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Development and Validation of a Questionnaire to Assess Situational Interest in a Science Period: a Study in Three Cultural/Linguistic Contexts

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Abstract

This article reports an international initiative to develop and validate a situational interest questionnaire in three cultural/linguistic contexts: Canada (French), USA (English), and Taiwan (Chinese). The 20-item solution (α = .90) presented four factors: enjoyment, value, attention/sustained work, and usefulness. These factors and the convergence of the three translations were partially verified through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). A shorter, unidimensional 7-item solution is also presented (α = .76) and was confirmed with CFA for two out of the three languages (with all α > .75). This questionnaire, named ISiQ, thus presents good or acceptable psychometric properties while securing better coverage of the situational interest construct than most surveys do. Reflections about its possible uses and about the stability/volatility of situational interest items are presented.

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Acknowledgements

We warmfully thank not only all participants of this research in Canada, the USA, and Taiwan for their participation, but also the teachers and administrators who facilitated and authorized data collection. We would also like to thank Jill Vandermeerschen for her help with the data analysis.

Funding

This project was supported by a start-up grant from the Université de Sherbrooke, by the Équipe de Recherche en Éducation Scientifique et technologique (EREST) and by the Chaire de recherche sur l’intérêt des jeunes à l’égard des sciences et de la technologie (CRIJEST).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de Didactique, Université du Québec À Montréal, C.P. 8888, Succursale Centre-Ville, Qc, Montréal, H3C 3P8, Canada

    Patrice Potvin

  2. Faculté d’éducation, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Canada

    Jean-Philippe Ayotte-Beaudet, Abdelkrim Hasni & Jonathan Smith

  3. College of Education, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA

    Michael Giamellaro

  4. Program of Learning Sciences, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Tzung-Jin Lin & Chin-Chung Tsai

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  1. Patrice Potvin
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  2. Jean-Philippe Ayotte-Beaudet
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  3. Abdelkrim Hasni
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  7. Chin-Chung Tsai
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Correspondence to Patrice Potvin.

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Potvin, P., Ayotte-Beaudet, JP., Hasni, A. et al. Development and Validation of a Questionnaire to Assess Situational Interest in a Science Period: a Study in Three Cultural/Linguistic Contexts. Res Sci Educ 53, 99–120 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11165-022-10050-0

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