Developing and validating scales to measure university students' attitudes, academic and social integration, and social identity in multicultural classrooms

Abstract

Multicultural classrooms are widespread at college and university levels in many countries around the world. This is of interest and concern to educational psychologists and educational experts. Multicultural classrooms should be investigated in order to create a more productive classroom environment, healthier relationships among students, better academic integration and better developed social identity. The main objective of this research was to develop three scales to measure students' attitudes, academic integration, social integration and social identity in relation to cultural diversity at the university level. A sample of 417 students from Al Ain University of Science and Technology in the UAE participated in the study by responding to the three scales, which were validated using content and construct validity procedures. The reliability of the scales was also investigated. To the best of the researchers' knowledge, these scales are the first of their kind to assess university students' attitudes, academic integration, social integration and social identity in multicultural classrooms.