Factors Influencing Undergraduate Students Toward Choosing a New Course
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.56103/nactaj.v68i1.138Keywords:
undergraduate, course choice, social norms, perceived behavioral control, attitudesAbstract
Although course choice may shape students’ academic futures, with some new courses, few students may register, resulting in course cancellation, lost student opportunities, and wasted faculty effort. The study aimed to explore the attitudes, social norms, and perceived behavioral control factors influencing students’ decisions to enroll in a new course. A QualtricsÒ survey, using a 7-point Likert scale (strongly disagree to strongly agree) and open-ended questions, was distributed by email to undergraduate students (>18 years) enrolled in the fall 2021 semester within a college of agriculture and life sciences. Of respondents (n = 84), most agreed or strongly agreed that interest in the subject matter and favorable attitudes toward the instructor influenced their decision to enroll in a new course. In the context of social norms, respondents were most influenced by advisor recommendations, a course workload that would not excessively interfere with their social activities, and having friends say positive things about the professor. Within perceived behavioral control, the highest levels of agreement were related to the course helping them complete requirements for their major and graduation. In conclusion, faculty may want to consider influential factors impacting students’ new course selection when undertaking course development.
Downloads
References
References
Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50(2), 179-211. https://doi.org/10.1016/0749-5978(91)90020-T
Ajzen, I. (2012). The Theory of Planned Behavior. In PAM Lange, AW Kruglanski & ET Higgins. Handbook of Theories of Social Psychology, 1, 438-459.
Asgari, H., Gupta, R., Titiloye, I., & Jin, X. (2022). Challenges, perceptions, and future preferences for post-secondary online education given experiences in the COVID-19 outbreak. Computational Urban Science, 2(1), 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1007/s43762-022-00058-7
Baia, P., & Strang, A. (2012). An elective course to promote academic pharmacy as a career. American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, 76(2). https://doi.org/10.5688/ajpe76230
Baker, R. (2018). Understanding college students’ major choices using social network analysis. Research in Higher Education, 59(2), 198-225. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-017-9463-1
Baker, R., & Orona, G. A. (2020). Gender and racial differences in awareness and consideration of curricular programs: Exploring a multistage model of major choice. AERA Open, 6(3), 2332858420937023. https://doi.org/10.1177/2332858420937023
Betz-Hamilton, A. (2021). Student perceptions of learning experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic: An examination of post-secondary hybrid, in-person, and online consumer affairs courses. Journal of Family & Consumer Sciences Education, 38(1).
Bradley-Geist, J. C., & Olson-Buchanan, J. B. (2014). Helicopter parents: An examination of the correlates of over-parenting of college students. Education+ Training, 56(4), 314-328. https://doi.org/10.1108/ET-10-2012-0096
Branch-Mueller, J. (2018). Who is my professor? Understanding the work life of school library faculty members. Knowledge Quest, 46(5), 40-47.
Brooks, R., Gupta, A., Jayadeva, S., & Abrahams, J. (2021). Students’ views about the purpose of higher education: a comparative analysis of six European countries. Higher Education Research & Development, 40(7), 1375-1388. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2020.1830039
Brown, C. L., & Kosovich, S. M. (2015). The impact of professor reputation and section attributes on student course selection. Research in Higher Education, 56(5), 496-509. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-014-9356-5
Chaturapruek, S., Dalberg, T., Thompson, M. E., Giebel, S., Harrison, M. H., Johari, R., Stevens, M. L., & Kizilcec, R. F. (2021). Studying undergraduate course consideration at scale. AERA Open, 7, 2332858421991148. https:/doi.org/10.1177/2332858421991148
Crisp, G., Doran, E., & Salis Reyes, N. A. (2018). Predicting graduation rates at 4-year broad access institutions using a Bayesian modeling approach. Research in Higher Education, 59(2), 133-155. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-017-9459-x
Davis, A. E. (1996). Instrument development: getting started. Journal of Neuroscience Nursing, 28(3), 204-208.
Dayton, E. (2017). Understanding soft skills. https://cccspecialpopulations.org/wp-content/themes/uu11822tfens9j9ad82j6123243/files/publications/understandingsoftskills.pdf
Decker, W. H., Calo, T. J., Yao, H., & Weer, C. H. (2015). Preference for group work in China and the US. Cross Cultural Management, 22(1), 90-115. https://doi.org/10.1108/CCM-03-2013-0053
Graham, K. W., Achenreiner, G., McDermott, M., & Crosby, E. (2020). Is what students want what they really need? A values view of undergraduate marketing elective course offerings. Marketing Education Review, 30(3), 140-149. https://doi.org/10.1080/10528008.2020.1773277
Griffith, A. S., & Altinay, Z. (2020). A framework to assess higher education faculty workload in US universities. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 57(6), 691-700. https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2020.1786432
Gulum, O., Gencel Ataman, O., & Parasiz, G. (2022). Factors affecting the course choices of students who took the elective course of music culture. International Online Journal of Educational Sciences, 14(1), 265-278. https://doi.org/10.15345/iojes.2022.01.020
Hwang, Y. (2019). The Role of College Experience in Shaping Major and Future Career Path Choice at Four-year Institutions (Doctoral dissertation, Indiana University).
Johnson, N., & Seaman, J. (2021). 2021 Special Topics Report: The growth of online learning and digital learning resources in Canadian post-secondary education. https://eduq.info/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11515/38619/2021-special-topics-report.pdf?sequence=2
Joo, M.-H. (2017). Students' group work contribution: Influence of work preference, gender, and individual assessment. Social Behavior and Personality: An International Journal, 45(1), 19-28. https://doi.org/10.2224/sbp.5385
Kalkbrenner, M. T. (2021). A practical guide to instrument development and score validation in the social sciences: The MEASURE Approach. Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation, 26(1), 1. https://doi.org/10.7275/svg4-e671
Latif, E., & Miles, S. (2020). Undergraduate characteristics and elective course choice. Australasian Journal of Economics Education, 17(1), 1-23.
Lee, N. E. (2018). Skills for the 21st century: A meta-synthesis of soft-skills and achievement. Canadian Journal of Career Development, 17(2), 73-86. Retrieved from https://cjcd-rcdc.ceric.ca/index.php/cjcd/article/view/80
Letkiewicz, J., Lim, H., Heckman, S., Bartholomae, S., Fox, J. J., & Montalto, C. P. (2014). The path to graduation: Factors predicting on-time graduation rates. Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice, 16(3), 351-371. http://dx.doi.org/10.2190/CS.16.3.c
Marquis, G. P., & Ghosh, S. (2017). Student preferences for a hybrid course. Journal of Education for Business, 92(3), 105-113. https://doi.org/10.1080/08832323.2017.1289886
McGoldrick, K., & Schuhmann, P. W. (2002). Instructor gender and student registration: An analysis of preferences. Education Economics, 10(3), 241-260. https://doi.org/10.1080/09645290210127480
Montano, D. E., & Kasprzyk, D. (2015). Theory of reasoned action, theory of planned behavior, and the integrated behavioral model. Health behavior: Theory, Research and Practice, 70(4), 231.
Nikolopoulou, K. (2022). Face-to-face, online and hybrid education: University students’ opinions and preferences. Journal of Digital Educational Technology, 2(2), ep2206. https://doi.org/10.30935/jdet/12384
O’Meara, K., Kuvaeva, A., Nyunt, G., Waugaman, C., & Jackson, R. (2017). Asked more often: Gender differences in faculty workload in research universities and the work interactions that shape them. American Educational Research Journal, 54(6), 1154-1186. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831217716767
Pass, M. W., Mehta, S. S., & Mehta, G. B. (2012). Course selection: Student preferences for instructor practices. Academy of Educational Leadership Journal, 16(1), 31. Retrieved from https://login.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/course-selection-student-preferences-instructor/docview/1037692141/se-2
Reynolds, H. L., & Kearns, K. D. (2017). A planning tool for incorporating backward design, active learning, and authentic assessment in the college classroom. College Teaching, 65(1), 17-27. https://doi.org/10.1080/87567555.2016.1222575
Russell, E., Thériault, É. R., & Colibaba, A. (2022). Facilitating age-conscious student development through lecture-based courses on aging. Canadian Journal on Aging/La Revue Canadienne du Vieillissement, 41(2), 283-293. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0714980821000246
Sabagh, Z., Hall, N. C., & Saroyan, A. (2018). Antecedents, correlates and consequences of faculty burnout. Educational Research, 60(2), 131-156. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2018.1461573
Sabir, R. I., Ahmad, W., Ashraf, R. U., & Ahmad, N. (2013). Factors affecting university and course choice: A comparison of undergraduate engineering and business students in Central Punjab, Pakistan. Journal of Basic and Applied Scientific Research, 3(10), 298-305.
Samara, F. (2015). Factors influencing students’ choice of elective science courses: a case study from the American University of Sharjah. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 3(08), 93. https://doi.org/10.4236/jss.2015.38010
Schmidt, N. A., & Brown, J. M. (2019). The effect of a perioperative nursing elective on nursing career paths. AORN Journal, 109(1), 87-94. https://doi.org/10.1002/aorn.12444
Seeley, E. L., Goddard, T., & Miller, R. M. (2018). Ge-whiz! How students choose their general education classes. Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.1108/JARHE-09-2017-0106
Sin, C., Tavares, O., & Amaral, A. (2019). Accepting employability as a purpose of higher education? Academics’ perceptions and practices. Studies in Higher Education, 44(6), 920-931. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2017.1402174
Smith, C., Hoderi, M., & Mcdermott, W. (2019). A preliminary study of students perception and learning from different delivery methods. Academy of Educational Leadership Journal, 23(2), 1-8. Retrieved from https://login.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/preliminary-study-students-perception-learning/docview/2330970901/se-2
Spooner, J. J., & Kennedy, D. R. (2017). An elective course to foster interest in academic pharmacy career opportunities. American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, 81(1). https://doi.org/10.5688/ajpe81113
Stewart, C., Wall, A., & Marciniec, S. (2016). Mixed signals: Do college graduates have the soft skills that employers want? In Competition Forum (Vol. 14, No. 2, p. 276). American Society for Competitiveness.
Tamta, P., & Ansari, M. (2015). University students' perception towards e-learning. Age (Years), 20(02), 08.30.
Ting, D. H., & Lee, C. K. C. (2012). Understanding students’ choice of electives and its implications. Studies in Higher Education, 37(3), 309-325. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2010.512383
Tinsley, H. N. (2016). Ripped from the headlines: Using current events and deliberative democracy to improve student performance in and perceptions of nonmajors biology courses. Journal of Microbiology & Biology Education, 17(3), 380-388. https://doi.org/10.1128/jmbe.v17i3.1135
Wiswall, M., & Zafar, B. (2015). Determinants of college major choice: Identification using an information experiment. The Review of Economic Studies, 82(2), 791-824. https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdu044
Yue, H., & Fu, X. (2017). Rethinking graduation and time to degree: A fresh perspective. Research in Higher Education, 58(2), 184-213. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-016-9420-4
