INDONESIAN PRIMARY SCHOOL AND MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARD SCIENCE: FOCUS ON GENDER AND ACADEMIC LEVEL

Abstract

Student attitudes toward science have been one of the longstanding topics in science education research. Even though Indonesia has a unique educational system in which cultural, religious, and cognitive aspects are incorporated in the science K-12 curriculum, a limited number of studies have explored Indonesian students’ attitudes towards science. This research aimed to examine students’ attitudes toward science and the interaction between academic grade level and gender in Indonesian primary and middle school. Thirty items from five components of the BRAINS instrument were administered to 1587 Indonesian students from fourth grade through ninth grade to measure their attitude toward science. Rasch analysis, two-way ANOVA, and structural equation modeling path analysis were used to answer the proposed research questions. The current research found that Indonesian students’ attitudes toward science were significantly affected by academic level, however, gender only affected three components of attitude (control belief, attitude toward the behavior, and intention). Female students showed a higher attitude toward science than male students in general. The trends in every component of the students’ attitudes decreased from primary school to middle school. The present research provides a deeper discussion by considering the socio-cultural and educational history of Indonesia. Keywords: academic level, gender, middle school, primary school, science attitude.