MEASURING INTRODUCTORY STUDENT INTEREST IN GEOSCIENCE USING THE NEW FOUR-PHASE GEOSCIENCE INTEREST SCALE (FPGIS)

A deeper insight into student interest can help educators better understand how student interest develops, what drives students to take introductory geoscience courses, and why they may select a geoscience major. A survey gathering quantitative and qualitative data was distributed to several introductory geoscience classrooms at three schools in three regions of the United States (n=433). The Four-Phase Geoscience Interest Scale (FPGIS) is rooted in the four-phase interest development model proposed by Hidi and Renninger (2006) and developed from the Interest Development Scale (IDS; Boeder et al., 2020) and was altered for a geoscience context using a seven-point Likert-type scale. Exploratory factor analysis revealed three factors (“Questioning and Development,” “Geoscience Value,” and “Self-Motivation”) with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.954. Quantitative data suggest that introductory students have a low interest in geoscience overall (M=2.95, SD= 1.15, scale=1-7). Of the three factors identified by factor analysis, the introductory students scored highest in Geoscience Value (M=3.58, SD= 1.81) and lowest in the Self-Motivation factor (M=2.57, SD=1.58). We further explored student geoscience interest by implementing open-ended questions. Thematic coding of open-ended questions revealed 10 themes related to students’ conceptions of geoscience importance including “importance for future careers” and “help in explaining the world”. Themes relating to applied effort (12 themes) and engagement (11 themes) included “desire to help the planet” and “recognition of class topics in daily life.” Many of the emergent themes relate students’ interest to grades; however, others elaborated on topics or an interest in geoscience outside of course success. Measuring student interest will allow educators, departments, and other interested groups to evaluate educational interventions with goals related to generalized geoscience interest development as well as better understand students’ motivations for taking a geoscience course.