What preconceptions and attitudes about engineering are prevalent amongst upper secondary school pupils? An international study

Abstract

In the Netherlands, as well as in many other countries, there is an increasing interest in implementing education about engineering as a part of general education at the upper secondary school level. In order to know what pupils at that level think about engineering, a study has been done to investigate their attitude towards and their concept of engineering. This study was done not only in the Netherlands but also in 39 other countries. In the preparation of the study, pupils were asked to draw concept maps of what they thought engineering was about. In the quantitative main part of the study, pupils were asked to respond to 33 Likert-type attitude items and 32 concept-items of the same type. A factor analysis was done in order to reveal the dimensions in the pupils’ attitude and concept. In contrast to studies carried out amongst students in lower secondary school levels, a fairly clear concept about engineering was found. The gender differences relating to engineering, found in lower secondary education, were not found in upper secondary education. The prevalent attitude of students towards engineering indicated a fairly positive image of engineering.