Investigating Attitudinal Profiles and Disparities in Attitudes among Historically Marginalized Undergraduate Chemistry Students

Self-efficacy holds important implications for attitudes toward learning and course performance. This study explores the configurations of self-reported sources of self-efficacy in a sample of general and organic chemistry students, as well as disparities in these configurations for historically marginalized students. A latent profile analysis classified 687 students into groups labeled as Multi-Source, Low Social Persuasions, Physiological State Dependent, or At-Risk based on the four sources of self-efficacy (i.e., mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, social persuasions, and physiological state). Profile membership was shown to be related to important attitudes toward the subject of chemistry (i.e., intellectual accessibility, emotional satisfaction, and anxiety) and was predictive of exam performance later in the semester. Students belonging to the Multi-Source profile, with high levels of all sources of self-efficacy, were found to have scored the highest on exams, one standard deviation above those with the At-Risk profile. Profile membership was not homogeneous among groups of students as a result of racism, sexism, and classism; rather, general chemistry, female, and first-generation students were each more likely to belong to the At-Risk group compared to organic chemistry, male, and continuing-generation students. Similarly, Black students were five times more likely to belong to the At-Risk group than White students. These findings indicate that self-efficacy profiles may serve as early screening tools for helping to identify at-risk chemistry students needing support, allowing instructors to proactively implement interventions to better support all students and mitigate the inequity of outcomes experienced by students from historically marginalized groups.