Construction And Validation Of Attitude Towards Mathematics Scale (Atms)

Abstract

This article reports constructing and validating a scale to measure the students' Attitude Towards Mathematics suited for the Indian population. Items for the scale were generated based on existing tools, literature reviews, and discussions with experts, teachers and students. After item generation, content validity and inter-item reliability were established. A random sample of 518 (245 males and 273 females) students studying in classes 8, 9 and 10 were selected from three schools. Most of the students were between 13 to 16 years of age. Factor analysis with a varimax rotation generated three factors: negative attitude towards mathematics, tendency to avoid mathematics and positive attitude towards mathematics. The psychometric properties were comprehensive; thus, the present scale can be recommended for investigating high school students' attitudes towards mathematics.