A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics
written by
Katherine A. Slaughter, Simon P. Bates, and Ross K. Galloway
Student success in a physics degree has been shown to depend on more than just performance in course assessment: important additional factors include student attitudes and beliefs about their subject. We have used an instrument (CLASS) that measures how student epistemologies evolve over the course of their undergraduate degree. Our previous work has sampled a cross-section of students at all levels across the physics undergraduate programme at Edinburgh in a single academic year, and found that student attitudes and beliefs remain essentially static. Here, we present fully longitudinal data collected over the past three years, where we track the evolution of the attitudes and beliefs of one group of students. We find broadly similar results: attitudes and beliefs remain surprisingly consistent over time. This suggests that a 'cross-sectional' or 'pseudo-longitudinal' study (collecting snapshot data in one year) is a valid methodology, rather than necessarily having to wait several years to accumulate truly longitudinal data.
Physics Education Research Conference 2011
Part of the PER Conference series Omaha, Nebraska: August 3-4, 2011 Volume 1413, Pages 359-362
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![]() <a href="https://www.compadre.org/portal/items/detail.cfm?ID=11886">Slaughter, K, S. Bates, and R. Galloway. "A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics." Paper presented at the Physics Education Research Conference 2011, Omaha, Nebraska, August 3-4, 2011.</a>
![]() K. Slaughter, S. Bates, and R. Galloway, , presented at the Physics Education Research Conference 2011, Omaha, Nebraska, 2011, WWW Document, (https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733).
![]() K. Slaughter, S. Bates, and R. Galloway, A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics, presented at the Physics Education Research Conference 2011, Omaha, Nebraska, 2011, <https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733>.
![]() Slaughter, K., Bates, S., & Galloway, R. (2011, August 3-4). A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics. Paper presented at Physics Education Research Conference 2011, Omaha, Nebraska. Retrieved April 3, 2025, from https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733
![]() Slaughter, K, S. Bates, and R. Galloway. "A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics." Paper presented at the Physics Education Research Conference 2011, Omaha, Nebraska, August 3-4, 2011. https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733 (accessed 3 April 2025).
![]() Slaughter, Katherine, Simon Bates, and Ross Galloway. "A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics." Physics Education Research Conference 2011. Omaha, Nebraska: 2011. 359-362 Vol. 1413 of PER Conference. 3 Apr. 2025 <https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733>.
![]() @inproceedings{
Author = "Katherine Slaughter and Simon Bates and Ross Galloway",
Title = {A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics},
BookTitle = {Physics Education Research Conference 2011},
Pages = {359-362},
Address = {Omaha, Nebraska},
Series = {PER Conference},
Volume = {1413},
Month = {August 3-4},
Year = {2011}
}
![]() %A Katherine Slaughter %A Simon Bates %A Ross Galloway %T A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics %S PER Conference %V 1413 %D August 3-4 2011 %P 359-362 %C Omaha, Nebraska %U https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733 %O Physics Education Research Conference 2011 %O August 3-4 %O application/pdf ![]() %0 Conference Proceedings %A Slaughter, Katherine %A Bates, Simon %A Galloway, Ross %D August 3-4 2011 %T A longitudinal study of the development of attitudes and beliefs towards physics %B Physics Education Research Conference 2011 %C Omaha, Nebraska %V 1413 %P 359-362 %S PER Conference %8 August 3-4 %U https://www.compadre.org/Repository/document/ServeFile.cfm?ID=11886&DocID=2733 Disclaimer: ComPADRE offers citation styles as a guide only. We cannot offer interpretations about citations as this is an automated procedure. Please refer to the style manuals in the Citation Source Information area for clarifications.
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