Actitudes hacia la química en estudiantes universitarios conforme avanzan en la carrera

Abstract

The aim of this work was to estimate the change of the student attitudes towards chemistry on biology careers (“Profesorado en Biología and Licenciatura en Biodiversidad”) at Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Santa Fe, Argentina. The student attitudes were studied during three stages: at the beginning (1st year), during (3rd year) and at the end (5th year) of their careers. The instrument chose to assess the attitudes of the students was a questionnaire according to Likert scale. All the students who attended each of the analyzed years (45, 30 and 20 students respectively) were surveyed. The obtained results indicate statistically significant differences (p ≤ 0.05) between attitudes towards chemistry presented by students of 3rd and 5th with respect to 1st year. This research showed that there is a positive trend in attitudes toward chemistry as students progress through university education. It could be inferred that it is possible to improve the attitude of the early college years, whether methodologies of teaching and evaluation, both in the last years of high school, and in the first years of college, are reviewed, to improve the attitude towards the chemistry of the students of biological careers from the beginning.