MASDER Surveys & Instruments
MASDER provides six validated instruments organized by discipline and perspective. Each instrument captures a distinct component of motivation or learning context in statistics and data science education.
Measures students' motivational attitudes toward statistics.
Measures students' motivational attitudes toward data science.
Measures instructors' motivational beliefs toward teaching statistics.
Measures instructors' motivational beliefs toward teaching data science.
Captures course-level features of the statistics learning environment.
Captures course-level features of the data science learning environment.
1. What surveys are available to administer?
MASDER maintains a family of six instruments that, when administered jointly, allow us to cohesively understand the undergraduate student learning experience in introductory statistics and data science courses.
- The student instruments measure student attitudes about learning statistics or data science.
- The instructor instruments measure instructor attitudes about teaching statistics or data science.
- The environment inventory collects information on the course and/or section learning environment.
| Student | Instructor | Environment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Statistics | S-SOMAS | I-SOMAS | EPIC-S |
| Data Science | S-SOMADS | I-SOMADS | EPIC-DS |
| Timeline | Students complete Pre and Post survey in one term | Instructors complete one time | Instructors complete Pre and Post surveys in one term |
| Time Commitment | 15 minutes each time | 15 minutes | 5 minutes Pre / 20 minutes Post |
SOMA stands for Survey of Motivational Attitudes and EPIC stands for Environment Pedagogy Institution Course. The S or DS after SOMA or EPIC indicates the subject of the survey. Therefore, S-SOMAS stands for Survey of Motivational Attitudes toward Statistics. I-SOMAS stands for Instructor Survey of Motivational Attitudes toward teaching Statistics.
2. What is the appropriate audience for each survey?
The student surveys are meant to be administered to undergraduate students taking an introductory statistics (S-SOMAS) or introductory data science (S-SOMADS) course, respectively.
They can be administered in courses designed to be similar to these. The I-SOMAS/DS surveys are meant to be taken by the instructors of these courses, respectively.
Lastly, EPIC-S/DS should be completed by the instructor for each course in which the student survey was administered.
3. What is the difference between the S-SOMAS/DS Pre and Post?
The students surveys are designed to be perfectly matching, aside from one block of items. The matching structure is intentional to facilitate pre/post comparisons on identical items, and to allow the survey to be administered longitudinally with no awkward language.
One block of items about Teacher-Student Relationships appears on the Post but not on the Pre. This is because students are not able to evaluate their relationship with their instructor before the course has started.
The EPIC-S/DS Post inventories contain a parallel set of items so that the instructor and student perspectives on their relationship can be compared.
4. What is the difference between the EPIC-S/DS Pre and Post?
EPIC-S/DS Pre is a brief inventory that collects basic information that is not dependent on what happens across the course of the term. For example, it includes questions on the prerequisites, course textbook, modality, meeting times (if synchronous), and more. Because EPIC Pre is not focused on teaching practices, it can be completed by a course coordinator or supervisor if needed. (EPIC Pre can be completed the the MASDER website holder, even if the person is not teaching the course.)
EPIC-S/DS Post includes items that ask an instructor to reflect on how they taught during the term. It includes questions on high-impact teaching practices, statistics - or data science-specific pedagogy, and course assessments. Because EPIC Post does focus on teaching practices, it should only be completed by the course instructor. (If the MASDER account holder created the survey instance on behalf of other instructors, they should send the EPIC post link to the actual course instructors for them to complete.)