Assessment of the effects of math anxiety, attitude and self-efficacy beliefs on the 8th grade students' graph reading and interpretations

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of math anxiety, attitude and self-efficacy beliefs of the eight grade students on the achievement levels about the reading and interpretation of the graphs. The study also investigated the impacts of variables, such as gender, TEOG exam scores and socio-economic status on the 8th grade students about the reading and interpretation of the graphs. The study included three hundreds eighty-eight 8th grade students who were from four different middle schools located in the city center of Aydın. The convenience sampling technique was used in the selection of the schools. The researcher used a multiple choice statistics test in the collection of the data. This test contained twenty-two questions about the reading and interpretation of graphs. First part of the test contained 9 questions about the reading and interpretation of the frequency polygon and finding of the measures of both central tendency and dispersion on it. Likewise, second part of the test consisted of 9 questions regarding the reading and interpretation of the histogram and finding of the measures of both central tendency and dispersion on it. The last part of the test included 4 questions about the standard deviation. This test was developed by the researcher who piloted it and found its reliability of Cronbach's alpha value as 0.803. The researcher also used a math anxiety scale developed by Şentürk (2010), a math self-efficacy beliefs scale developed by Umay (2002) and an attitude scale developed by Aşkar (1986) in the collection of the data in the study. In the analysis of the data, the researcher employed the paired samples t-test, independent samples t-test and two- way ANOVA. The study indicated that the participants of this study were more successful in reading and interpretation of frequency polygon (line graph) than histogram. There were no statistically significant differences found in the computation of mode, median, range and standard deviations in both types of graphs between the achievement levels of the students. In other words, types of graphs did not influence the achievement levels of the students regarding the computation of measures of both central tendency and dispersion. However, the study also indicated that the participants were more successful on the items that required the interpretations of standard deviations than the items which required the computation of standard deviations. Moreover, although gender was not a great factor on the accomplishment levels of the participants on the test, both TEOG exam scores and socio-economic status played prominent roles on the students‟ achievements on the test. There was a positive relationship between the students‟ achievement levels and socio-economic status on the statistics test. Furthermore, the study documented that the math anxiety, attitude and self-efficacy levels of the eight grade students in mathematics had considerable effects on the students‟ achievement levels about the reading and interpretation of the graphs, frequency polygon (line graph) and histogram. The study also indicated that there was a positive relationship between the students‟ selfefficacy level and the overall test scores. Furthermore, when their achievement levels were examined according to their anxiety levels, the achievement levels of the students on the test were found successively high, low and medium. Similarly, there was a positive correlation between the students‟ attitudes toward mathematics and the overall test scores. In addition to the mentioned findings, the interactions of students' math anxiety and self-efficacy, math anxiety and attitude, and attitude and self-efficacy levels did not influence the accomplishment levels of the students about the reading and interpretation of the graphs. Keywords: Reading and Interpretation of graph, math anxiety, attitude, selfefficacy beliefs, 8th grade