Conference Session

Influences on Female Interest in Pursuit of STEM Fields

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James Concannon, University of Missouri, Columbia; Lloyd H. Barrow, University of Missouri

Tagged Divisions

Minorities in Engineering

imaginepossible situations and respective outcomes for performing successfully and unsuccessfully; 3) aperson’s ability to learn though observing others; 4) a person’s influence by verbal persuasionsfrom external sources; 5) psychological states; and 6) emotional states 3.In the early 1980s and into 1990s, the self-efficacy construct was taken from Bandura’s initialdefinition and tied to a person’s confidence in passing a course, finishing an engineering degreeprogram, or one’s confidence in finding a job that he or she will like. In 1981, Betz and Hackett4, 5 established field of occupational self-efficacy research, where a person’s confidence in careerrelated pursuits. Lent 6 established the first academic milestones measure of self-efficacy, a

Conference Session

Factors Affecting Minority Engineering Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Pedro Leite, Kansas State University-Salina; Jung Oh, Kansas State University-Salina

Tagged Divisions

Minorities in Engineering

.” Page 13.171.2This research will use a hybrid approach in which quantitative data related to self-efficacy,learning preferences, and structured interviews will be combined in an attempt to identify traitsof successful female students enrolled in Engineering Technology programs at a large land-grantuniversity in the Midwest. Hazzan and colleagues (10) writing about the advantages of usingqualitative research in some studies, notably computer science education, noted that: … in many cases, CSE research deals with topics related to learners’ mental, cultural and social processes. Such processes, by nature, are rich, consisting of many details and perspectives. Accordingly, it is reasonable to assume that if we approach