Factors Affecting Academic Achievement

However, the incessant hovering and excessive involvement from Asian parents can add tremendous pressure and stress onto young Asians. In the Daily Collegian News, Penn State sophomore Trevor Hsu expresses, “It puts pressure on Asian [students] themselves to fit that stereotype…they can feel that they let themselves [and their families] down because they have not achieved the level of excellence that the stereotype has set.” (qtd. in Dailey). Because they feel guilty and shameful, many Asian students are reluctant to admit to their parents and teachers that they have difficulties with class works and assignments as much as their non-Asian classmates and consequently, they do not received the support they need to improve their performance.

It is common to think that school success is only related to IQ, however, that is not totally true because there are other factors that strongly related to students’ academic performance. According to a study published in 2011 by “The journal of school health” students who had a balance and nutritious diet regularly, scored higher on tests. In addition, an improvement of 6.8% in academic performance was observed (qtd in “Healthy vs unhealthy food”). Furthermore, Dr. Philip Alapat, medical director, states that “any prolonged sleep deprivation will affect, your mood, energy level, and ability to concentrate, focus and learn, which directly affects your academic performance.” (qtd in “Sleep deprivation”)

The Asian group has strong standards regarding academic success. The United States Census Bureau reported that the percentage of Asian Americans to possess a bachelor’s degree or higher increased by 54% which shows a significant increase within the past 20 years (United States Census Bureau, 2016). Throughout much of Asia, children are taught at an early age to believe that education is the only path to success. While they are a distinct minority, their indicators of success in terms of education and future income occur because of the unique style of parenting which is based on the belief of the philosopher Confucius. Within their culture, they are taught to work on self-perfection which will help them achieve self-improvement in qualities such as diligence, determination, and concentration (Seal, 2010). Parents, family members, and their community assume the responsibility for teaching and disciplining children. Furthermore, they instill the belief that a child’s achievement or lack thereof is a direct reflection on the efforts of the entire family and community (Chen & Uttal, 1988). These types of demands coupled with academic

A school setting provides opportunities where issues of social justice, oppression, and discrimination can be addressed. According to Bemak and Chung (2009), students of color and economically disadvantaged students are likely to have low academic achievement, in comparison to their White middle class counterparts. These disparities in academic

Research suggests that students of color and economically disadvantaged students are likely to have low academic achievement, in comparison to their White middle class counterparts. Studies show that these disparities are a result of environmental, historical, sociopolitical, sociocultural, and institutional factors, and not necessarily students’ capabilities (Bemak & Chung, 2008). These environmental, sociocultural and sociopolitical factors can result to depression, low self-esteem, and a lack of educational and career opportunities. Thus, counseling professionals in the school settings need to develop advocacy plans to cater for these environmental factors that are barriers to academic, career and personal development (Ratts & Hutchins,

The source of this discourse can be attributed to global biases and stereotypes of Asian American students. Asian American students are stereotyped for being model students when it comes to education. Most of this academic achievement has been attributed to Asian cultural values that promote educational endeavors. Culture is a major explanation for achievement differences. The article,” Asian-American educational achievements: A phenomenon in search of an explanation” states, “demands and expectations for achievement and upward mobility, induction of guilt about parental sacrifice and the need to fulfill obligations” (Sue, S., & Okazaki, S., 2009), implying that those are key contributors to why Asian families promote educational achievements.

One of the first and foremost reoccurring themes throughout the review of current literature on this subject has been the concept of self-efficacy and perseverance as the sole reason of black male success and retention at Hispanic Serving Institutions. In a doctoral work entitled, “Personal and Institutional Factors Relationship to Self-Efficacy of Persistence to the Senior Year in College Among Self-Identified Black Undergraduate Students in a Hispanic Serving Institution,” author Sandra Fletcher analyzes eight key factors that are alleged to have a significant role in the success and retention of Black males at Hispanic Serving Institutions. The eight factors listed as determinants of success were, “self-pride/personal goal, professional aspiration/career, motivation to support family, desire to have financial independence/better job, to serve community, opportunity to go to college, being first-generation college student, and prove to family the value of higher education” (Fletcher 2012: vii).

The findings reveal that Asian American students’ cultural orientation is a significant contributor to their academic achievement. Asian Americans put strong emphasis on efforts whereas white students see academic abilities as an inherent characteristic that cannot be improved through efforts. Further, the immigrant self-selection and optimism for future success among Asian American students and their parents contribute to their exceptional outcomes. On the other hand, they did not find any significant differences between Asian American and white students’ cognitive abilities. Socio-demographic characteristics in Hsin and Xie’s analysis had limited explanatory power for Asian Americans’ superior academic achievement. The authors claim that such lack of significance of socio-demographic characteristics is due to socioeconomic variation within Asian Americans. While they do not completely reject the significance of socio-demographic factors, Hsin and Xie fail to consider how Asian Americans as a group exhibit exceptional academic performance despite with-in group variation in socio-demographic

The United States of America is known for being a country filled with people of many different ethnic backgrounds. Likewise, the student population in schools is just as diverse as it continues to grow. Lynch (2015) notes that schools are expected to teach their students “how to synthesize cultural differences into their knowledge base” as this will help “facilitate students’ personal and professional success in a diverse world” (para. 8). Educators must be able to provide for the diverse needs of students and are expected to equip students with skills that can lead to healthy development as it can affect higher levels of student achievement and students have more opportunities of success in their future. Providing students with tools and skills requires an awareness and acceptance of their ethnic identity. Once students have developed self-acceptance about their ethnic identity, they can begin to feel empowered and motivated to do well. Through cultural empowerment, students of color can develop intrinsic motivation and achieve academic success.

The concept of academic possible selves is related to academic attainment; however, this relationship is not the same for students of color and of low socioeconomic status (Oyserman, Bybee, & Terry, 2006). In addition to possible selves, Previous research has shown that students’ views of self (i.e. self-efficacy, self-concept, identity) tend to be related to academic performance (Guay, March, & Boivin, 2003; Lane & Lane, 2001; Zarate, Bhimji, & Reese, 2005). One of the views of self we measure in terms of academic achievement is possible selves. However, our conceptualization of possible selves may be problematic as Oyserman, Bybee, and Terry (2006) posit that possible selves are domain specific. Further, the concept of possible selves alone is not an accurate way to explain the relationship between views of self and academic attainment; especially among students of color and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds. In an effort to explore this relationship, the present utilized data from The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent and Adult Health (ADD Health) database was used to answer the following research question: does academic possible selves (APS), intelligence self-concept, and cumulative high school GPA

The Social Costs of Academic Success across Ethnic Groups is a study conducted by Thomas E. Fuller-Rowell and Stacy N. Doan in 2010. The main intention behind this research was to explore the long-term comparison between academic achievement and social acceptance across different ethnic groups in a sample of adolescents. In order to find out the race/ethnicities as well as social acceptance of the participants they conducted in-home interviews. In order to find the GPA, they utilized self-reports. The results of this research show that social acceptance is positively correlated with GPA. African Americans and Native Americans adolescents have a bigger social cost with academic success than White adolescents do. These findings also suggested that students of Mexican decent also show different social costs within their achievement.

The influence of parents on self-handicapping, from the perspectives of parenting styles and set expectations as known from research make a real difference in the strategies their children will engage in throughout their lives in response to challenging situations. Parents while known to have an effect in students’ academic performance (Sirin, 2005; Martin, March, & Williamson, 2003; Fong & Krause, 2014), have been linked to more specifically to affecting self-handicapping and in turn students’ approach to scenarios in which they expect to face failure. Parenting styles appear to influence frequency in which individuals engage in self-handicapping, research shows that female adolescents “with mothers high on caring self-handicapped less” (Greaven et al., 2000). Students are prone to experiencing different parenting styles depending on the family’s culture, background and beliefs. A Hispanic family in which machismo is practiced, for example, the

Over the course of the last 10 years, cultural and socioeconomic factors, cultural and social capital, self-efficacy, and self-handicapping have been studied as contributors to academic achievement and attainment. Cultural status refers to the customs, values, and traditions whereas socioeconomic status refers to the social and economic factors influencing attitude, character, lifestyle, and decisions. It is important to study how cultural and socioeconomic status influence cultural and social capital defined by Bourdieu 1986 as the factors such as education, eloquence, appearance among others that influence social mobility and the total resources possessed by an individual respectively. Also, during the last decade Bandura’s 1977 theory of self-efficacy has been studied at various dimensions with studies upholding the definition of self-efficacy as an individual’s belief in their ability to engage in a particular behavior most often tied to an expectation or goal. Similarly, Jones & Berglas 1978 self-handicapping theory has been studied from perspectives beyond the scope of the field of education. Self-handicapping is defined by Jones & Berglas (1978-SOURCE) as the search for obstacles known to likely decrease performance or success. Because the NCLB Act of 2001 expects all students to successfully learn the curriculum, regardless of cultural or socioeconomic status, ethnicity, or gender it is important to study how these relate to academic

There are many factors that contribute to students’ academic success, such as low levels of procrastination, a high level of work drive, being emotionally stable, and a low level of negative life stress. However, scholars have pointed out that many statistics instructors are concerned about the anxiety associated with taking a course in the subject (Bui & Alfaro, 2011). The results from studies investigating anxiety about statistics have shown that student attitudes to statistics courses have an impact on their success and competence (Bui & Alfaro, 2011). In deed most of undergraduate student tend to have negative attitude toward research method course. Therefore, it is an important to understand students attitude and helps

The performance of mathematics in most schools has been attributed to genetic factors which mainly arise from parents. In a school, an analysis is carried out to determine if the performance of mathematics depends on Genetic factors. Population for students who perform better depends on the initial satisfaction exhibited by end year results of this pupils. The population will be based on the confidence level that is required by the School. The amount of students we survey on in this school will be based on the initial level of the research level. The determination of sample size will be based on several factors including the end year results. The number of the parents to be interviewed for this research will determine the