Epistemological Development Profiles of Chinese Engineering Doctoral Students in U.S. Institutions: An Application of Perry's Theory

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundIn the fields of science and engineering, Chinese students earned the largest number of doctorate degrees among foreign students in U.S. institutions from 1989 to 2009. Although prior studies have explored Chinese students’ adjustment issues in U.S. institutions, such as language capabilities, socialization, and learning experiences, little is known about the cognitive aspects of their academic experiences.PurposeThis study adopted Perry's theory, which describes college students’ epistemological development from a dualistic to a relativistic manner of thinking in four stages, to map the epistemological developmental profiles of Chinese engineering doctoral students in U.S. institutions.MethodThe dominant epistemological development stages of Chinese engineering doctoral students from five Midwestern universities were identified through a quantitative survey with four subscales corresponding to Perry's four stages. ANOVA tests explored differences in the subscales concerning demographic parameters.ResultsThe results suggested that the dominant thinking styles of nearly 80% of the students fell into the latter two stages of Perry's theory. Significant differences were observed in survey subscales regarding factors such as students’ academic progress and university at the time of research.ConclusionsThe study offers a profile of Chinese engineering doctoral students’ epistemological development using Perry's theory. Our results highlight the possible effect of U.S. engineering graduate training and demographic factors on students’ epistemological development.