Scale for attitudes of secondary education students towards nuclear power: A scale development study


EKİCİ G., GÖKMEN A., Atik A. D., ÇİMEN O., Altunsoy S., Sahin H.

Energy Education Science and Technology Part B: Social and Educational Studies, cilt.5, sa.1, ss.395-406, 2013 (SCI-Expanded) identifier

Özet

The main goal of this research is to prepare a valid and reliable measurement tool in order to determine the attitudes of secondary school students towards nuclear power. The research is an area study of descriptive quality and the working group of the research consists of 334 secondary school students. In the scale developing process, the related literature was scanned primarily, the related students were asked questions open to interpretation to get their opinions and an item pool was formed with the data collected. The draft form of the measurement scale towards nuclear power prepared from the item pool was arranged according to expert view and its last form was shaped after a pre-application. Annotated Factor Analysis, Cronbach's Alpha Factor, Pearson's Product Moment Correlation Coefficient and descriptive statistics were employed in the analysis of scale data. KMO (Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin) value of the scale for attitude towards nuclear power was 0, 82 and Barlett Test value appeared as 5635, 87. As a result of the analysis of reversed basic components it was found out that the scale was composed of three sub-dimensions. These dimensions were defined as interest, anxiety and benefit dimensions towards nuclear power. Cronbach's Alpha reliability factor was determined as 0,909 for the whole scale whereas it was calculated as 0,807 for interest dimension, 0,713 for anxiety dimension and 0,736 for benefit dimension. When the correlation between the dimensions of the scale was analysed, a statistically meaningful and highly positive relation was determined. That the relations are high and positive shows that the scale is composed of independent factors. The results achieved expose that the scale developed, of attitudes towards nuclear power is a valid and reliable scale. © Sila Science.