Assessing the attitudes of economics students towards econometrics

Abstract

Econometrics is the dominant research methodology in Economics, and it is also frequently used in other social sciences disciplines. Skills related to this subject are much in demand around the world, both in the public and private sector. However, numerous Econometrics lecturers consider that Economics students do not have positive attitudes toward the subject. This can be a problem for learning the contents and acquiring econometric skills, since attitudes are crucial for the learning process. It has been argued that the development of positive attitudes should be a desired course outcome. This paper reports how lecturers can evaluate if this outcome has been achieved in their courses using a questionnaire for assessing students’ attitudes towards Econometrics. In this research it has been administered to undergraduate Economics students at the end of an introductory Econometrics course. There are no other studies of this type related to this subject. Further research extending the preliminary instrument presented in this research to other courses, universities, countries… would be very convenient.