Assessing subjective university success with the Subjective Academic Achievement Scale (SAAS)

Abstract

University achievement is a highly relevant educational outcome with implications for students' academic and professional futures. As the majority of students that drop out of university do so due to subjective reasons in contrast to a lack of capability to handle the workload, a measure of subjective university achievement (complementing grade point average) is helpful to enhance educational research on causes, correlates, and consequences of university success. This study aims to introduce a short scale for assessing subjective academic achievement – the SAAS – and provide first results on its psychometric properties. Based on two independent samples of university students, the internal consistency, factorial validity, and construct validity of the SAAS are corroborated, suggesting the measure's administration in educational research on university success and related issues.