A Comparison of Two Computer Curricular Programs at a Texas Jr. High School Using the Computer Attitude Questionnaire (CAQ)
Technical Report 95

Texas Center for Educational Technology
Telecommunications and Informatics Laboratory
Lab Director: Gerald Knezek
Research Associate: Rhonda Christensen

This report is a summary of findings regarding the use of the Computer Attitude Questionnaire (CAQ) to compare two types of computing curricula at a junior high school in Leander, Texas. The first program is a traditional computer literacy class mandated by the state of Texas. The second program, a pilot program, teaches the mandated computer literacy elements through the integration of computers within the existing 7th grade curriculum.

Background

Leander Jr. High School is located in rural Leander, Texas. The school includes approximately 1300 students in 7th and 8th grades. Currently there are about 175 Macintosh computers available for student use in the school. Students in this school district have had some computer exposure since first grade. Through the 5th grade, computers are located in classrooms. At the 6th grade level, students use computers in a laboratory environment. There are five computer labs available for student use in junior high school (three with 30-35 systems for regular classroom teachers and two 14-system labs available only to the computer literacy classes).

Instrument

The Computer Attitude Questionnaire (CAQ) was used to carry out this research study. The CAQ includes a 65-item Likert-type self-rating questionnaire and 3 paired comparison items. The Likert-type questions measure six psychological dispositions: Computer Importance, Computer Enjoyment, Motivation, Study Habits, Empathy, and Creative Tendencies (Knezek & Miyashita, 1993).

Subjects

Three groups were used for comparison. Group 1 included students who were receiving the traditional computer literacy class. This group included mostly 8th graders but also some 7th grade students.

Group 2 students were those receiving the pilot program of computer integration. In the pilot integration program, teachers are in three teams. Each team contains a teacher from each of the subject areas (math, science, language arts, and social studies). The computers are integrated into the existing 7th grade curriculum in each of the subject areas. Some examples of software that are used include ClarisWorks, HyperCard and Wagon Train 1848.

Group 3 includes 7th grade students who received both the computer literacy course and the integration program simultaneously. There are only 22 of these subjects so caution is advised when drawing conclusions based on comparisons of this group to the others.

In the three groups combined, there were 588 subjects. Of these subjects, 356 were 7th graders and 232 were in 8th grade. 52% (292) of the subjects were male, while 48% (271) were female students. The groups were divided in the following way: Group 1 has 245 subjects, Group 2 has 321 subjects and Group 3 had only 22 subjects.

Reliability

Table 1 contains the results of a post-hoc reliability analysis for the six-factor CAQ structure. Internal consistency reliability ranges from .80 to .87, all of which fall into the range of "very good" (DeVellis, 1991). This indicates the indices obtained from the Leander students should be accurate representations of their psychological dispositions in these areas.

Table 2 contains information concerning comparison of the three groups to each other using one way analysis of variance (ANOVA). There were overall significant differences for Computer Importance (f=7.92, 557 X 2 df, p=.0004), Computer Enjoyment (f=11.27, 551 X 2 df, p=.0000), Creative Tendencies (f=4.10, 543 X 2 df, p =.0171) and Empathy (f=3.31, 549 X 2 df, p=.0374) at the alpha = .05 level. Post-hoc comparisons (alpha = .025) were carried out in these three areas to determine which specific groups were significantly different from the others, and in which direction. Group 2 was found to be significantly higher than group 1 on Computer Importance, Computer Enjoyment and Creative Tendencies.

No group was significantly (p=.025) higher or lower than the others on Empathy. However, examination of the means provided in Table 2 indicates the trend is for Group 3 to be lower than either Groups 1 or 2.

Considering the possibility that different grade levels could cause the findings to be different, a one way ANOVA was performed looking at all 7th grade students in each of the three groups. Because the number of subjects was small for group 3, no conclusions were drawn in comparison to the other groups. A significant difference (p=.01) was found in both Computer Importance and Empathy in these 7th graders. Specifically, group 2 (integration group) tended to be more empathetic. They also considered computers to be more important than their 7th grade counterparts in the other two groups. Mean values for 7th grade students on the six psychological indices are shown in Table 3.

Gender differences.

Significant male-female differences were found regarding reported study habits and empathy. Females were significantly higher than males in Study Habits (f=6.12, 525 x 1 df, p=.0137). As shown in Table 4 females were found to be higher in Empathy than males at the p>.001 level of significance (f=165.72, 527 x 1 df, p=.0000). No significant differences were found with respect to gender for Computer Importance, Computer Enjoyment, Motivation or Creative Tendencies.

When comparing males to females in Group 1 (computer literacy) alone, females continued to be significantly higher on Study Habits and Empathy. However, when looking at gender differences in Group 2 (integration) alone, females were only significantly higher only in Empathy.

Comparisons among the females in the three curricula groups showed a significant difference in Computer Enjoyment between group 1 and group 2. The females in Group 2 rated Computer Enjoyment significantly (p>.01) higher than group 1. Mean values for females are shown in Table 5.

No curricular group for males was found to be significantly different from the others (alpha = .025) even though there was significant variation overall (across all 3 groups) at the alpha = .05 level. As shown in Table 6. the trend was for group 3 to be lower than group 1 or group 2 for Computer Importance, Study Habits and Empathy; Group 2 tended to be higher than 1 or 3 on Computer Enjoyment

Discussion

These findings indicate that the students participating in the integrated computer activities enjoyed computers more and perceived them as more important than the students taking computer literacy. In addition, the students involved in the integrated, teacher-teaming computer activities rated themselves as higher in creative tendencies than their peers enrolled in computer literacy.

The most prominent gender difference in the data gathered was in the area of Empathy. Females were consistently higher than males, as has been previously found by YCCI researchers for grades 1-3 students in Texas, Mexico and Japan (Knezek & Miyashita, 1993). Also consistent with YCCI findings for grades 1-3 is no apparent gender bias in attitudes toward computers among Leander Junior High students. In addition, no consistent gender differences were found to be attributable to type of computer curriculum for the Leander students.

References

DeVellis, R. F. (1991). Scale Development: Theory and Applications. Newbury Park: Sage Publications, Chapter 4.

Knezek, G. A. & Miyashita, K. T. (1993). Handbook for the Young Children's Computer Inventory. Denton, TX: Texas Center for Educational Technology.