European Journal of Education Studies
ISSN: 2501 - 1111
ISSN-L: 2501 - 1111
Available on-line at: www.oapub.org/edu
Volume 3 │Issue 11│2017
doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1058985
EXAMINATION OF ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY:
A SURVEY ON PRE-SERVICE AND INSERVICE
ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS
Yeliz Yazici,
Erhan Suri
Sinop University,
Gerze Vocational School,
Turkey
Abstract:
Academic self–efficacy can be defined as person`s belief that he can successfully achieve
at a desired level on an academic task or a specific goal (Schunk & Pajares, 2002). This
study aims to investigate the level of academic self-efficacy levels of pre-service and inservice teachers. In this study problem solving skills and epistemological beliefs are
evaluated as predictors of academic self-efficacy levels of pre-service and in-service
groups. Each groups are consisting of 40 people. The data gathered via online
questionnaire form via link given in the Facebook group pages. The gathered data
analyzed using regression, t-test and related descriptive analysis. The results show that
epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills can predict the %14 for in-service
English language teachers and this is %15 for pre-service English language teachers.
Besides the results show that when the relationship between the gender and the other
dependent factors there is only relation in pre-service teachers academic self-efficacy
and epistemological beliefs. The female participants have higher values than male ones.
Keywords: academic efficacy, ELT, pre-service, ın-service
1. Introduction
Academic self-efficacy can be defined as a person`s belief that he can successfully
achieve at a desired level on an academic task or a specific goal (Schunk & Pajares,
Copyright © The Author(s). All Rights Reserved.
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Yeliz Yazici, Erhan Sur
EXAMINATION OF ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY:
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2002) (Bandura, Self-Efficacy, 1994). It functıons at a multilevel set of beliefs that effect
the way people feel, think, behave and motivate. Rooting from these multilevel set of
beliefs, in this study problem solving skills and epistemological beliefs are to be
examined as predictors of academic self-efficacy of pre-service and in-service language
teachers around Turkey. It is also examined the relationship and the effect of perceived
beliefs and acquired skills on self-efficacy in terms of gender, age and related variables.
Epistemological beliefs can be broadly defined as the beliefs about the source of
knowledge and the criteria, process of knowing and the level of certainty. It refers to the
ways of reaching, acquiring and practicing the data to the current environment. In this
context, it is learning-teaching environment. In order to measure it, Epistemological
Beliefs Questionnaire which was developed by Schammer (1990) and adapted by Chan
and Elliot (2002, 2004) is to be applied. Another independent variable of the study as
predictor of academic self-efficacy is problem solving skills. The efforts and the process
of eliminating the problems faced during the time in attaining a goal can be defined as
problem solving (Bingham, 1998) and it is crucial to have alternative skills throughout
the problem solving process. To measure these skills Problem Solving Inventory for
Adults which was developed by Heppner and Petersen
and adapted by Şahin
and Heppner (1993) is to be applied. The academic self-efficacy as a dependent variable
measurement scale is Academic Self-Efficacy Scale and it was developed by Morgan
and Jnik(2003). Examining academic self-efficacy is considered to help the
understanding, explaining and developing the behaviours of the teachers both inservice and pre-service. As it is believed that self-efficacy effects performance (Eccles,
McGrew,
, it s highly related to develop performances of the in-service
teachers. It helps not only developing themselves but also build relationships between
these beliefs, skills and efficacy which enlighten different perspectives on their
knowledge and beliefs in an academic context.
2. Literature Review
Academic self-efficacy has gained importance since the first outbreak with Bandura`s
social cognitive theory. Self-efficacy is a term that presents the person`s belief on
himself when life becomes hard and when the person come across with new life events
(Bandura, 1977, s. 191-215). According to Bandura (1977), the people who have high
self-efficacy levels are better in coping with new and/or challenging life issues.
Academic self-efficacy is the academic dimension of general self-efficacy which shows
the relation between the challenges of academic life events and persons belief on
himself. There are numerous studies carried on academic self-efficacy (Pintirch, 2002;
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EXAMINATION OF ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY:
A SURVEY ON PRE-SERVICE AND INSERVICE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS
Eccles & Wigfield, 2002; Linenbrink & Pintrich, 2003) and it has been concluded that
both students and teachers who have high academic self-efficacy levels are good at in
problem solving skills. For students it seems that they can use a variety of problem
solving skills and for teachers it seems that they are more willing and open to the new
methods while teaching.
The other term is problem solving skills and it has been investigated and
developed by Heppner and Petersen in 1982 (s. 66-75). Problem solving skills target and
research four main skills in persons behaviour and these are: defining the problem and
formulating it helping to understand the possible solutions, formulating different ways
of solutions, giving decisions and applying the solutions and evaluation. Literature
review shows that both teachers and students need effective problem solving skills in
order to overcome the teaching-learning problems in an effective way. Problem solving
skills are the combination of two basic elements: observation and critical thinking
Dora, Campell & Luretta,
5zden,
Yalçınkaya,
. By the help of these
two elements, teachers can recognize the source of the problem and critical thinking
skills help them to find effective solutions in the classroom environment.
The other element used in this study to examıne the academic-efficacy is
epistemological beliefs of the participants. This belief emphasizes the way of learning
and teaching the knowledge so it has clearly been related with the perceptions of
teachers and students. Epistemological beliefs show all the decisions taken during the
lives of individuals, the elements affecting the decisions and the conclusion also. The
elements affecting epistemological beliefs can be listed as age, level of education, family
structure and the environment in which people live etc. It has a dynamic nature and can
change according to these variables (Belenky et al. 1986, Buehl et al. 2002, Bayrak, 2013).
Along with all these terms, the current study focuses on following research questions:
1. Can epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills predict the academic selfefficacy of in-service English language teachers?
2. Can epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills predict the academic selfefficacy of pre-service English language teachers candidates?
3. Methodology
In this study, the effect of problem solving skill and epistemological beliefs over
academic self-efficacy levels of pre-service and in-service language teachers is examined
and presented. A questionnaire was applied to the English language teachers and
teacher candidates via online systems. There are three different questionnaires and
these are Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire; it is used to define the participants
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A SURVEY ON PRE-SERVICE AND INSERVICE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS
beliefs about the source of the knowledge. Problem Solving Inventory is used to define
the levels of the participants in times of problems and Academic Self-Efficacy Scale is
used to examine the participants` beliefs on themselves in terms of academic success.
The gathered data were analyzed using SPSS programs ANOVA, the descriptive
analysis are also applied.
3.1 Participants
The participants are teachers (n=38) and pre-service teachers (n=38). They attended at
the study via online forms send blindly using internet groups at social media. The
%
. of the ın-service teachers (n=35) are male and the %12.5 (n=5) of them are females.
The pre-service participants are composing of 13 (%32.5) males and 27 (%67.5) females.
In terms of their experience in teaching; %70 of the teachers (28 teachers) have
experience between 1-10 years, %27 of them (11 teachers) have experience between 1120 years and %2.5 of them (1 teacher) have 21 and more experience in teaching. The
grades of the university students are range as follows: %22.5 of the students (9 students)
are first year, and same amount for second grades, %15 of them (6 students) are third
grade students and %40 of them (16 students) at their fourth year in the university.
3.2 Data Collection Instruments
Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire was developed by Schommer (1990) and it was
adapted into Turkish Deryakulu and Büyüköztürk (2002). The questionnaire composed
of 35 items and the scale five-point and it has three sub-dimensions.
Problem Solving Inventory was first developed by Heppner and Peterson
(Heppner & Petersen, 1982) and it was adapted into Turkish by Şahin et al. Şahin,
Şahin, & Heppner, 1993). It has 35 items and it is 6 likert type scale. The answers change
from
to
and
means ı always act like that and
means I never act like that . If
participants get high scores it means the participant evaluate himself inadequate in
problem solving skills.
Academic Self-Efficacy Scale is formed by Owen & Froman (1988) and it was
adapted to Turkish by Ekici (2012, s. 174-185). The scale composes of 33 items and it is
prepared in five-point likert type. It changes from
to
and
means agree and
means strongly disagree . If the points are high then it means the participants have
high academic self-efficacy levels and if it is low, it means the participants have low
academic self-efficacy levels.
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EXAMINATION OF ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY:
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3.3 Procedure
The questionnaires were applied at an online environment. The related questionnaires
were prepared and sent via mails or using the social platforms, Facebook messages
and/or Twitter messages. The questionnaires were gathered ın national scale and the
participants were volunteers in attending at the study. The Cronbach-alpha value for
self-efficacy scale is found .936 for teachers and .760 for students. The second research
questionnaire is epistemological belief questionnaire and its Cronbach-alpha value for
teachers is .896 and the same value for .612 and the third scale is problem solving skills.
The Cronbach alpha value for teachers .927 while the same value for students is found
.911.
5. Analysis
The research paper aims to find answers for mainly two research questions and the first
one is whether epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills can predict the
academic self-efficacy levels of the in-service language teachers or not. In order to find
the answer for this research question regression analysis was applied to the data. The
related issue of the data analysis is given in Table 1.
Table 1: Regression Analysis Results for the In-Service Candidates
B
Std. Error
β
t
p
Epistemological Beliefs
.555
.287
.329
1.936
.061
Problem Solving Skills
,-113
.210
.-092
.-593
.593
Independent Factors
R=379
R2=144 F(3.107)= 057
p>005
The results of the regression analysis show that epistemological beliefs and problem
solving skills neither can nor predict the academic self-efficacy levels of the ın-service
language teachers. The p value for the epistemological beliefs is not statistically
meaningful (p=.061, p>.05) and it is also same for the problem solving skills (p=.593,
p>.05). Also the R and R2 values show that the correlation between the factors are quite
low.
The second research question is related with prediction of the pre-service
language teachers (teacher candidates) academic self-efficacy level via problem solving
skills and epistemological beliefs. The related data analysis is given in Table 2.
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EXAMINATION OF ACADEMIC SELF-EFFICACY:
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Table 2: Regression Analysis Results for the Pre-Service Candidates
B
Std. Error
β
t
p
Epistemological Beliefs
.857
1.612
.365
2.226
.032
Problem Solving Skills
.868
.390
.-145
.-881
.384
Independent Factors
R=449
R2=201 F (4.660) = 016
p<005
At Table 2 the results for the pre-service teachers` academic self-efficacy levels
prediction via epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills are given. It can be
seen that the results for epistemological beliefs are statistically meaningful (p=.032,
p<.05) while the problem solving skills` results are not statistically meaningful (p=.384,
p>.05). The R and R2 values show that the correlation between the factors show
relatively low of the total variation in the dependent variable.
6. Discussion and Conclusion
This study is based on to find the relationship the academic self-efficacy levels of preservice and in-service language teachers between problem solving and epistemological
beliefs. The study was carried in an online platform. The results show that while the
epistemological beliefs and problem solving skills scales can predict the academic selfefficacy level of pre-service participants, it is not the same for the in-service teachers.
The research studies are generally carried separately with these factors such as the
relation between self-efficacy levels and problem solving skills etc.
The findings show that academic achievements and activities at school have
effect on self-efficacy levels of the students (Schunk & Pajares, 2002) and the
participants in the study have a heavy background at schooling so they have a
moderate level of academic self-efficacy levels at least they have faced with events
challenging their self-efficacy levels. At this study the epistemological beliefs of the
participants seems to have a relation with the academic self-efficacy levels. It can be
said that because of these challenges these participants have a statistically meaningful.
Another study ın the literature shows that there is a relation between self-efficacy
and academic performances (Pajares, 1996). The students` self-efficacy levels effect their
achievements and performances. Their expectations also are effected by the self-efficacy
levels and in this study, although they are considered as teachers they are still students
(teacher candidates) so it will be better to explain that their academic self-efficacy levels
are closely related with the epistemological beliefs. These factors are all effective by
themselves and they have effect over each other. If the epistemological beliefs of the
participants are the subject it can be said that it is effective on problem solving skills.
When the subject is teacher candidates epistemological beliefs have impact on their
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conception of teaching (Ching, Myint, & Teo, 2006). Ching et al. (2006) find that preservice teachers believe that strong effort is the way in acquiring the knowledge and
they also think that knowledge is something continuously changing and this requires
hard work. Findings in thıs study also show that pre-service teachers have similar
beliefs related to the source of the knowledge and they are in search of the correct
sources. At this point the in-service and pre-service participants believe that the experts`
saying generally are true sources ın getting the new knowledge.
Another item at this research study is the problem solving skills and in the
related studies, it is seen that there is a relationship between the problem solving skills
and self-efficacy levels Yalmancı & Aydın, 2014). Problem solving skills and selfefficacy levels are directly related because the higher the self-efficacy level the higher
the success in overcoming a problem, it is thought (Bandura, Self-Efficacy, 1994). The
same situation is true for the academic self-efficacy levels in coping with the problem
solving skills in an academic situation. This close relationship can be seen while solving
the problems, using the strategies and accomplishing the tasks. Sharna and Nasa (2014,
s. 57-64) define academic self-efficacy as a reliable predictor in education especially of
performances. In this study it is thought that pre-service teachers are still coping with
problems that s why their data is statistically significant but for ın-service teachers they
should have the awareness of self-efficacy and academic self-efficacy first and their role
in developing students` academic self-efficacy. Teachers can develop by setting goals
for students, strategy trainings, modeling and giving feedbacks (Schunk D. , Selfefficacy and education and instruction, 1995).
At the end of these findings, it can be said that all of the factors that have been
studied here share some common features such as being continuous, effected by
personal experiences along with the environment. Family and teacher support is also
while developing these feature and it needs to be evaluated with all of these elements.
For future studies, the relation between these factors and vulnerability can be studied, it
is also considered to be fruitful to study with different levels.
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A SURVEY ON PRE-SERVICE AND INSERVICE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS
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