An introspective study on students’ motivation, understanding and performance in engineering statics

Abstract

Statics is a fundamental engineering course, which many students find difficult [1-3] to understand. This has considerably affected the students’ performance in Statics and other follow-on courses, and consequently, disheartened them from pursuing engineering as a career [4, 5]. However, findings from previous researches showed that good academic performance on assessment alone does not necessarily reflect the engineering students’ deep understanding of the fundamental concepts [6, 7]. Steif [8]suggested that apart from the universal issues such as the hard to learn concepts, the local culture and students’ work habits contribute to this continual problem . In an earlier survey conducted by the authors, most students attributed their performance in Statics to their own efforts in learning. Therefore, this paper investigates the influence of students’ motivational factors in learning for understanding and learning for achieving good performance through statistical data analysis and semi-structured interviews. The findings of this research provide a useful insight into students’ motivation in the learning of this fundamental engineering course. This will be useful in designing a curriculum that could enhance engineering students understanding and performance and retain them in the programme.