Pathways to low-SES student success in science: a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis

Abstract

ABSTRACT Persistent concerns exist regarding the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and science achievement, prompting ongoing research into the factors enabling some low-SES students to excel in science despite the odds. This study seeks to identify multiple combinations of individual, family, and school conditions that contribute to successful outcomes within this demographic. Utilising a sample of 1,460 low-SES Chinese students, aged 15, from the 2015 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), this study employs fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) as its methodological approach. The results reveal seven viable pathways that can equally enable low-SES students to achieve academic success in science. These pathways involve a combination of multiple factors, such as parental emotional support, school science instruction practices, and science-related attitudes and beliefs. The analysis also indicates that certain causal factors (i.e. parental emotional support, extrinsic motivation, enquiry-based science instruction practices, or teacher adaptation of science instruction), can be absent in the configurations, but can still contribute to academic resilience when complemented by other conditions (e.g. elevated levels of intrinsic motivation, epistemological beliefs about science, teacher-directed science instruction, or teacher support in science classes).