement. For example, Weinburgh's (1995) meta-analysis of research concluded that
the correlation between attitude toward science and achievement is 0.50 for boys and 0.55
for girls, indicating that attitude can account for 25–30% of the variance in achievement.
Using a posttest-only control group design, Freedman (1997) found that the correlation
between attitude toward science and achievement was 0.41 in the treatment group. Salta and
Tzougraki (2004) reported that the correlation between high school students' achievement in
chemistry and their attitudes toward chemistry ranged from 0.24 to 0.41. Bennett, Rollnick,
Green and White (2001) also discovered that undergraduate students who had a less positive
attitude to chemistry almost invariably obtained lower examination marks.
Another reason why it is important to develop students' positive attitudes toward science
lessons taught in school is that attitudes predict behaviors (Glasman and Albarracín 2006; Kelly
1988). For example, Kelly (1988) found that British students' liking for a particular science
subject was a good predictor of their actual choice of physics, chemistry, or biology in schools.
Furthermore, research has revealed that students show different attitudes to physics,
chemistry, and biology in school (Barnes et al. 2005; Harvey and Stables 1986; Hofstein et
al. 1977; Kahle and Meece 1994; Murphy and Whitelegg 2006; Osborne and Collins 2001;
Spall et al. 2004; Stables and Wikeley 1997; Steinkamp and Maehr 1984). Girls tend to
respond more positively to biological sciences than to physical sciences (Foster 1967;
Gardner 1975; Johnson 1987; Kelly 1988; Ramsden 1998; Stables 1990; Stark and Gray
1999; Warrington and Younger 2000). Havard (1996) found that advanced-level students in
the UK least enjoy studying physics and thus he suggested that the reference to ‘science’ in
attitude research is too broad and research must deal with individual sciences separately if
the findings are not to be distorted. Spall et al. (2004) also urged researchers to distinguish
between different branches of science.
However, to my knowledge, only nine previous studies examined secondary school
students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons taught in ordinary classrooms (Barnes et al.
2005; Dhindsa and Chung 1999; Harvey and Stables 1986; Hofstein et al. 1977; Menis
1983, 1989; Salta and Tzougraki 2004; Shannon et al. 1982; Steinkamp and Maehr 1984).
Although these nine studies are informative, some of them have produced mixed results.
For example, in Brunei, Dhindsa and Chung (1999) explored Form 5 students' enjoyment
of chemistry learning and reported that females enjoyed chemistry lessons more than males.
In contrast, in a study of third year secondary school students in England, Harvey and Stables
(1986) found that males had a more positive attitude toward chemistry than girls. Hofstein
et al. (1977) surveyed a sample of grades 11 and 12 students in Israel and found that there
was a decline in attitude toward the study of chemistry when students progressed from
grade 11 to grade 12. On the other hand, in the USA, Menis (1989) reported that grade 12
students showed a more positive attitude toward chemistry in school than grade 11 students.
Why did some previous studies generate mixed results? One of the possible reasons is
that none of the above nine previous studies investigated the interaction effect (Kachigan
1991) between grade level and gender on student attitudes toward chemistry lessons. This is
critically important because attitude research in science education has indicated that grade
level and gender can interact with each other (Aiken 1979; Doherty and Dawe 1985;
George 2006; Greenfield 1997). In other words, gender differences in student attitudes
toward chemistry lessons may vary across grade levels. Therefore, if there is a significant
interaction effect, attitudinal data should not be combined from both sexes or from several
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
77
grade levels when the data are analyzed, otherwise potentially significant relationships will
be concealed.
Additionally, attitude is a multidimensional concept and research has confirmed that the
interaction effect between grade level and gender may be present on certain dimensions
only (Greenfield 1997). Thus, if researchers do not consider the multidimensionality of
their attitudinal data, they may fail to detect significant interaction effect between gender
and grade level (see, for example, Simpson and Oliver 1985). Rennie and Parker (1987)
also demonstrated that results can be misinterpreted if attitudinal data are analyzed without
considering scale dimensionality or population heterogeneity attributable to sex and class.
The purpose of the present study was to determine whether there is a significant
interaction effect between gender and grade level on students' attitudes toward chemistry
lessons implemented in secondary schools. The sample consisted of 954 chemistry students
in Hong Kong. This paper is organized in three parts. First, previous research on students'
attitudes toward chemistry lessons taught in secondary schools is reviewed, paying special
attention to the mixed results generated by past research studies. Second, the methodology
of the present study is described. Finally, results of the study are presented and discussed.
Previous Research
An attitude may be defined as a predisposition to respond in a favorable or unfavorable
manner with respect to a given attitude object (Oskamp and Schultz 2005). The attitude
object can be anything, such as chemistry, chemists, chemistry lessons, chemistry topics
taught in school, chemical education research, and industrial chemistry. The focus of this
paper is on secondary school students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons taught in ordinary
classrooms. The term ‘lessons’ refers to both theory classes and laboratory classes in
secondary school. Thus, the scope of the present study was limited to chemistry as
experienced by students in secondary school rather than out-of-school experiences obtained
from external sources such as the media, museums, field trips, and friends.
To locate relevant previous studies, computer searches of three databases were
conducted: Australian Education Index, Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC),
and British Education index. Only nine research reports written in English were found
(Barnes et al. 2005; Dhindsa and Chung 1999; Harvey and Stables 1986; Hofstein et al.
1977; Menis 1983, 1989; Salta and Tzougraki 2004; Shannon et al. 1982; Steinkamp and
Maehr 1984). As indicated earlier, none of these nine studies explored the interaction effect
between gender and grade level on student attitudes toward chemistry lessons. A number of
curriculum evaluation projects included student attitude to chemistry as one of the
dependent variables (e.g., Adesoji and Raimi 2004; Thompson and Soyibo 2002), but they
are not reviewed in this paper because they focused on the effectiveness of a curricular or
instructional innovation rather than the attitudes of males and females toward chemistry
lessons at different levels of schooling. Also, previous studies (e.g., Lang et al. 2005) which
merely used student attitude toward chemistry as a variable to correlate with other
constructs are not included in this review. The findings of the nine previous studies are
summarized below.
Gender Differences in Student Attitudes toward Chemistry Lessons
Hofstein et al. (1977) is probably the first published report on gender differences in
secondary school students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons. They adapted the Physics
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Attitude Scale used by Tamir et al. (1974) to form a 76-item Chemistry Attitude Scale. The
items were placed in four categories: the study of chemistry in high school; the social and
economic image of chemistry; the role of chemistry at the national-political level; and the
masculine-feminine image of chemistry. Using the Chemistry Attitude Scale, they surveyed
300 grades 11 and 12 high school students (16–18 years of age) in Israel. Hofstein et al.
found that girls had a more positive attitude toward the study of chemistry than boys, but
they pooled the data on the two grade levels.
Steinkamp and Maehr (1984) conducted a meta-analysis of research on school science
reported between the years of 1965 and 1981. They concluded that girls' attitudes toward
chemistry are more positive than boys'. Similarly, in Brunei, Dhindsa and Chung (1999)
reported that female students enjoyed learning chemistry more than male students, but their
research involved Form 5 students only. They used a 22-item Likert scale with four
components: enjoyment, motivation, anxiety, and importance of chemistry. They claimed
that the items were obtained from published research, but no sources were given. Using a
questionnaire with a semantic differential format, Shannon et al. (1982) surveyed the
attitudes to science subjects of 830 year 11 students in Sydney, Australia. They reported
that females found chemistry more enjoyable than males.
However, not all previous studies documented that girls had a more positive attitude
toward the study of chemistry than boys. Salta and Tzougraki (2004), for example,
surveyed 576 high school students in Greece using an attitude scale with four subscales: the
difficulty of chemistry course; the interest of chemistry course; the usefulness of chemistry
course for students' future career; and the importance of chemistry for students' life. They
found no gender differences in student attitudes regarding interest, usefulness, and
importance of chemistry, but the interaction effect of gender and grade was not examined.
Three previous studies found that boys showed a more positive attitude to learning
chemistry than girls. In Israel, Menis (1983) adapted Aiken's (1979) questionnaire to
measure a sample of grade 10 students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons. Questionnaire
items were categorized into four dimensions: interest and fascination in chemistry; use of
chemistry; enjoyment of chemistry; and importance of chemistry. Menis concluded that
boys showed a more positive attitude to learning chemistry than girls, but his research
examined one particular year group. Harvey and Stables (1986) reported an England study
that surveyed 2,311 third-year secondary school students' attitudes toward science, physics,
chemistry, biology, and school. Boys were found to have a more positive attitude toward
chemistry than girls. In Australia, Barnes et al. (2005) explored sex differences in enrolment
intentions expressed by 449 year 10 students from five high schools in Sydney. They used
three items to measure student interest in chemistry and concluded that males found
chemistry more interesting than females.
Changes in Student Attitudes toward Chemistry Lessons across Grade Levels
The effect of grade level on student attitudes was rarely studied by chemistry educators;
most past studies considered science generally. Only two previous studies examined
changes in secondary school students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons across grade
levels. As indicated above, Hofstein et al. (1977) surveyed 300 grades 11 and 12 high
school students in Israel. They found a decline in the attitude toward the study of chemistry
when students progressed from grade 11 to grade 12. However, how grade level interacted
with gender was not investigated in their study. In contrast, Menis (1989) reported that
grade 12 students had a more positive attitude toward school chemistry than grade 11
students. His sample consisted of 2,804 grade 11 and 656 grade 12 students in the USA. He
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
79
used seven items to measure students' attitudes toward school chemistry, but the items did
not specify chemistry explicitly. Also, the interaction between grade level and gender was
not investigated by Menis.
Research Methodology
Instrument
Two types of instruments have been commonly used in attitude research in science
education: semantic differential scales (e.g., Shannon et al. 1982; Reid and Skryabina
2002), and Likert scales (e.g., Dhindsa and Chung 1999; Menis 1983). Schibeci (1982)
suggested that high school students' general attitudes to science can be measured with the
semantic differential technique, but if more specific attitudes are to be measured, Likert
scales are more appropriate. Simpson and Oliver (1990) also found that Likert-type items
had produced the highest reliability when several formats were tested.
In the present study, the Attitude Toward Chemistry Lessons Scale (ATCLS) developed
by Cheung (2007) was used to survey a sample of secondary school students in Hong
Kong. The ATCLS consisted of 12 items with a Likert format. They were written in
Chinese and constructed on the basis of a four-dimension conceptual framework. The 12
items have been translated into English for reader information in Table 1. Students
responded to the items on a 7-point rating scale with labels strongly disagree, moderately
disagree, slightly disagree, not sure, slightly agree, moderately agree, and strongly agree. A
scale with seven points was used to increase the reliability of data. A combination of
positively and negatively worded items was often used by attitude researchers to reduce the
effects of acquiescence and other response biases. However, research has indicated that
negative items, written as reversals of positive items, may load on a separate factor, forming
a measurement artifact (Miller and Cleary 1993; Pilotte and Gable 1990; Schmitt and Stults
1985). Therefore, negatively worded items were not included in ATCLS.
According to social psychologists, attitude is an internal state and thus is not directly
observable. The existence of an attitude can only be inferred from observable attitudinal
Table 1 Attitude toward chemistry lessons scale
Subscale
Subscale 1: Liking for chemistry theory
lessons
Item
I like chemistry more than any other school subjects.
Chemistry lessons are interesting.
Chemistry is one of my favourite subjects.
Subscale 2: Liking for chemistry
I like to do chemistry experiments.
laboratory work
When I am working in the chemistry lab, I feel I am doing
something important.
Doing chemistry experiments in school is fun.
Subscale 3: Evaluative beliefs about
Chemistry is useful for solving everyday problems.
school chemistry
People must understand chemistry because it affects their lives.
Chemistry is one of the most important subjects for people to
study.
Subscale 4: Behavioral tendencies to learn I am willing to spend more time reading chemistry books.
chemistry
I like trying to solve new problems in chemistry.
If I had a chance, I would do a project in chemistry.
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Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
responses (Eagly and Chaiken 1998; Krosnick et al. 2005). There are generally three classes
of attitudinal responses: affective, cognitive, and behavioral (Oskamp and Schultz 2005).
The 12 items were randomly distributed in the ATCLS and formed four subscales (Table 1).
The first subscale focuses on the feelings a student has toward the chemistry theory lessons
implemented in school, while the second subscale evaluates whether a student likes
chemistry laboratory classes in school. Thus, these two subscales are concerned with
affective attitudinal responses. The third subscale is cognitive in nature; it refers to the
beliefs that a student holds about the importance and usefulness of school chemistry. The
fourth subscale is concerned with a student's behavioral tendencies to respond to school
chemistry. It is important to note that an attitude is not behavior; rather it is an action
tendency to respond in a particular way to the attitude object (Eagly and Chaiken 2005).
The 12 ATCLS items were subjected to confirmatory factor analysis to examine the
construct validity of data. Each item was allowed to load on only one factor (i.e., the
dimension of the attitudinal response that the item had been constructed to measure), and
the errors of measurement associated with all items were posited to be uncorrelated. Fit
indices generated by the LISREL program showed that there was a good fit between the
hypothesized four-dimension model and the observed data (e.g., goodness of fit index=
0.96, normed fit index=0.95, comparative fit index=0.96). The Cronbach's alphas for the
four subscales ranged from 0.76 to 0.86, indicating that the student data were of adequate
reliability. The empirical evidence for the construct validity and reliability of ATCLS data
has been described in detail in an earlier paper (Cheung 2007). This paper concerns only
the interaction effect between gender and grade level.
Sample
In Hong Kong, secondary schooling consists of 7 years (Secondary 1–7), and academic
year in secondary schools begins in September. Chemistry is offered as a separate subject to
Secondary 4–7 students (approximately 16–19 years of age). The 12-item ATCLS was
administered to a convenience sample of Secondary 4–7 chemistry students in six
secondary schools in December 2006, close to the middle of the academic year in Hong
Kong. The students were of a wide spectrum of socio-economic backgrounds and had a
large diversity in intellectual ability. Although the data were cross-sectional rather than
longitudinal, males and females opted out of chemistry at very similar rates across grade
levels in the six schools and thus the cross-sectional sample still provided a fair basis for
comparing students in different years.
The chemistry teachers administered the ATCLS to students in their classrooms during
regular chemistry periods. The survey was anonymous. All participation in the survey was
voluntary and no incentives were offered. A total of 954 students completed the ATCLS.
The numbers of students responding in Secondary 4, 5, 6, and 7 were 278, 269, 258 and
148, respectively. Seventy-two percent of the students were male.
Data Analysis
Student responses to the ATCLS items were coded on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 7
(strongly agree) so that higher scores represented more positive attitudes. Using the SPSS
program, a two-way multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted to
determine the interaction effect between grade level and gender on the four subscale scores.
Two-way MANOVA is appropriate because the four subscales are positively correlated
(Cheung 2007). If the two-way MANOVA test indicates that there is a statistically
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
81
significant interaction effect between grade level and gender, then follow-up statistical tests
will be conducted to locate where the interaction effect is significant.
Results and Discussion
The results for the two-way MANOVA indicated a significant main effect for grade level
(Wilks' lambda=0.968, F (12, 2,490)=2.587, p<0.005), a significant main effect for gender
(Wilks' lambda=0.979, F (4, 941)=5.145, p<0.001), and a significant interaction between
grade level and gender (Wilks' lambda=0.975, F (12, 2,490)=1.959, p<0.05).
Because the interaction between grade level and gender was significant, I examined
the differences among grade levels for male and female students separately. The results
of the one-way MANOVA test for male students are summarized in Table 2. Significant
differences were found among grade levels on the four subscale scores, Wilks' lambda=
0.943, F (12, 1,799)=3.351, p<0.001. The multivariate eta squared, η2, indicates the
effect size, and a value of 0.019 means that only 1.9% of multivariate variance of the
dependable variables was associated with grade level. On a 1–7 rating scale from
‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’, the scores averaged between 4 (not sure) and 5
(slightly agree) on the four subscales, indicating that males generally were not
enthusiastic about school chemistry. Researchers such as Menis (1983) and Larson
(1996) also found similar results.
Univariate analyses of variances (ANOVAs) on each subscale were conducted as followup tests to the one-way MANOVA. Because four ANOVAs were involved, the probability
of committing Type I error (i.e., rejecting the null hypothesis when it is in fact true) would
increase. To control for Type I error across the four ANOVAs, I used the Bonferroni method
(Green and Salkind 2005; Hair et al. 1998), which states that the alpha level used in any
separate test should be adjusted by dividing the alpha level by the number of tests. Thus, I
used a more stringent alpha level to reduce the probability of committing Type I error; each
ANOVA was tested at the 0.05 divided by 4 or 0.0125 level. As can be seen in Table 2, the
differences across grade levels were significant on the first and second subscales. But the
small effect sizes indicate weak relationships between grade levels and the changes in
males' attitudes on these two subscales. Post hoc analyses to the univariate ANOVAs were
conducted. With the Bonferroni method to control for Type I error, each pairwise
comparison was tested at the alpha level for the ANOVA divided by the total number of
comparison (i.e., 0.0125 divided by 6 or 0.002). Secondary 4 male students' liking for
Table 2 Relationships between subscale means and grade level for males
Subscale
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
Grade level
S4 mean
(SD)
S5 mean
(SD)
S6 mean
(SD)
S7 mean
(SD)
4.69
5.23
4.65
4.39
5.05
5.07
4.75
4.40
4.65
4.87
4.46
4.17
4.61
4.58
4.36
4.06
(1.29)
(1.13)
(1.04)
(1.20)
(1.28)
(1.38)
(1.31)
(1.19)
(1.35)
(1.23)
(1.23)
(1.16)
(1.53)
(1.40)
(1.32)
(1.51)
F
Sig.
η2
3.818
6.963
3.144
2.693
0.010
0.000
0.025
0.045
0.016
0.030
0.014
0.012
Numbers of male students in Secondary 4, 5, 6 and 7 were 231, 184, 171 and 101, respectively. Means were
based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks' lambda=0.943, F(12, 1,799)=3.351, p<0.001. The multivariate η2 =0.019.
Univariate F-tests with (3, 683) degrees of freedom.
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Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
chemistry laboratory work was significantly greater than Secondary 7 male students'. All
the other pairwise comparisons on the four subscales were nonsignificant.
The results of the one-way MANOVA test for female students are summarized in
Table 3. Significant differences were found among grade levels on the four subscale scores,
Wilks' lambda=0.910, F (12, 683)=2.069, p<0.05. Like males, females' scores averaged
between 4 (not sure) and 5 (slightly agree) on the four subscales. ANOVAs on each
subscale were conducted as follow-up tests to the one-way MANOVA. Using the
Bonferroni method, each ANOVA was tested at the 0.0125 level. Only the difference
across grade levels on the first subscale was significant. Post hoc analyses to the univariate
ANOVAs were conducted and each pairwise comparison was tested at the 0.002 level. It
was found that Secondary 6 female students' liking for chemistry theory lessons was
significantly greater than Secondary 4 female students'. All the other pairwise comparisons
on the four subscales were nonsignificant.
To compare the mean scores of the two sexes, I conducted one-way MANOVA test for
each of the four grade levels separately and the results are summarized in Tables 4, 5, 6 and
7. Table 4 shows that the one-way MANOVA on the four subscale scores for Secondary 4
students with gender as the factor was significant, Wilks lambda=0.959, F(4, 273)=2.911,
p<0.05. ANOVAs on each subscale were conducted as follow-up tests to the one-way
MANOVA. Using the Bonferroni method to control for Type I error across the four tests,
each ANOVA was tested at the 0.05 divided by 4 or 0.0125 level. The difference between
males and females on the first subscale was significant; Secondary 4 males reported greater
liking for chemistry theory lessons than females.
As can be seen in Table 5, the one-way MANOVA on the four subscale scores for
Secondary 5 students with gender as the factor was also significant, Wilks lambda=0.926,
F(4, 263)=5.256, p<0.001. ANOVAs on each subscale were conducted as follow-up tests
to the one-way MANOVA. Using the Bonferroni method to control for Type I error across
the four tests, each ANOVA was tested at the 0.0125 level. The difference between males
and females on the first subscale was significant; Secondary 5 males liked chemistry theory
lessons significantly more than Secondary 4 females.
The one-way MANOVA on the four subscale scores for Secondary 6 students with
gender as the factor was nonsignificant, Wilks lambda=0.971, F(4, 253)=1.894, p=0.112
(Table 6). Also, the one-way MANOVA on the four subscale scores for Secondary 7
students with gender as the factor was nonsignificant, Wilks lambda=0.955, F(4, 143)=
1.690, p=0.156 (Table 7).
Table 3 Relationships between subscale means and grade level for females
Subscale
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
Grade level
S4 mean
(SD)
S5 mean
(SD)
S6 mean
(SD)
S7 mean
(SD)
3.99
4.78
4.44
3.98
4.50
4.99
4.91
4.17
4.94
5.24
4.79
4.42
4.55
4.92
4.79
4.23
(1.58)
(1.47)
(1.17)
(1.26)
(1.20)
(1.08)
(1.01)
(1.18)
(1.21)
(1.20)
(0.80)
(1.12)
(1.47)
(1.30)
(0.95)
(1.42)
F
Sig.
η2
5.261
1.617
2.510
1.408
0.002
0.186
0.059
0.241
0.057
0.018
0.028
0.016
Numbers of female students in Secondary 4, 5, 6 and 7 were 47, 84, 87 and 47, respectively. Means were
based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks' lambda=0.910, F(12, 683)=2.069, p<0.05. The multivariate η2 =0.031.
Univariate F-tests with (3, 261) degrees of freedom.
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
83
Table 4 Secondary 4 students' subscale means by gender
Subscale
Male mean (SD)
Female mean (SD)
F
Sig.
η2
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
4.69
5.23
4.65
4.39
3.99
4.78
4.44
3.98
10.646
5.517
1.599
4.580
0.001
0.020
0.207
0.033
0.037
0.020
0.006
0.016
(1.29)
(1.13)
(1.04)
(1.20)
(1.58)
(1.47)
(1.17)
(1.26)
There were 231 male and 47 female students in Secondary 4. Means were based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks'
lambda=0.959, F(4, 273)=2.911, p<0.05. The multivariate η2 =0.041. Univariate F-tests with (1, 276)
degrees of freedom.
A graphic display of the interactions between gender and grade level for the four
subscales is shown in Fig. 1. For the Liking for Chemistry Theory Lessons subscale
(Fig. 1a), across the four grade levels, only the difference between female students' mean
scores in Secondary 4 and Secondary 6 was significant. When the mean scores of the two
sexes were compared at each grade level, Secondary 4 males liked chemistry theory lessons
significantly more than Secondary 4 females and Secondary 5 males liked theory lessons
significantly more than Secondary 5 females. These findings are largely consistent with
those obtained in previous studies (e.g., Barnes et al. 2005; Harvey and Stables 1986).
Therefore, although males started out liking theory lessons more than females, their
attitudes remained just marginally positive across grades Secondary 4–7 (mean scores
varied between 4.61 and 5.05). The majority of Secondary 4 females were not sure whether
they liked chemistry theory lessons, but their attitudes improved when they progressed from
Secondary 4 to Secondary 6. Unfortunately, female students' development of a positive
attitude toward chemistry theory lesson appeared to halt during Secondary 7. Overall, the
sex differences decreased as students progressed through secondary schooling.
For the Liking for Chemistry Laboratory Work subscale (Fig. 1b), the attitudes of both
male and female students were slightly positive (mean scores varied between 4.58 and
5.24). Across grade levels, males' attitudes to chemistry lessons as expressed by their liking
for chemistry laboratory work showed a significant decline from Secondary 4 (mean score
5.23) to Secondary 7 (mean score 4.58), but there was no such a significant change in
female attitudes. No significant gender difference at each grade level was found on this
subscale. These findings are inconsistent with those found by Dhindsa and Chung (1999)
but quite consistent with those reported by Hofstein, Ben-Zvi and Samuel (1976). Dhindsa
and Chung's (1999) study focused on Form 5 students in Brunei. They reported that females
enjoyed chemistry laboratory work more than males. Hofstein et al. (1976) measured 505
10th, 11th and 12th grade students' attitudes toward chemistry laboratory work in Israeli
high schools, but they did not examine the interaction effect between grade level and
Table 5 Secondary 5 students' subscale means by gender
Subscale
Male mean (SD)
Female mean (SD)
F
Sig.
η2
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
5.05
5.07
4.75
4.40
4.50
4.99
4.91
4.17
10.940
0.211
0.964
2.024
0.001
0.646
0.327
0.156
0.040
0.001
0.004
0.008
(1.28)
(1.38)
(1.31)
(1.19)
(1.20)
(1.08)
(1.01)
(1.18)
There were 184 male and 84 female students in Secondary 5. Means were based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks'
lambda=0.926, F(4, 263)=5.256, p<0.001. The multivariate η2 =0.074. Univariate F-tests with (1, 266)
degrees of freedom.
84
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
Table 6 Secondary 6 students' subscale means by gender
Subscale
Male mean (SD)
Female mean (SD)
F
Sig.
η2
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
4.65
4.87
4.46
4.17
4.94
5.24
4.79
4.42
2.821
5.376
5.088
2.612
0.094
0.021
0.025
0.107
0.011
0.021
0.019
0.010
(1.35)
(1.23)
(1.23)
(1.16)
(1.21)
(1.20)
(0.80)
(1.12)
There were 171 male and 87 female students in Secondary 6. Means were based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks'
lambda=0.971, F(4, 253)=1.894, p=0.112. The multivariate η2 =0.029. Univariate F-tests with (1, 256)
degrees of freedom.
gender. They found that girls and boys did not differ in the attitudes toward laboratory work
in chemistry, and 12th grade male and female students had a less positive attitude toward
chemistry laboratory work than their 10th and 11th grade counterparts.
For the Evaluative Beliefs subscale (Fig. 1c) and Behavioral Tendencies subscale
(Fig. 1d), although we can see some fluctuations in the mean scores, no statistically
significant changes in attitudes across grade levels and between the two sexes were
detected. Both male and female students just experienced marginally positive attitudes,
however. Dhindsa and Chung (1999), in Brunei, similarly found that there were no gender
differences when they examined Form 5 students' perceptions of the importance of
chemistry and their tendencies to learn more chemistry. Thus, there is no evidence that the
chemistry curricula implemented in the six schools in Hong Kong have affected students'
beliefs about the importance of school chemistry and behavioral tendencies to learn
chemistry in any positive ways. This seems to be a worldwide problem in school chemistry.
For example, Rop (1999) criticized the chemical education in the USA. He argued that the
school chemistry is not good enough because it does not help students understand what
happens in daily things and fails to stimulate their desire to learn. He pointed out that
educational researchers are “good at saying that subjects such as chemistry are important in
themselves and important components of a liberal education” (p. 233), but they are not very
good at “forming or articulating honest reasons or incentives for learning difficult things
such as real chemistry–those reasons which will convince students who are understandably
skeptical of the use value of what they learn” (p. 233).
How can educators improve student attitudes toward chemistry lessons? Research has
shown that the quality of science teaching is an important determinant of student attitudes
toward school science (Ebenezer and Zoller 1993; Osborne et al. 2003; Papanastasiou and
Papanastasiou 2004; Sundberg et al. 1994). For example, Papanastasiou and Papanastasiou
(2004) found that the strongest direct influence on student attitudes toward science is that of
teaching. Their research was based on the TIMSS data on 8th grade students in Australia,
Table 7 Secondary 7 students' subscale means by gender
Subscale
Male mean (SD)
Female mean (SD)
F
Sig.
η2
Liking for theory lessons
Liking for lab work
Evaluative beliefs
Behavioral tendencies
4.61
4.58
4.36
4.06
4.55
4.92
4.79
4.23
0.052
1.954
3.923
0.463
0.819
0.164
0.050
0.497
0.000
0.013
0.026
0.003
(1.53)
(1.40)
(1.32)
(1.51)
(1.47)
(1.30)
(0.95)
(1.42)
There were 101 male and 47 female students in Secondary 7. Means were based on a scale of 1 to 7. Wilks'
lambda=0.955, F(4, 143)=1.690, p=0.156. The multivariate η2 =0.045. Univariate F-tests with (1, 146)
degrees of freedom.
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
a
5.5
Mean Scores
5.0
Males
4.5
Females
4.0
3.5
S4
S5
S6
S7
Grade
b
5.5
Mean Scores
5.0
Males
4.5
Females
4.0
3.5
S4
S5
S6
S7
Grade
c
5.5
Mean Scores
5.0
Males
4.5
Females
4.0
3.5
S4
S5
S6
S7
Grade
d
5.5
5.0
Mean Scores
Fig. 1 Changes in male and
female students' attitudes by
grade levels. a Liking for chemistry theory lessons. b Liking for
chemistry laboratory work. c
Evaluative beliefs about school
chemistry. d Behavioural tendencies to learn chemistry
85
Males
4.5
Females
4.0
3.5
S4
S5
S6
Grade
S7
86
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
Canada, Cyprus, and Korea. The results of the present study (Fig. 1) suggest that male and
female students may need different interventions to facilitate them to develop a more
positive attitude toward chemistry lessons. For males, it is worrying that their liking for
chemistry laboratory work declined across grades Secondary 4–7 (Fig. 1b). Also, males'
liking for chemistry theory lessons, beliefs about the importance of school chemistry, and
behavioral tendencies to learn chemistry as a school subject appeared to decline across
grades Secondary 5–7 (see Fig. 1a,c, and d), though the differences were not statistically
significant at the 0.002 level.
That males' liking for chemistry laboratory work declined across Secondary 4–7 is a
disturbing finding. Something must be wrong with the chemistry laboratory work
implemented in Hong Kong secondary schools. The reasons why males' liking for
chemistry laboratory work declined when they progressed from Secondary 4 to Secondary
7 were not investigated in the present study. One plausible reason is that males do not like
the cookbook-style practical work implemented in most laboratory classes in Hong Kong
schools. Another plausible explanation is that males do not see the links between the
laboratory work and their lives outside the chemistry laboratory.
Students' attitudes toward science can be improved by targeted learning activities (Parker
et al. 1995), and the positive effect of laboratory work on student attitudes toward science
or chemistry has been confirmed by research (Adesoji and Raimi 2004; Wolf and Fraser
2007; Wong and Fraser 1996). A recent empirical study by Wolf and Fraser (2007)
indicated that inquiry-based laboratory work has differential effectiveness for male and
female American seventh-grade students. They found that inquiry-based laboratory
activities can make males enjoy science lessons more than females because males are
enthusiastic about devising their own experiments. Furthermore, in a study conducted in
Singapore, Wong and Fraser (1996) found that secondary school students' enjoyment of
chemistry lessons was positively correlated with chemistry laboratory activities which were
linked with theory classes. They also discovered that open-ended laboratory work could
result in less favorable student attitudes toward scientific inquiry in chemistry. These
findings suggest that Hong Kong chemistry teachers may make laboratory work more
‘male-friendly’ by integrating guided inquiry rather than open inquiry laboratory work into
the existing chemistry curriculum. Ten examples of inquiry-based chemistry experiments
have been developed in Hong Kong and organized into a teacher's guide (Cheung 2006).
However, implementation of inquiry-based laboratory work poses many challenges for
Hong Kong chemistry teachers. One main hurdle teachers must overcome is large class
size. There are usually 40 students in a chemistry class in Secondary 4 and 5. Even in
Secondary 6 and 7, a chemistry class can be crowded with as many as 35 students.
Instructional strategies have been designed by Cheung (2008) to implement inquiry-based
laboratory work in large classes and they have been successfully pilot-tested in seven
secondary schools in Hong Kong. But it is not known how extensively these instructional
strategies have been used in other schools.
Contrary to expectation, the present study found that females' attitudes toward chemistry
lessons did not decline over the years of secondary schooling. Their attitudes appeared to
increase positively between Secondary 4 and Secondary 6 (Fig. 1). After reaching the peak
in Secondary 6, their attitudes dropped during Secondary 7. The decline in females'
attitudes during Secondary 7 is puzzling. There are at least two possible explanations.
Females and males come to school with different sets of needs due to the ways in which
they are socialized in their families and in contemporary culture (Koch 2007). Recently,
Cousins (2007) interviewed 15 male and 15 female Year 12 chemistry students in an
Australian school. He discovered that females were more pragmatic than males when asked
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
87
why they selected chemistry. The focus of females was mainly on the requirement or
benefits of chemistry for entry to tertiary study. In Hong Kong, Secondary 7 students have
to submit their applications for admission to universities. Perhaps they generally find that
chemistry is not a major requirement for entry to their favorable university programs and so
their attitudes toward chemistry lessons drop during Secondary 7. Another possible
explanation may relate to public examinations in Hong Kong. Secondary 7 female students,
like their male counterparts, have to take ‘high-stakes’ public examinations at the end of
Secondary 7 and thus experience a lot of pressures. Consequently, during Secondary 7 their
attitudes to chemistry are less favorable than those in earlier grades. However, further
research is needed to uncover the real explanations for the decline in Secondary 7 females'
attitudes to chemistry lessons.
It is important to note that the attitudes of female students started out lower than their
male peers on all the four subscales (Fig. 1), although the gender differences on the second,
third, and fourth subscales did not reach statistical significance at the 0.0125 level. This
should be a red flag to chemistry teachers in Hong Kong. They should make efforts during
Secondary 4 to bring females to the same starting level of attitude as males. Research has
indicated that female students are usually underinvolved in science lessons, feel school
science uninteresting, and find that the science curriculum has no connection to their daily
lives (Meyer 1998; Parker et al. 1995). As noted by Rop (1997), “Girls, particularly, have a
strong need to know why they are learning about things and how it is connected to the way
the real world works” (p. 60). Frazer and Shotts (1987) also found that female students,
compared with male peers, considered learning about chemicals in everyday life to be more
important. In a qualitative study involving 144 16-year-old students in the UK, Osborne
and Collins (2001) were surprised to find that “the subject that attracted the most vehement
expression for its lack of relevance and appeal was chemistry” (pp. 448–449). In Hong
Kong, Secondary 4 chemistry students have to learn topics such as the periodic table,
atomic structure, elements, ionic bonding, covalent bonding, and metals. Unfortunately,
these topics are presented as decontextualized facts by most textbook writers. Thus, one
possible way to improve student attitudes is to consider the preferred learning styles of
females and pay special attention to the humanistic orientation (Bybee and Welch 1972;
Cheung and Ng 2000; Rutherford 1972) when designing the Secondary 4 chemistry
curriculum. The curriculum may place more emphasis on traditionally feminine interests
such as kitchen chemistry (Lister 2005) and nutrition (Eubanks et al. 2006). A genderinclusive science curriculum should also stress the social and environmental applications of
science (Hughes 2000; Parker and Rennie 2002). Chemistry learning should be connected
to the world outside of school not only to make learning more motivating to students but
also to develop their ability to use chemical knowledge and skills in real world settings.
Furthermore, instructional strategies for giving girls more positive experiences in the
physical sciences have been suggested by numerous educators (Alexakos and Antoine
2003; Meyer 1998; Parker and Rennie 2002; Rop 1997; Rosser 1990; Ziegler and Stoeger
2004). For example, Rop (1997), a chemistry educator, has suggested that school teachers
may consider the use of single-gender laboratory groups, arrange mentoring relationships
with female scientists, introduce the history and philosophy of chemistry and chemical
knowledge, integrate chemical concepts with other disciplines, and use alternative
assessments that require writing and oral skills. Because females learn more easily when
cooperative rather than competitive learning is used (Owens and Barnes 1982; Rosser
1990), I have developed learning materials to facilitate chemistry students to learn five
topics through the jigsaw strategy (Aronson and Patnoe 1997). The five topics are:
applications of lithium; natural and synthetic diamonds; chiral drugs; methanal; and
88
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
applications of EDTA. The sample learning materials can be downloaded at http://www3.
fed.cuhk.edu.hk/chemistry/. Further research is underway to evaluate the effectiveness of
these learning materials.
It is important to note that the above suggested changes will benefit students of both
genders because they are just elements of a good chemistry curriculum (Rop 1997).
Steinkamp and Maehr (1984) also pointed out that “A more feminine science need not be
less rigorous, of course; the concepts and theories would merely be packaged in a form
more palatable to girls” (p. 54). I agree with Murphy and Whitelegg (2006) that “the
problem is not the girls” (p. 300). Rather, it is the quality of the intended and implemented
chemistry curriculum.
Conclusions
Never before have researchers investigated the interaction effect between grade level and
gender on student attitudes toward chemistry lessons implemented in secondary schools.
There are two features of the present study which make it noteworthy. First, students'
attitudes to chemistry lessons were measured using a multidimensional scale with good
construct validity, thus giving a more complete picture of the variation of male and female
students' attitudes across grade levels. ‘Attitude toward chemistry lessons’ was conceptualized as a set of a student's affective reactions toward, evaluative beliefs about, and
behavioral tendencies to the learning of chemistry in school. Second, unlike the study of
Hofstein et al. (1977), gender and grade level were not treated as two separate variables in
the present study; instead, the interaction effect between grade level and gender was
determined using two-way MANOVA to avoid any distortion of findings.
Overall, the findings of the present study suggest that if one of the desirable educational
objectives of secondary schooling is the development of favorable attitudes toward school
chemistry, then the objective is not attained in Hong Kong. The mean scores for males and
females on the four subscales ranged from 3.98 to 5.24 based on a scale of 1 to 7, indicating
that students were just marginally positive about chemistry lessons implemented in
Secondary 4–7.
Some previous studies have indicated that males have more favorable attitudes toward
chemistry lessons than females, but the findings of the present study show that the picture is
more complex. I found that males liked chemistry theory lessons more than females in
Secondary 4 and Secondary 5 only. In other words, significant gender differences were
limited to the theory lessons subscale for Secondary 4 and 5. Also, a lot of previous studies
(e.g., George 2006; Greenfield 1997) have documented that students' attitudes toward
science lessons decline from junior grades to senior grades, but the Hong Kong data reveal
that this is true for males' scores on the chemistry laboratory work subscale only.
Perhaps the most important implication of the results from the present study is that
chemistry educators need to consider different components of the chemistry curriculum in
order to improve male and female students' attitudes toward chemistry lessons. The key to
make chemistry lessons more male-friendly is probably the regular use of inquiry-based
laboratory work at each grade level, while the use of the humanistic approach to designing
the chemistry curriculum may be a good strategy for making chemistry lessons more
female-friendly.
The results reported here are based on cross-sectional data collected from a convenience
sample of chemistry students; therefore the above conclusions should be verified with a
representative sample using a longitudinal research design. Further research is also required
Res Sci Educ (2009) 39:75–91
89
to identify the underlying reasons for the gender differences in attitudes across grade levels.
Appropriate interventions can then be formulated and implemented to improve school
chemistry in Hong Kong.
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