Great Minds Think Together: Examining the Relationship Between Faculty Interactions and STEM Students' Math Mind-Set

• In Event: Highlighting the Value of Faculty and Staff Interactions for College Students

Abstract

Guided by Pascarella’s (1980) Student-Faculty Informal Contact and College Outcomes (SFICCO) model and Dweck’s (2006, 2010) fixed and growth mindset model, this quantitative longitudinal study examines the relationship between faculty interactions and first-year STEM students’ math growth mindset. Utilizing two nationwide and multi-institutional surveys, this study employed a combination of crosstabulations and ordinal regression analyses to illuminate that although first-year STEM students enter college with a relatively strong belief in math growth mindset, this belief decreases significantly during the first year, across various background and academic characteristics. Additionally, regression analysis unveiled the salience of faculty interactions on the development of STEM students’ math growth mindset. Future research should further explore and disentangle math growth mindset across intersecting identities.

Author

• Chantra Nhien, University of California - Los Angeles