Development of Mathematics Achievement Goal Orientation Scale (MAGOS): Validity and Reliability Study

Abstract

The present study aims to develop a valid and reliable instrument for measuring students' mathematics achievement goal orientation. The participants were 356 high school students studying in Diyarbakir in 2013-2014 Education Year Spring Semester. Expert opinion was consulted with regard to the scale's content and face validity. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) were performed in order to measure the scale's construct validity. As a result of EFA, a 25-item and a four-factor structure, which explains 51.15% of the total variance was obtained. The emerging factors were named learning approach, performance approach, learning avoidance and performance avoidance. The findings obtained CFA indicated that the 25 items and four-factor structure related to Mathematics Achievement Goal Orientation Scale (MAGOS) have satisfactory goodness of fit indices. As for the criterion related validity, the calculation of correlation between students' scores obtained from the MAGOS and mathematics achievement scores reported findings similar to the ones in the literature. The scale's reliability coefficients were calculated by means of Cronbach Alpha and composite reliability methods. The reliability analysis showed that the Cronbach Alpha coefficients were .85, .78, .71 and .67 for learning approach, performance approach, learning avoidance and performance avoidance subscales respectively. On the other hand, the composite reliability coefficients were .80, .66, .57 and .52 for learning approach, performance approach, learning avoidance and performance avoidance subscales respectively. In order to determine the discriminatory power of the MAGOS items corrected item total correlation was calculated. The findings of the item analyses showed that item total correlation range between .37 and .68 and all of the items in the scale were discriminatory. In light of these findings it could be argued that the scale is reliable and valid and can be used in order to test students' mathematics achievement goal orientation. © 2014 IOJES. All rights reserved