The Role of Self-Efficacy in the Thesis-Writing Experiences of Undergraduate Honors Students

Writing a thesis is often the culminating experience for undergraduate students enrolled in university honors programs in the United States. Because writing a thesis is one of the most difficult academic tasks that an undergraduate student may undertake, it requires a high level of self-efficacy, or belief in one’s capabilities to achieve certain results. However, the factors that contribute to students’ efficacy expectations when writing a thesis are not fully understood. This qualitative study followed 11 honors students over the course of several months in order to understand their experiences as they completed their theses. Data was gathered through a series of four questionnaires and two interviews. Analysis revealed six themes: previous research experiences, emotions, project timelines, structure, advisors, and support networks. These themes suggest that students’ abilities to manage their emotions and employ self-regulatory strategies play a critical role in their self-assessments of efficacy during work on challenging academic tasks, findings which have implications for a variety of academic programs and campus support services. In addition, this study reveals that faculty mentoring of undergraduate students may require greater attention to cultivating emotional awareness and regulation than does the mentoring of graduate students.

The autonomy of informal STEM and benefits of andragogy with gifted children

Purpose In distinguishing the education of adults from the education of children, a gray area lies on where to classify gifted and honors students. The purpose of this study was to determine if the attitudes of students at an honors STEM summer camp paralleled the educational needs of adults, namely self-directed learning.Design/methodology/approach Researchers analyzed survey responses through an exploratory factor analysis and five t tests.Findings The interpretation of the effect sizes showed that after engaging in a self-directed learning experience, students expressed more positive self-efficacy and intrinsic motivation, experienced reduced extrinsic motivation and anxiety, and were less task-completion oriented.Originality/value The results suggest that gifted and honors students may have a propensity to learn that is more similar to that of adults rather than their same-age peers.

Learning Transdisciplinary Collaboration: Undergraduate Student Perceptions of Successes and Areas for Improvement in Transdisciplinary, Problem-Focused Honors Seminar Courses

The honors college at a large land-grant research university developed transdisciplinary courses to provide undergraduate opportunities for small, student-centered classes and collaborative problem engagement in a global context. In these courses, students engage principles of competency-based education and inquiry-based learning combined with instruction in transdisciplinarity and decision-making tied to the college mission statement and course learning outcomes. As an observational study, we surveyed 91 honors students from 12 transdisciplinary courses over three semesters, asking five-point Likert scale questions and open-ended perspective questions at the beginning and end of each semester. Participants predominantly identified as White (74%), male (57%), senior-level students (67%), and represent 34 majors. Findings emphasize outcomes of lasting faculty relationships and opportunities to explore interests outside students’ majors, which respondents report influencing their academic development. Students also report areas for curricular improvement in developing research skills and engaging problem-focused experiences. We describe new offerings made to address findings.

Non-probative Photos Promote the Truth of Positive Claims

<p>People’s judgments are prone to the influence of feelings, even cognitive feelings such as the ease with which related information comes to mind (Alter & Oppenheimer, 2009; Schwarz & Clore, 2007). In 14 experiments, we¹ found evidence that non-probative photos — ones that relate to what people are evaluating, but that provide no relevant information for their task — produce cognitive feelings that lead people to evaluate claims more positively. In Part 1, we examined the extent to which photos promote the truth of positive and negative claims. People saw the names of several fictitious wines. Some wine names appeared with a photo that depicted the noun in the name; other wine names appeared without a photo. For each wine people decided whether a positive or a negative claim about it was true. Photos selectively promoted the truth of positive claims, did so most when they could help people comprehend wine names, and swayed people’s judgments about the taste of wines. In Part 2, we showed that those findings translated to when people judged claims about their own (and other people’s) experiences. People “interacted” with several unfamiliar animals (on a computer). Later, people saw the animal names again, sometimes with a photo of the animal and sometimes alone, and decided whether it was true that they (or other people) had positive or negative experiences with the animals. Photos selectively led people to think positive claims were true, and exerted their strongest effects when they could most help people bring related thoughts and images to mind². ¹ Although the research in this thesis is my own, I conducted it in a lab and supervised a team comprised of research assistants and honors students. I also received advice and direction from my supervisors. Therefore, I often use the word “we” in this thesis to reflect that fact. As you will also see, I use the word “we” in a different context to refer to what is known (or not known) in the wider scientific community. ² Portions of this thesis were adapted from: Cardwell, Newman, Garry, Mantonakis, & Beckett (manuscript under review). Photos that increase feelings of learning promote positive evaluations. Cardwell, Henkel, & Garry (manuscript in preparation). Non-probative photos lead people to believe positive claims about their recent pasts. But I have expanded on the introduction, results and discussion.</p>

Non-probative Photos Promote the Truth of Positive Claims

<p>People’s judgments are prone to the influence of feelings, even cognitive feelings such as the ease with which related information comes to mind (Alter & Oppenheimer, 2009; Schwarz & Clore, 2007). In 14 experiments, we¹ found evidence that non-probative photos — ones that relate to what people are evaluating, but that provide no relevant information for their task — produce cognitive feelings that lead people to evaluate claims more positively. In Part 1, we examined the extent to which photos promote the truth of positive and negative claims. People saw the names of several fictitious wines. Some wine names appeared with a photo that depicted the noun in the name; other wine names appeared without a photo. For each wine people decided whether a positive or a negative claim about it was true. Photos selectively promoted the truth of positive claims, did so most when they could help people comprehend wine names, and swayed people’s judgments about the taste of wines. In Part 2, we showed that those findings translated to when people judged claims about their own (and other people’s) experiences. People “interacted” with several unfamiliar animals (on a computer). Later, people saw the animal names again, sometimes with a photo of the animal and sometimes alone, and decided whether it was true that they (or other people) had positive or negative experiences with the animals. Photos selectively led people to think positive claims were true, and exerted their strongest effects when they could most help people bring related thoughts and images to mind². ¹ Although the research in this thesis is my own, I conducted it in a lab and supervised a team comprised of research assistants and honors students. I also received advice and direction from my supervisors. Therefore, I often use the word “we” in this thesis to reflect that fact. As you will also see, I use the word “we” in a different context to refer to what is known (or not known) in the wider scientific community. ² Portions of this thesis were adapted from: Cardwell, Newman, Garry, Mantonakis, & Beckett (manuscript under review). Photos that increase feelings of learning promote positive evaluations. Cardwell, Henkel, & Garry (manuscript in preparation). Non-probative photos lead people to believe positive claims about their recent pasts. But I have expanded on the introduction, results and discussion.</p>

Practice-oriented Approach to Development of Leadership Competencies of Honors Students: the Project «The Territory of Intellectual and Liberal Inventions»

This article presents the results of the study dedicated to the development of leadership competencies of the students with high academic achievements based on the practice-oriented approach. The authors of the paper reveal the features of the development of leadership competencies of Honors College students based on a practice-oriented approach, present the theoretical justification and description of the project «The Territory of Intellectual and Liberal Inventions», develop the specific character of gamification of the process of development leadership competencies among students of the Honors College. The main methods of this study were a review of theoretical works devoted to leadership and leadership competencies, circumstances of the educational environment of the Honors College, and theory and practice of gamification; a survey of Siberian Federal University Honors students; substantiation, description and creating of the project «The Territory of Intellectual and Liberal Inventions»; a design of a gamification model of student leadership competencies’ development process; a pilot experiment of this model, an analysis of the experiment results. The results of the conducted research reveal that the development of leadership competencies among gifted students based on a practice-oriented approach is actually and widely discussed by the educational community. The use of gamification allows intensifying the passing of the studied process. The materials of this article may be essential and beneficial for the researchers of development of leadership competencies, as well as for comparative studies in the field of teaching gifted students

Honors Students and Thesis Research: A Study of Information Literacy Practices and Self-Efficacy at the End of Students’ Undergraduate Careers

This study explored the information literacy practices of undergraduate students conducting research for their Honors theses in their final year of study. Data was collected from 11 Honors students during several months through four rounds of open-ended, journal-style questionnaires and two rounds of interviews. Honors students’ sense of confidence varied throughout the thesis process, and several practices were identified that influenced students’ sense of self-efficacy. This study suggests that instruction librarians can help to increase students’ self-efficacy by modeling advanced research strategies, designing opportunities for students to practice challenging research tasks that build on previous skills, and addressing the affective and self-regulatory aspects of conducting higher-level research.

The relationship between high school GPA and information literacy pre and post-test scores

Although many studies explore the effect of library instruction on information literacy test scores, there are far fewer studies exploring the relationship between high school Grade Point Average (GPA) and scores on information literacy pre- and post-tests of first year college students. This research study compares the scores of three cohorts of Franklin Pierce University students--honors students, Center Scholars (students with a cumulative high school GPA of below 2.5) and Average GPA students --on an information literacy pre-test administered in the first two weeks of the fall, and a similar post-test administered after students have attended a library instruction session. The results of this study show a relationship between high school GPA and pre-test scores and reveal an even stronger relationship between high school GPA and scores on the post-test, with honors students attaining the highest scores and Center Scholars the lowest. This article proposes explanations for these results as well as recommendations for addressing the test score disparities between these three cohorts.