College Majors and their Harmony with Students’ Multiple Intelligences

Abstract

This study aims to explore the harmonisation of scientific specialisation for undergraduate science students using multiple intelligences (MI), their relationship to academic achievement (GPA) and the students’ attitudes towards science. The sample consists of 198 male and female students chosen randomly from different year groups in the departments of physics and chemistry at Al-Qunfudah College at Umm Al-Qura University in Saudi Arabia. The study used a tool to survey MI and a questionnaire to measure the sample’s attitudes towards science. The researcher obtained the students’ GPAs from the college administration department. The results showed that the ranking of intelligences for the sample, respectively, was existential, logical, interpersonal, kinaesthetic, naturalistic, visual, intrapersonal, linguistic and musical. There was consistency between the levels of students’ MI with their science specialisation. There was no significant correlation between the levels of study, GPA variables and attitudes towards science. There was a significant and positive increasing correlation between GPA and each of the following MI: logical, intrapersonal and existential. There was a significant difference between attitudes towards science in favour of chemistry, a significant difference between the medians of existential intelligence in females and a significant and positive increasing correlation between the attitudes towards science and existential intelligence.