International Journal of Advancements in Research &
Technology, Volume 3, Issue 2, February-2014 47 ISSN
2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART Effect of Gender, Attitude
towards Science, Parental Education and Family Size on Science
Achievement of Secondary School Students of Central U.P. Gyan
Pratap Singh1 , Dr. Ali Imam2
1(Research Scholar) Department of Education, Integral
University, Lucknow, India 2(Associate Professor and Head),
Department of Education, Integral University, Lucknow, India Email:
[email protected] ABSTRACT This electronic document is a live
template. The various components of your paper [title, text, heads,
etc.] are already defined on the style sheet, as illustrated by the
portions given in this document. (Abstract) This study explored the
effects of gender, attitude towards science, parental education,
and family size on science achievement. A convenience sample of
2006 students, 1080 males and 926 female from twenty one schools of
central UP was used for study. The
ScienceAttitudeScale,ScienceAchievement TestandPersonal
andEnvironmentalbackgroundassessmentQuestionnaire
wereusedfordatacollection,whilet-test,f-testandcorrelationtechniqueswereusedforstatisticalanalysis.Theresultsre-vealed
that there was a significant difference between science achievement
of boys and girls. The results of analysis showed that there was
positive co-relation between attitude towards science and
achievement in science. The results of the analysis showed that the
parental education is positively correlated with the science
achievement of the students. The family size of the students was
positively associated with the science achievement of the students.
Keywords:Science Achievement; Gender; Attitude towards Science;
Parental Education and Family Size. 1INTRODUCTION DUCATION on all
accounts is accepted to be a systematic
andapplieddiscipline.Itissystematicbecauseitdraws heavily upon
other discipline. It is applied because educa-tional ideas have to
be practiced before they could gain proper acknowledgementand
accuracy.It raisesthestatus
ofthehu-manbeingsandthecommunityasawhole.Itbroadensthe mental
horizon of the human beings.
Educationinvolvesthetransferofcommunicationofin-formation knowledge
and skills from one point (The source) to another (The Receiver).
According to M.K. Gandhi Education
Meanstheallrounddriveoutthebestinchild,man,body, Mind and Soul.
Educationisuniversallyrecognizedasthemosteffective tool of bringing
about change towards the social and economic
bettermentandculturaltransformationofasociety.Itraises
thestatusofhumanbeingandthecountryasawhole.It broadens the mental
horizon of the human being. In one hand
educationdevelopsthetotalpersonalityoftheindividual;on
theotherhanditcontributestogrowthanddevelopmentof
thesociety.Itisonlythrougheducationthemoralideasand
spiritualvalues,theaspirationofthenationanditscultural
heritagearetransferredfromonegenerationtoanotherfor
preservation,purificationandsublimationintohigherand higher
culture.
Educationisthekeytoallprocessesofdevelopmentespe-cially-humandevelopment.Catalyticactionofeducationin
thiscomplexanddynamicgrowthprocessneedstobe planned meticulously
and executed with great sensibility.
Thenationthatfailstomakeagenuineassessmentofhis
humanenergyavailableinit isboundto lagbehindothersin
theeraofgreatcompetitioninthenationalandinternational fields. An
ideal system of education should enable individuals
toknowanddevelop to thefullesttheir physicaland intellec-tual
potentialities and promote their awareness of societal and human
values so that they can develop a strong character and live better
lives and function as responsible members of
socie-ty.ScienceandMathematicsarethepartsofeducationalsys-temwhichplayapivotalroleinmakingamanrationaland
develophisindependentthinkingandhelpinremovingthe
superstitions,prevalentinthesysteminvariousforms.In
viewofthemoderndevelopmentanditsimportanceinto-day'sworld,theScienceandMathematicseducationhasas-sumedasignificantplace
inthe curricula ofprimaryandsec-ondary school education. Science
and Mathematics have become a substantial and in-tegral part of an
organized society. There is a close interaction
betweenScienceandMathematicsandtheeconomic,social, political and
educational issue of the society, therefore, there is
hardlyandneedtojustifytheplaceofScience inaschemeof
generaleducationforschoolchildren.TheobjectivesofSci-enceteachingatsecondarylevelasspeltoutbytheNCERT
(1988), clearlyindicates, "thatthebasicpurpose
ofScienceed-ucationatsecondarylevelistounderstandthenatureofSci-ence,itsprocesses,methodsandscope,sothatthestudents
can use scientific method to solve their problems and develop
scientificattitude".Anotherimportantobjectiveofsecondary school
Science is to provide a sound foundation for those seek-ing to
continue the study of Science at higher level. According to Kothari
(1966-68), "the aim of teaching Science in the prima-ry school
should be to develop proper understanding of facts, concepts,
principles and processes in the physical and
biologi-calenvironment".InthewordsofIrawinL.Ramsay(1968)
"Wearelivinginaworldofchangeandchallengeaworld E
IJOARTInternational Journal of Advancements in Research &
Technology, Volume 3, Issue 2, February-2014 48 ISSN
2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART
Filledwithstockingandaweinspiringdiscoveriesaswellas
worldfilledwithcrumblingofmoralrotanddecay."Sucha time with its
fast tempo has many implications for science
ed-ucation,unimaginedhighertoespeciallyforadeveloping country like
India. Sciencehasrespondedtohumanconcernsinseveralareas
likemedicineandagriculture.Thetechnologicaldevelop-mentshavereduceddrudgeryfor
aconsiderablesectorofthe
population.Infuture,however,thesideeffectsofthedevel-opmentsanddevelopmentalactivitieswhichalienatehuman
societyfromnaturewillhavetobeseriouslyrespondedto.
Everyindividualwillrequiretrainingandpreparednessin
areaslikedisastermanagement.Needbasedknowledge would be valued by
the society and the community In the present social set-up, science
is more important
forthecommonman.Alittlereflectionwillshowwhatpre-dominantrolescienceplaysinoureverydaylifeandhowit
hasbecomeanindispensablefactorfortheprogressofour present day
world. It is the pivot of all civilization. This is the
subjectwhichundisputedformstheverybasisofentire
world'scommercialsystem.Itisacontributoryfactorinthe prosperity of
human race. There is no mathematics, no art and no profession,
where science does not held a key position. The
accuracyandexactnessofathingisdeterminedtoamajor
extentbytheamountofscienceutilizedinit.Evensocialsci-ences
likeeconomics, psychology,geographyetc.makeabun-dant use of
science. The gigantic work of construction of dams,
bridges,buildingofships,airplanes,bombsetc.arepossible only
becauseofthequantitativescience.Even inmedicalarea
sciencesisusedtomeasurethedoses,thebloodpressure,the rate of the
pulse, the body temperature
etc.Achievementistheendproductofalleducationalendeav-ours.Themainconcernofalleducationeffortsistoseethat
thelearnerachieves.Qualitycontrol,qualityassuranceand
totalqualitymanagementofachievementhaveincreasingly
gainedtheattentionofresearchineducation.Afterexploring the concept
of achievement in the cognitive, affective and
psy-chomotoraspectsofhumanbehaviour,researchershave
probedfurtherandhaveattemptedtounderstandthe'black box' of
achievement. Theworldisbecomingmoreandmorecompetitiveand quality of
performance has become the key factor for personal progress.
Parents desire that their children climb the ladder of
performancetoashighalevelaspossible.Thisdesireofa
highlevelofachievementputalotofpressureonstudents,
teachersandinstitutions,ingeneraltheeducationalsystem
itself.Infactitappearsasifthewholesystemofeducation
revolvesaroundtheacademicachievementofthestudents,
throughvariousotheroutcomesarealsoexpectedfromthe system.Thusalot
oftimeandefforts oftheschoolsare
help-ingstudentstoachievebetterintheirscholasticendeavours.
Theimportanceofscholasticachievementhasraisedseveral
importantquestionsforeducationalresearchers.Whatfactors
promoteachievementinstudents?Howfardothedifferent
factorscontributetowardsacademicperformance?Therefore
manyfactorshavebeenhypothesizedandresearchedupon and
researchershavecomeoutwithdifferentresults,attime,
complementingeachotherbutattimescontradictingeach other. 2
Conceptual Frame Work:
DerekCheung(2009)examinedtheinteractioneffectbe-tweengradelevelandgenderwithrespecttostudentsatti-tudetowardchemistrylessonstaughtinsecondaryschools.
Thesampleconsistedof954chemistrystudentsingradeSec-ondary 4-7
(approximately) 16-19 years of age) in Hong Kong.
Studentsattitudesweresurveyedusinganattitudetoward
chemistrylessonsscale(ATCLD),andsubscalescoreswere produced on four
dimensions: liking for chemistry theory
les-sons,likingforchemistrylaboratorywork;evaluativebeliefs
aboutschoolchemistry;andbehavioraltendenciestolearn
chemistry.WhentheATCLSdataweresubjectedtotwo-way
MANOVA,theinteractioneffectbetweengradeleveland
genderonstudentsattitudestowardchemistry.Lessonwas
staticallysignificant.Theinteractioneffectwasattributableto
scoresonthetheory-lessonssubscaleandlaboratorywork
subscale.Malestudents inSecondary4and5likedchemistry theory lessons
more than their female counterparts. However,
malestudentslikingforchemistrylaboratoryworkdeclined
whentheyprogressedfromSecondary4toSecondary7;no such a significant
decline in attitude toward chemistry
labora-toryworkwasfoundinfemales.Overall,bothmalesandfe-maleswerejustmarginallypositiveaboutchemistrylessons
during the years of secondary schooling. Implications of these
findings for curriculum design are
discussed.Tzuriel,David(2010)exploredthebarrierstochildren's
achievement in the areas of science, math, and engineering. A
genderdifferenceingirls'spatialabilitiesemergesveryearly
indevelopment.Researcherstudiedmorethan100first
grad-ers,placingabouthalfoftheminatrainingprogramthatfo-cusedonexpandingworkingmemory,perceivingspatialin-formationfromaholisticpointofviewratherthanbasedon
particulardetails,andthinkingaboutspatialgeometricpic-turesfromdifferentpointsofview.Theotherchildrenwere
placed in a control group that took part in a substitute training
program.Aftereightweeklysessions,initialgenderdiffer-ences in
spatial ability disappeared for those who had been in the first
group. This is the first study to find that training helps reduce
the gender gap in spatial ability. Further work can fol-low up on
these findings by determining whether eliminating
thegendergapcontributestoachievementinmathandsci-ence. While the
research doesn't yet show that the intervention
leadstobetterachievement inscience,math,andengineering
forgirls,thisisapromisingdirectionforsupportinggirls' achievement
and eventual contributions in. Every research project deals with
the solution of a problem
ofhumaninterest.Therefore,theresearcherhasadefinite
purposeinmind.Hehascertainspecificgoalstoachieve through his
research work. Such specific goals or purposes are technically
formed as objectives.Everyresearchstudymust
havesomeobjectivestoachieves,withoutwhichnoresearch
canbeconducted.Theentireresearchprocessisguidedby objectives which
have been explicitly and precisely spelled out by the investigator
in advance.
Thepresentstudyisaimedatachievingthefollowingob-jectives:
1.Tocomparethescienceachievementofsecondary IJOARTInternational
Journal of Advancements in Research & Technology, Volume 3,
Issue 2, February-2014 49 ISSN
2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART school students on gender
basis. 2.Tostudytherelationshipofattitudetowardsscience with
science achievement of secondary school students.
3.Tostudytheeffectofparentaleducationonscience achievement of
secondary school students.
4.Tostudytheeffectoffamilysizeonscienceachieve-ment of secondary
school students. 3 Methods: Thepresentwork
isadescriptivestudyinvestigating
ifstudentsscienceachievementdifferedsignificantlytoa
groupofvariablessuchasgender,attitudetowardsscience
andparticipationinsportsactivities.Thesampleconsistedof
2006studentsofclassIX,selectedfrom21schoolsofcentral UP in which
1080 were male and 926 were female students. In
thisstudy,schoolswerecategorizedonthebasisoftheirme-diumofinstructions.Forinstance,EnglishMediumschools,
where pupilsinIXarefromallsocio-economicstrataandare
admittedthroughcompetitionsandHindiMediumschools, where
pupilsinIXarefromallsocio-economicstrataandare admitted through
competitions. 3.1 TOOLS USED 3.1.1 Science Attitude Scale:
Thescienceattitudehasoperationallydefinedasa
generalizedattitudetowardstheuniverseofsciencecontent
andbeingmeasuredintermsofitsfavourablenessorunfa-vourablenessestimatedfromthescoresobtainedbythesub-jects
on an attitude scale toward science comprising of the four
categoriesfromtheuniverseofcontent'ScienceAttitude',(i) Positive
intellectual (ii) negative intellectual, (iii) positive emo-tional
and (iv) negative emotional attitudes.
TheScienceAttitudeScaleisadependabletoolfor
measuringstudent'sattitudetowardsscience.Itappears tobe
usefulforteachersofscience,guidanceworkersandresearch scholars.It
canbeusedbythecurriculumspecialiststo meas-ure the outcomes of
teaching science. The students of Psychol-ogy and Education can
also use it to study the development of their attitude towards
attitudes.The attitude score of a subject is the sum total of
scores onallthetwentyitemsofthescale.Foreachstudentatotal score on
the scale can be obtained by summating his scores for the
individual items. Thus a maximum of 80 scores can be
ob-tainedbyasubject.However,theadministrationofthetest reveals that
the scores ranged from 25 to 70.
Thesummationofscoreearnedbyastudentonall
statementswastakenashisattitudescore.Thetotalscores indicate
favourableness or unfavourableness of the attitude of
studentstowardsscience.Thehigheristhescorethemore
favourableistheattitudetowardsscienceandloweristhe score the more
unfavourable is the attitude towards science of the students.3.1.2
Science Achievement Test:
TheachievementtestinscienceforclassIXstudents that is used in the
present study was constructed by the inves-tigator. This is a very
comprehensive test based on 16 chapters of class VIII science text
book (NCERT). The test consists of 75 items of multiple choice type
representing achievement at var-ious areas of science such as
physics, chemistry and biology of eighth class of U.P. Board and
C.B.S.E. Board. Physics have 35
items,chemistryhave20itemsandbiologyhaving20items. The total score
on the test as a whole was used as a measure of achievement in
science. All the items in the test were the easy items
inthetestwerearranged in orderofdifficulty,the easy items being
placed in the beginning and this was done to
mo-tivatethestudents.Thedifficultyvaluesofitemsinthetest
betweentherange of.25to.85similarly,eachitemhadadis-criminating
power greater than 0.30. The test was based on the latest syllabus
prescribed by the directorate of education, U.P.
&NCERT.Thistesthadafairlyhighcontentvalidityandits reliability
is found to be 0.87.3.1.3 A Personal and Environmental background
assessment Questionnaire:
Thepersonalandenvironmentalinformationsheetispre-paredbytheinvestigator.Thissheetcontainssuchquestions
requiringthesubjectstogiveinformationontheirparental
educational,scienceresourcesavailableathome,fatheroccu-pation,gender,familysizeandtimespentonwatchingT.V.
etc. 4 Results and Analysis
Table1:Comparisonofmeanscienceachievementscoresof male and female
students. GenderNMean SDdf t-value Sig./Not sig. Male108031.2012.34
20044.51** Sig.at 0.01 level Female92628.7511.88 ** Significant at
0.01 level Data analysisisperformedon
computerwithSPSS17soft-warepackage.Whendatawasanalyzedtomakeacompara-tivestudyoftheachievementinScienceofmaleandfemale
students (Table 1) the result shows a significant difference
be-tweenachievementinscienceofmalesandfemales(df=2004, t=4.51).
Thetotalnumbersofmaleandfemalestudentswere
1080&926respectivelyasindicatedbythetable1.Outof75
scores,themeanachievementscoresinScienceofmalestu-dentis31.20andstandarddeviation(SD=12.34).Incaseof
femalestudents,themeanScienceachievementscoreis28.75 and standard
deviation (SD=11.88). The statistically calculated
t-valueis4.51;whichissignificantat0.01levelwith2004df.
Theresultclearlyindicatesthatthereissignificantdifference
betweenmeanscienceachievementscoreofmaleandfemale
secondaryschoolstudents.Botharenotequallygoodthey differ in their
Science achievement. Thus the hypothesis of the study that "there
is no significant difference between male and female students in
Science achievement" is rejected at 0.01 lev-el of
significance.Table2:Relationshipofattitudetowardsscienceandmean
science achievement scores of secondary school students
IJOARTInternational Journal of Advancements in Research &
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2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART Varia-bles
NMeanSDCorrelation coefficient (r) ATS 2006 41.66 13.59 0.338** SAT
2006 30.07 12.19 ** Significant at 0.01 level
Thecorrelationwasemployedtofindouttherela-tionshipofattitudetowardsscienceandachievementinsci-ence.
The TotalSamplewas2006. Themeanscores ofattitude
towardsscienceandachievementinscienceofsecondary
schoolsstudentswerefoundtobe41.66and30.07whereas
thestandarddeviationofattitudetowardsscienceand
achievementinscienceofsecondaryschoolsstudentswere found to be
13.59 and 12.19 respectively. The calculated
corre-lationcoefficient(r)is0.338,whichissignificantat0.01level.
The mean score, standard deviation (SD) and correlation
coef-ficient (r) values are given in table 2. Theanalysis
doesnotconfirmthe predictionhypoth-esized in this studyforthe
present sample.Astrong
relation-shipbetweenstudentsattitudetowardsscienceandachieve-ment
in science has been demonstrated by this finding. Hence, the
hypothesis stating that, there is no significant relationship
betweenattitudetowardsscienceandachievement inscience of secondary
school students was rejected at 0.01 level of sig-nificance. Table
3Comparisonofscienceachievement scoresamongthe three categories of
fathers Education (E1= illiterate, E2= up to 12, E3= degree level
and above) of secondary school students illiterateE1 (N=262) up to
12 E2 (N=1109) degreelevel and aboveE3 (N=635) Signifi-cant pairs
(*) F- value MeanSDMeanSDMeanSD 24.54 10.09 27.27 10.24 37.22 12.09
E1 Vs E2 E1 Vs E3 E2 Vs E3 197.94** ** Significant at 0.01 level
Forstudyingrelationshipbetweenfatherseducation and their
children'sachievementinsciencethedatawas
cate-gorisedintothreegroups,i.e.,illiterate,educateduptoclass
12th,anddegreelevels&above,onthebasisoftheirfathers
education.Themeansciencescoresoftheirchildrenofthese
groupsare24.54,27.27and37.22respectively.Thescoresof these
groupswereputtoanalysisofvariance.The resultsare given in table 3.
AnalysisofvarianceofthemeanscoresofthethreegroupsgiveF valueas
197.94**,which issignifi-cant at 0.01 level. Thisimplied that there
issignificantoveralldifferenceinthemeansofthesethree groups. Hence
F-test wasfoundsignificant;thereforeDuncansposthoctestwas applied
for further investigation.
Furthersupporttothisconclusion,itisalsoprovidedbya
testofsignificanceofdifferencebetweenscienceachievement scores of
three type of fathers educational level as given in the table
3.Thestatisticalmethodusedintestingthemajorhypothesis
wastheDuncan'sposthoctestforthedifferencebetweenthe
meansofthreegroupsoffathereducation.Thesignificant
pairsobtainedbycomparingeachgroupsmeanscience
achievementscorewiththatofevery othergroupsshowthat out of
threepossible pairedcomparison all three showed sig-nificant
difference.The result clearly indicates that as the father's
education in-creases, the achievement in science score of their
children also increasesaccordingly.Thelowestmeanscoresinscienceis
found of children whose fathers are illiterate and on the other
handthehighestscoreinscienceachievementisfoundofthe children whose
fathers are highly
educated.Table4Comparisonofscienceachievementscoresamong
thethreecategoriesofmotherseducation(E1=illiterate,E2= up to 12,
E3= degree level and above) of secondary school stu-dents ( Duncans
Mean Test ) illiterateE1 (N=502) up to 12 E2 (N=1122) degreelevel
and aboveE3 (N=382) Signifi-cant pairs (*) F- value
MeanSDMeanSDMeanSD 25.06 10.12 29.43 11.46 38.52 12.45 E1 Vs E2 E1
Vs E3 E2 Vs E3 156.90** ** Significant at 0.01 level For studying
relationship between mothers education andtheir
children'sachievementinsciencethe datawas
cate-gorizedintothreegroups,i.e.,illiterate,havingreceivededu-cation
up to class 12th, and degree levels & above, on the basis
oftheirmotherseducation.Themeansciencescores oftheir children of
these group are25.06, 29.43 and 38.52 respectively. The scores
ofthesegroupswereputtoanalysis of variance. Theresults are given in
table 4. Analysisofvarianceofthemeanscoresofthethreegroups give
F-valueas156.90** ,
whichissignificantat0.01level.Thisimpliedthatthereissignificant
overalldifference in the meansof these
threegroups.HenceF-testwasfoundsignificant,thereforeDuncans post
hoc test was applied for further investigation.
Furthersupporttothisconclusion,itisalsoprovidedbya
testofsignificanceofdifferencebetweenscienceachieve-mentscoresofthreetypeofmotherseducationallevelas
given in the table
4.Thestatisticalmethodusedintestingthemajorhypothesis was the
Duncan'sposthoc testforthedifferencebetweenthemeans of three
groupsofmothereducation. The
signifi-cantpairsobtainedbycomparingeachgroups mean
scienceachievementscorewiththatofeveryothergroupsshowthatoutofthreepossiblepairedcomparisonallthree
showed significant
difference.Theresultclearlyshowsthatasthemother'seducationin-creases,
the achievement in science score of their children also
increasesaccordingly.Thelowestmeanscoresinscienceis found of
children whose mothers are illiterate and on the
oth-erhandthehighestscoreinscienceachievementisfoundof
IJOARTInternational Journal of Advancements in Research &
Technology, Volume 3, Issue 2, February-2014 51 ISSN
2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART the children whose mothers
are highly educated.Hence a significant difference between science
achievement scores of students parental qualification has been
demonstrat-ed by this finding.
Hencethehypothesisstatingthatthereisnosignificant
differenceamongthecategoriesofparentaleducationand achievementin
scienceofsecondaryschoolsstudents isre-jected at 0.01 level.
Table5Comparisonofscienceachievementofstudentsac-cording to their
family size Family size N Mean achieve-ment score SD df t-value
Small433 34.07 13.08 2004 7.842** Large157328.9611.70 **
Significant at 0.01 level The total sample has been divided into
two groups on
thebasisoftheirfamilysizei.e.smallfamily(upto4mem-bers)largesize(morethan4members).Thenumberofstu-dentsbelongstosmallsizeandlargesizewas433&1573re-spectivelyas
indicatedbythistable 5. Themeanachievement ofstudentsofsmall family
is 28.96 and SD=11.70. In case of
largefamily,themeanachievementscoreofthestudentsis 34.07 and
SD=13.06. The graphical presentation of these mean scores is given
in fig 5.8. The statistically calculated t -value is
7.842whichissignificant at 0.01 level with 2004 df.
There-sultclearlyindicatesthatscienceachievementofstudentsof
smallsizeoffamilyhavegreaterachievementthanthestu-dents of large
family size. Theanalysisdonotconfirmstheprediction hypothesized in
this studyfor the presentsample. A
relation-shipbetweenfamilysizeofthestudentsandscience
achievementhasbeendemonstratedbythisfindings.Hence the seventh
hypothesis stating that "there is no significant
dif-ferencebetweenfamilysizeandachievementinscienceof students was
rejected.5
DISCUSSIONThepurposeofthepresentresearchwastodeterminethe
effectofGender,attitudetowardsscience,parentaleducation
andfamilysizeonscienceachievementofsecondaryschool students of
central U.P.. Data from a large contemporary sam-ple of IX class
students were analyzed.FtestfollowedbyDuncansmeantest,Correlation
coefficient and t-test were used to determine the effects of
var-iables onScienceachievement,while controllingfor otherrel-evant
background
influences.Theresultsoftheanalysisofdatashowsthattheef-fectofgender,attitudetowardsscience,parentaleducation,
andfamilysizeallhadsignificanteffectonscienceachieve-ment
scores.Therewassignificantdifferenceinscienceachieve-mentscoresbetweenboyandgirlsinthepresentstudy.The
findingofthisstudyinsupportedbylinnC.Merle(1989)in-vestigatedthatmalehavegreateraccesstoscienceandtech-nicalfieldsandgreaterearningpowerthanfemales.Thena-tionalassessmentofeducationalprogressandEverybad
counts:reportsthatmalewerefoundtoshow higher motiva-tion levels
than
females.HensleyClementine,ElizabethBarber(1987)investi-gatedthatboysconsistentlyscoredlowerthangirls.Sarkar
(1983), Singh (1984) are also supported that male scored higher
thanboys.WingandStaver(1997)thestudy"Anempirical
studyofgenderDifferencesinChinesestudentsscience
achievement.foundthatboyscoredhigherthangirls.
Melkonion,Michael(1997)thestudywasconductedtoknow
theeffectofgenderonscienceachievementlevelfoundthat
generallyfemalestudentattainedsignificantlyhighergrades
thantheirmale.Manning,M.Lee(1998)andPinchasTamir (1998) supported
that boys like to study math and science that
femaleandachievehingescoredinsconce.Leader(1992)has
alsoreportedtheexistenceofgenderdifferencesinscience subjects in
general as well as in math. According to same
find-ingslikeTzurielDavid(2010)thisstudyexploredberriersto
children's achievement in the areas of science, math and
engi-neering.Agenderdifferenceingirlsspecialabilitiesemerges very
early in development. In that the two groups one is
train-ingprogram andother is controlledgroup, aftereightweeks he
found there are gender difference in the first
group.Itgenerallybelievedthatattitudetowardssubjectsdeter-minestheirsuccessinthatsubject.Inotherwords,favorable
attituderesultstogoodachievementinasubject.AStudents
constantfailureinaschoolsubjectandscienceinparticular can make him
to believe that he can never do well on the
sub-jects,thusacceptingdefeat.Ontheotherhand,hissuccessful
experiencecanmakehimtodevelopapositiveattitudeto-wardslearningthesubject.Thissuggeststhatstudentsatti-tudetowardssciencecouldbeenhancedthrougheffective
teaching strategies. It has in fact been confirmed that effective
teaching strategies can create positive attitude on the students
towards school
subjects.Itbecomesquiteclearthatattitudetowardsscienceand
achievement in it are positively related in this study. The
stud-iessupportedtothisareHBroun(1965)foundthatmaleand
femalearesignificantlydifferentachievementinscience.Lowery(1967)foundthatgirlsgenerallyhavesignificantly
morepositiveattitudestowardssciencethanboys.Sharma
(1967-68)conductedastudyover260studentsofClassXin
Delhiandfoundthattheboysandgirlsshowsnearlyfavora-bleattitude
towardsphysicsand there isnodifferenceinatti-tude towards Physics
between boy and girls. Thnhikom (1989)
Thestudy'Attitudetowardsandachievementinscienceof
secondarystudentsinKasetSartDemonstrationschool,
Bangkok,ThailandConductedonthepopulationof709stu-dent in grades
VII, VIX & IX & found that boys had more
posi-tiveATSthangirls,girlsattitudedeclinedandboysattitude improved
when grade level
increased.Khatoon(1998)thestudyinvestigatedattitudeto-wards science
and its effect on science achievement at
second-aryschoolstudents.Shefindthatthemeanpercentageof marks of
Hindu & Muslims male students show that both
dif-fersignificantlyintheirachievement.DerekCheung(2009)
hasstudiedtoexaminetheinteractioneffectbetweengrade
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2278-7763Copyright2014SciResPub.IJOART
levelandgenderwithrespecttostudent'sattitudetowards chemistry
lesson taught in secondary schools. The sample
con-sistedof954students,afterinvestigationhefoundthatboth males and
females were just marginally positive about chemis-try lesson
during the years of secondary schooling.In this study parental
education is found to be an
im-portantfactorofchildrenachievementinscience.Children
fromhighlyeducatedparentsarelikelytohavesignificantly higher
science achievement scores as compared to the children
oflesseducatedparents.ThestudysupportedbyChatterji,
MukherjiandBanerji(1971),theaimofthisstudywasto
investigatetheeffectof some importantaspects ofsocial class such as
income , parental education , family size , general con-ditions of
home etc. He found that parents education level was
directlyrelatedtotheachievementoftheirchildren.White
(1982)studiestherelationshipbetweenSESandacademic achievement , the
result shows that SES is correlated with
aca-demicachievement.ColdisandBankstorne(1997)foundthat
socialstatushavesignificantandsubstantiveindependent
effectinindividualacademicachievement.T.SBegumand
Dr.(mrs)M.Phukan(2000)foundthattype offamily,number
ofsiblings,educationofparentsandfamilyincomehadsig-nificant impact
on academic achievement of the students. Thisstudyalsoexploredthe
relationshipbetweenstudents achievement in science and their size
of the family. Children of smallerfamilyhavegot
significantlyhigherachievementinsciencethanthechildrenoflargerfamily.Thatisthereisnegativecorrelationbetweensizeofthefamilyandachieve-mentinscienceandasthefamilysizeincreasetheachieve-mentdecreasesaccordingly.Thestudysupportedtothisare,
BrownHarris(1997)foundthatlargerfamilieslentto score lower in
reading achievement, languageandmath's
thandidstudentfromsmallfamiliesandbirthorderwasrelatedto
achievement. Chatterji, et. al. (1971) found that size of the
fam-ilywasnotrelatedtotheacademicachievementKrishnan&
Namboodin(1994)foundthatsmallerfamilysizehasledto higher
educational status. 5.1 DELIMITATIONS
Itisnotpossibleinasingleresearchstudytocoverevery aspect of
variables associated with the problem under investi-gation.
Although, the problem is very natural and is prevalent
everywhereyetduetoshortageoftime&resourcesallthe
aspectsvariablescouldnotbecovered&thestudyislimited
inseveralways.Ithadtobedeterminedintermsofpopula-tioncovered,sampleselected,scopeofvariablesstudied,the
scope of genralizability of finding & so on.
1.Duetotheshortageoftime&resourcesthestudywas
carriedoutonlyonstudentsof class9thalthoughproblemof achievement is
common to elementary classes yet the focus of the study has been on
the secondary stage only.
2.Thesamplewasrestrictedtoruralandurbanareasof central U.P. only so
as to make an in-depth study of the factors that affect achievement
in science in these schools. 3. The phenomenon of achievement has
been studied on in
relationtoselectedpersonal,environmentalandinstitutional variables
only. 4.Thescopeofstudycoversonlyafewdistrictsofcentral U.P. as the
investigator felt that no study had been conducted
inthisarea.Hencethegeneralizabilityofthefindingswould be limited
accordingly. 5. The tool for the assessment of the achievement in
science isdevelopedbyinvestigatorhimself.Althoughattempthas
beenmadeforproperitemselection,tryout,estimationof
reliabilityandvalidityofthetool,detailednormsstillremain to be
prepared. 6.Itisdesirablethattheresearcherreachesfirsthandor
originalsourcesforthestudy,butasaccesstosomematerial
wasnotpossiblematerialstakenfromavailablesecondary sources has been
used. 7. Collecting of data in two sitting may be one more
delimi-tationasanumberofstudentsarepresentonlyinoneofthe
twosessions. Throughathird visitis
madetocoversuchstu-dents,somedropoutsstillremainbeyondreachoftheinves-tigator
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