The Intergenerational Transmission of Mathematics Attitudes
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.46328/ijemst.v8i2.741Keywords:
Mathematics attitudes, Parental beliefs, Self-efficacy, Mathematics capitalAbstract
Cold sweats, head shakes, and memories of hardship are the common reactions when adults are introduced to a high school mathematics teacher. These negative reactions contribute to an attitude towards mathematics that continues to permeate American society. Unfortunately, there is a growing concern that these negative attitudes may be passed from adults to susceptible youth resulting in a never-ending cycle of dislike towards mathematics. The current study aimed to investigate the ways in which students internalize the mathematics attitudes of their parents in light of mathematics capital theory. Instruments measuring self-efficacy beliefs in mathematics, as well as value placed on learning content were administered to all juniors, seniors, and their parents in a suburban school district. The survey data was analyzed to identify candidates for interviews. Interviews of eight parents and their children were conducted to explore the sources of the students’ self-efficacy beliefs. Findings revealed that the relationship between a parent and child’s belief systems is complex and varies according to the parent’s level of mathematics beliefs.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Articles may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Authors alone are responsible for the contents of their articles. The journal owns the copyright of the articles. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand, or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of the research material.
The author(s) of a manuscript agree that if the manuscript is accepted for publication in the journal, the published article will be copyrighted using a Creative Commons “Attribution 4.0 International” license. This license allows others to freely copy, distribute, and display the copyrighted work, and derivative works based upon it, under certain specified conditions.
Authors are responsible for obtaining written permission to include any images or artwork for which they do not hold copyright in their articles, or to adapt any such images or artwork for inclusion in their articles. The copyright holder must be made explicitly aware that the image(s) or artwork will be made freely available online as part of the article under a Creative Commons “Attribution 4.0 International” license.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
