2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Equitable Engineering Identity? Race/Ethnicity and Gender Differences in the Predictors of Engineering Identity in First-Year Engineering

Presented at Educational Research and Methods Division (ERM) Technical Session 12

This research paper investigates predictors of engineering identity at the beginning of a first-year engineering course. This research paper investigates predictors of engineering identity at the beginning of a first-year engineering course. Engineering role identity has been connected to important student outcomes, including academic success, retention, and well-being. Students (n = 834) reported their sense of belonging in engineering, cross-racial and cross-gender belonging experiences, engineering self-efficacy, interest in engineering, and engineering identity. Through a series of path analyses, a form of structural equation modeling, we tested the predictive relationships of the measured constructs with engineering identity and investigated differences in these relationships by student race and gender. The model includes engineering identity as directly predicted by self-efficacy, interest, and sense of belonging. Sense of belonging is likewise predicted by self-efficacy and interest, generating additional indirect influences on engineering identity. Finally, a sense of belonging is further predicted by cross-racial and cross-gender belonging experiences. The strong relationships between measures provide insight into the potential for interventions to improve engineering identity in early career engineering students. Future work to analyze the longitudinal change in measures and identity in association with the intervention will further demonstrate variable relationships. Results provide insights into the potential importance of sociocultural interventions within engineering classrooms to improve the engineering climate, engagement, and retention of women and Black, Latino/a/x, and Indigenous (BLI) students.

Authors

Dr. Matthew Bahnson http://orcid.org/https://0000-0002-0134-0125 Purdue University [biography]

Matthew Bahnson is a Matthew Bahnson completed his Ph.D. in the Applied Social and Community Psychology program in at North Carolina State University. His previous training includes a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Northern Iowa, an M.A. in Social Sciences from the University of Chicago, and postdoctoral training in engineering education with Dr. Catherine Berdanier at Penn State. Matthew’s research focuses on sociocultural inequality in engineering educational spaces with the intention of increasing diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice in STEM education. He is currently a Research Scientist with Allison Godwin studying belonging and identity at Purdue University.
Dr. Eric Trevor McChesney http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7831-9642 University of Pittsburgh [biography]

Eric McChesney (he/him) is a Postdoctoral Scholar for Psychosocial Interventions at Scale with the Learning Research and Development center at the University of Pittsburgh. His work focuses on the development of robust, transferrable psychosocial interventions that improve the outcomes of and environments experienced by women, people of color, and other historically-marginalized students pursuing degrees in Science, Engineering, Mathematics, and Technology (STEM). A further strand of his research examines the development of interdisciplinarity in the sciences and works to define the mechanisms by which it is formed, identify the contexts conducive to its flourishing, and develop the educational experiences that accelerate its development.
Carlie Laton Cooper University of Georgia [biography]

Carlie is a doctoral student in the Louise McBee Institute of Higher Education at the University of Georgia (UGA). She earned a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from UGA (2017) and a Master of Education in Higher Education Administration from Georgia Southern University (2021). She has higher education experience in business affairs and academic advising. She researches structures that contribute to underrepresentation in STEM majors and is currently a Graduate Assistant for the UBelong Collaborative.
Dr. Allison Godwin http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0741-3356 Cornell University [biography]

Allison Godwin, Ph.D. is an associate professor in the Robert Frederick Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Cornell University. Her research focuses on how identity, among other affective factors, influences diverse students to choose engineering and persist in engineering. She also studies how different experiences within the practice and culture of engineering foster or hinder belonging and identity development. Dr. Godwin graduated from Clemson University with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and Ph.D. in Engineering and Science Education. Her research earned her a 2016 National Science Foundation CAREER Award focused on characterizing latent diversity, which includes diverse attitudes, mindsets, and approaches to learning to understand engineering students’ identity development. She has won several awards for her research including the 2021 Journal of Civil Engineering Education Best Technical Paper, the 2021 Chemical Engineering Education William H. Corcoran Award, the 2022 American Educational Research Association Education in the Professions (Division I) 2021-2022 Outstanding Research Publication Award, and the 2023 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Award for Excellence in Engineering Education Research.
Dr. Linda DeAngelo http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8508-5909 University of Pittsburgh [biography]

Linda DeAngelo is Associate Professor of Higher Education, Center for Urban Education Faculty Fellow, and affiliated faculty in the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Program at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. DeAngelo studies social stratification, investigating how social inequities are produced, maintained, and interrupted. Currently her scholarship focuses on access to and engagement in faculty mentorship, the pathway into and through graduate education, and gender and race in engineering.
Kevin R. Binning http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5396-4183 [biography]

Social psychologist with an interest in diversity and belonging in STEM.

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