Citation
Harackiewicz, J., Rozek, C., Hulleman, C., & Hyde, J. (2012). Helping parents to motivate adolescents in mathematics and science: An experimental test of a utility-value intervention. Psychological Science, 23(8), 899-906.
Highlights
- The study’s objective was to examine the impact of providing information to parents about the importance of STEM on their children’s decisions to enroll in advanced high school math and science courses.
- The study was based on a subsample of 188 students and their parents included in the Wisconsin Study of Families and Work (WSFW) 1990–1991 birth cohort. Students were randomly assigned at the end of 9th grade to either a treatment group that was given brochures and access to a website that promoted STEM at the beginning of 10th grade, or to the control group, to which no materials were provided. The authors measured STEM course enrollment using students’ self-reported responses to the WSFW surveys and the students’ high school transcripts.
- The study found that students in the treatment group took significantly more math and science classes than students in the control group (predicted means of 8.31 versus 7.50 semesters), but outcomes did not vary by gender.
- The quality of causal evidence provided in this study is high. This means we are confident that the estimated effects are attributable to the information provided to parents about the importance of STEM, and not to other factors.
Features of the Study
The study randomly assigned a subsample of 188 adolescents from the Wisconsin Study of Families and Work 1990–1991 birth cohort to either a treatment or control group. The treatment included three interventions administered over a 15-month period when children were in 10th or 11th grades: (1) a mailed brochure, (2) a second mailed brochure with more information and a website address, and (3) an invitation to evaluate the website. The brochures and website highlighted the importance and relevance of STEM to daily life and for improving college and career outcomes. The control group did not receive any materials. The authors hypothesized that parents of children in the treatment group would use this information to encourage their children to take more STEM courses and analyzed self-reported course enrollment and information on high school transcripts to assess the impact of the intervention on students’ course enrollment.
The authors conducted statistical analyses of (1) the number of STEM courses taken; and (2) whether specific mathematics and science course were taken, as reported by the student. All analyses controlled for experimental condition, parent’s education level (specified as mother’s education in some models), student’s gender, and interaction terms among all variables . Follow-up correspondence with the study authors confirmed that study attrition was low.
Findings
- The study found that students in the treatment group took significantly more math and science classes overall than students in the control group (means of 8.31 versus 7.50 semesters), but outcomes did not vary by gender.
- The study also found that students in the treatment group took significantly more advanced math and science courses—such as algebra II or advanced algebra, trigonometry, precalculus, calculus, statistics, chemistry, and physics—than students in the control group.
Considerations for Interpreting the Findings
The authors conducted multiple statistical tests on outcomes related to STEM enrollment, making it more likely that some impacts would be found statistically significant purely by chance and not because they reflect program effectiveness. The authors did not perform statistical adjustments to account for the multiple tests, so the number of statistically significant findings in these domains is likely to be overstated.
Causal Evidence Rating
The quality of causal evidence provided in this study is high because it was based on a well-implemented randomized controlled trial with low attrition. This means we are confident that the estimated effects are attributable to the information provided to parents on the importance of STEM, and not to other factors.