Validating Test Score Interpretations by Cross-National Comparison

Cross-national assessment of students’ competences in higher education is becoming increasingly important in many disciplines including economics but there are few available instruments that meet psychological standards for assessing students’ economic competence in higher education (HE). One of them is the internationally valid Test of Understanding in College Economics (TUCE), which has been adapted and employed successfully in HE systems in various countries, but the test results have seldom been used for international comparisons of students’ Economic Content Knowledge (ECK). Here, we compare the German and the Japanese test adaptations of the TUCE with reference to the American origin…

Macroeconomic knowledge of higher education students in Germany and Japan – a multilevel analysis of contextual and personal effects

Recent trends towards harmonising and internationalising business and economics studies in higher education are affecting the structure and content of programmes and courses, and necessitate more transparent and comparable information on students’ economic knowledge and skills. In this study, we examine by linear multilevel regression modelling the current state of macroeconomic knowledge of higher education students in Germany and Japan, while controlling for the effects of key study-related aspects such as study progress and completion of economics courses. We assess macroeconomic knowledge using the internationally established Test of Understanding in College Economics, which has been ad…

Gender-specific differences in economic competence

Implementierung und Wirksamkeit der erweiterten Autonomie im öffentlichen Schulwesen – Eine Mehrebenenbetrachtung

Das Konzept der erweiterten Schulautonomie hat als eine umfassende Innovation in der letzten Dekade zunehmende Beachtung erfahren. Spatestens nach der Veroffentlichung der ersten PISA-Ergebnisse in 2000 gehort „Schulautonomie“ zweifelsohne zu einem der Schlagworter der bildungspolitischen Diskussion und auch mehrere Forschungsdisziplinen und -richtungen (wie Educational Governance- Forschung, padagogische Implementationsforschung, Innovations- und Schulentwicklungsforschung etc.) haben sich mit diesem Konzept aus ihrer jeweiligen Perspektiven intensiv auseinandergesetzt. Je nach Annahme bzw. Fokus solcher theoretischen Sichtweisen (z. B. die juristische bzw. verwaltungsrechtliche Sicht, ste…

Influences on Master’s Degree Students’ Economic Knowledge

Despite the growing body of research, little is known about students’ economic knowledge at the beginning of, or at various points throughout, their master’s degree programs. In this study different impact factors on students’ microeconomic knowledge are tested. Based on the “utilization of learning opportunities model” by Helmke we focus on 1) individual and sociodemographic characteristics of the students, 2) their learning potential and study-related characteristics and 3) the characteristics and structure of their learning environment. For each of the three influencing factors we used different indicators that were expected to correlate with students’ knowledge. We tested the assumption…

Statistics Anxiety and Self-Concept of Beginning Students in the Social Sciences - A Matter of Gender and Socio-Cultural Background?

Angst im Fach Statistik und statistisches Selbstkonzept von Studienanfangerinnen und -anfangern in den Sozialwissenschaften - eine Frage des Geschlechts und des sozio-kulturellen Hintergrunds? Es ist weitgehend unerforscht, ob bestimmte Studierendengruppen in den Sozialwissenschaften ihr Studium mit unterschiedlichen Einstellungen zum Fach Statistik beginnen. Im Folgenden wird untersucht, inwieweit das Geschlecht und der sozio-kulturelle Hintergrund einen Einfluss auf die Angst und das Selbstkonzept im Fach Statistik zu Studienbeginn haben. Eine Befragung von 504 Studierenden im ersten Studienjahr an zwei Universitaten und zwei Studiengangen zeigt, dass zwischen den Geschlechtern deutliche …

Gender Effects in Assessment of Economic Knowledge and Understanding: Differences Among Undergraduate Business and Economics Students in Germany, Japan, and the United States

Gender effects in large-scale assessments have become an increasingly important research area within and across countries. Yet few studies have linked differences in assessment results of male and female students in higher education to construct-relevant features of the target construct. This paper examines gender effects on students’ economic content knowledge with a focus on construct-relevant explanations. Moreover, we compare gender effects cross-nationally between Germany, Japan, and the United States. To assess economic content knowledge of higher education students, we used translated, adapted, and validated versions of the Test of Understanding in College Economics (TUCE, 4th ed.), …

Assessing the previous economic knowledge of beginning students in Germany: Implications for teaching economics in basic courses

Study-related prior knowledge plays a decisive role in business and economics degree courses. Prior knowledge has a significant influence on knowledge acquisition in higher education, and teachers need information on it to plan their introductory courses accordingly. Very few studies have been conducted of first-year students’ prior economic knowledge or differences among students in such knowledge. In this article, the prior economic knowledge and the influence of personal factors on first-year students’ prior economic knowledge are examined. For this purpose, an adaptation of the fourth, revised edition of the American Test of Economic Literacy was administered, which was adapted in 2014…

Die Signalwirkung von Hochschulrankings - eine empirische Studie unter Studienanfängerinnen/-anfängern der Wirtschaftswissenschaften

Hochschulrankings sind in den letzten Jahren auch in Deutschland gerade in den Wirtschaftswissenschaften sehr popular und damit zunehmend zum Gegenstand der Forschung geworden. Allerdings erweisen sich die Erkenntnisse sowohl zur generellen Bedeutung von Rankings bei der Hochschulwahl als auch zur Wirkung der Rankings in Abhangigkeit bestimmter personenbezogener Eigenschaften der Studieninteressierten bislang als begrenzt. An diesem Forschungsdefizit setzt der vorliegende Beitrag an, indem zunachst die Wirkungsweise von Rankings theoretisch betrachtet wird, bevor Befragungsergebnisse von 1.314 Studienanfangerinnen und -anfangern der Wirtschaftswissenschaften prasentiert werden. 19.12.2014 |…

Effects of prior economic education, native language, and gender on economic knowledge of first-year students in higher education. A comparative study between Germany and the USA

The assessment of university students’ economic knowledge has become an increasingly important research area within and across countries. Particularly, the different influences of prior education, native language, and gender as some of the main prerequisites on students’ economic knowledge have been highlighted since long. However, the findings are often only available within countries and focus on students who are at different levels of their studies or graduates. To remedy this research deficit, the goal of our article is to analyze the status of economic knowledge of students at the beginning of their course of studies and compare the effects of prior economic education, gender, and nati…

Validating a Test for Measuring Knowledge and Understanding of Economics Among University Students

Abstract. University students' knowledge and understanding of economics have mostly been investigated cross-sectionally; however, longitudinal analyses are needed to determine which factors influence knowledge development and to draw valid conclusions based on test results. In the WiWiKom II project, a quasi-experimental longitudinal study was conducted assessing bachelor students of business and economics over the course of their studies in Germany (N = 39 universities). In this project, running from 2016 – 2019, the test-takers complete the WiWiKom II-test of economic knowledge (adapted TUCE4G and TEL4G items) and a general cognitive ability test (BEFKI 11) at four measurement points, ea…

Modeling and Measuring University Students’ Subject-Specific Competencies in the Domain of Business and Economics – The ILLEV Project

Current research provides very little empirical evidence regarding the influence of academic higher education on the development of professionalism among students. Over the course of the reform of the higher education systems in Europe (Bologna declaration) this issue has become increasingly important.

The relationship between migration background and knowledge and understanding of personal finance of young adults in Germany

Abstract Financial knowledge and understanding is needed to function well in society; however, young people with a migration background in Germany have been found to perform worse on tests of financial knowledge than those without. Very little investigation has been made into the relationship between financial knowledge and language ability, and ostensibly no in-depth investigation has been made into the connection between frequency of use of the local language and how it correlates to performance on such tests. In this paper we examine the relationship between migration background and knowledge and understanding of personal finance of young adults in Germany. We administered a validated Ge…

Gender gap in Swiss vocational education and training teachers’ economics content knowledge and the role of teaching experience

In the commercial sector, which is of crucial importance to the Swiss economy among other countries, a large number of apprentices are trained on a vocational education and training programme every year. Besides other subjects, the subject Economics and Society forms an integral part of the vocational education and training curriculum and serves to prepare apprentices for professional, economic and civic participation. Although content knowledge is widely considered necessary to both teaching quality and student achievement, little is known about the subject-specific content knowledge of Swiss Economics and Society teachers. As previous research has shown a gender gap in the content knowled…

The relationship among gender, interest in economic topics, media use, and the economic knowledge of students at vocational schools

The results of numerous studies indicate that male students achieve better results on economic knowledge tests than their female classmates. Although this phenomenon has been known for a long time, the gender-specific mechanisms of this gap have not been explored in depth. According to social and educational scientific theories and the current state of research, interest and media use could be related to gender. In this study, we administered a German adaption of the internationally accepted Test of Economic Literacy to explore the gender gap in the economic knowledge of 983 students from 62 classes at 7 vocational secondary schools and commercial vocational schools specializing in business…

Validity and fairness of a new entry diagnostics test in higher education economics

Abstract Research has been focusing increasingly on measuring students’ prior economic knowledge in higher education. However, in German-speaking countries, valid instruments are rare. A diagnostic study investigated the validity and fairness of an internationally established economic knowledge test (adapted German version of TUCE IV and TEL IV) with a representative sample of 7664 students from 46 universities across Germany. Previous findings with the dataset ( Zlatkin-Troitschanskaia et al., 2019a ) suggest that native language significantly predicts missing answers in the knowledge test. Similar effects can be found for gender. After coding missing answers as incorrect, students with a …

How feedback provided by voluntary electronic quizzes affects learning outcomes of university students in large classes

Abstract In view of the increasing number of university students attending large statistics classes as a requirement for their degree courses, the use of an online learning environment is indispensable for delivering immediate and frequent feedback. However, results of research on the value of technological tools and blended courses in various academic disciplines are not consistent and only point to minimal effects on academic achievement. To fill this gap, in this study, participation in optional electronic quizzes and its effects on exam grades in large statistics classes depending on gender and previous statistics- and mathematics-related abilities are investigated. Overall, participati…

Using the U.S.Test of Financial Literacyin Germany—Adaptation and validation

ABSTRACTIn this article, the authors present the adaptation and validation processes conducted to render the American Test of Financial Literacy (TFL) suitable for use in Germany (TFL-G). First, they outline the translation procedure followed and the various cultural adjustments made in line with international standards. Next, they present results from the validation of the TFL-G's content and relations between test scores and external variables, including test takers' prior economic education and interest in economic topics. Preliminary analyses of data gathered from expert interviews and cognitive labs, and the results of the first administration to first-year higher education students (N…

Young adults’ knowledge and understanding of personal finance in Germany: Interviews with experts and test-takers

In recent years, the financial education of young adults has gained importance in Germany; however, very few valid test instruments to assess the knowledge and understanding of personal finance are suitable for use in Germany. In this article, we describe results of a survey in which experts in Germany in areas related to personal finance judged the relevance of the items of the American Council of Economic Education’s Test of Financial Literacy for use in Germany. Overall, they found the German version of the Test of Financial Literacy to be a valid instrument for assessing the knowledge and understanding of personal finance of young adults in Germany. Also, we conducted cognitive intervi…