The increasing use of low-stakes international assessments highlights the importance of test-taking efforts. Previous studies have used self-reported and response time-based measures to examine this effort. Although differences between these measures have been suggested, their association with performances and potential gender gaps remains…

This study investigates the relationships between students' self-concept, self-efficacy, and achievement in mathematics, considering contextual factors such as socioeconomic status, gender, and immigration background, by using Swedish data from PISA 2003 and 2012. Additionally, these relationships between the two types of schools in Sweden are…

Subject-specific self-efficacy is a measure of confidence in one's own ability to complete tasks related to that subject. This confidence does not necessarily reflect actual ability in the subject and can be an over- or underestimate of true ability. We use nationally representative samples of 15-year-old students from the US to measure the degree…

Guided by the school climate and social-emotional learning literature, this study explored math self-concept in relation to student-teacher relationships and students' sense of school belonging while accounting for sex differences. Participants included two random subsamples (Ns = 532; 558) of 15-year-old Canadian students who participated in the…

This paper examined if difficulty in reading comprehension (PISA) is distinct from difficulty in reading fluency and if the distinct types of reading difficulties are differently associated with learning motivation, school burnout, and school enjoyment. The participants were 1324 Finnish ninth graders. Findings suggested that difficulties in…

The current study explores students' collaboration and problem solving (CPS) abilities using a human-to-agent (H-A) computer-based collaborative problem solving assessment. Five CPS assessment units with 76 conversation-based items were constructed using the PISA 2015 CPS framework. In the experiment, 53,855 ninth and tenth graders in Taiwan were…

This study used the data from the 2015 OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) to examine the relationship between perceived teacher unfairness and science achievement with a three-level hierarchical linear model (HLM) as the analytic approach. Data of 188,104 students from 4895 schools in 52 countries and economies were used…

This study investigated the predictiveness of preferred learning styles (competitive and cooperative) and classroom climate (teacher support and disciplinary climate) on learning strategy use in mathematics. The student survey part of the Programme for International Student Assessment 2003 comprising of 4633 US observations was used in a weighted…

Many arguments have been advanced in the context of the predictive correlation between learning strategies and reading achievement. There is insufficient understanding, however, of the subtle ways in which different types of learning strategies (i.e. memorisation, elaboration and control strategies) function in facilitating students' reading…

In recent years, large-scale international assessments have been increasingly used to evaluate and compare the quality of education across regions and countries. However, measurement variance between different versions of these assessments often posts threats to the validity of such cross-cultural comparisons. In this study, we investigated the…

Enjoyment of reading, diversity of reading and metacognitive awareness of reading strategies are cognitive and affective variables pertaining to three facets of reading engagement for students to read happily, widely and skilfully. These have been found to be related to effectiveness in reading instruction. They together form a focus for this…

The current study investigates the mediating role of student-student relationships (SSRs) and teacher-student relationships (TSRs) in the association between neuroticism and test anxiety. Gender differences in these associations were examined. A total of 513 adolescent girls and boys from secondary schools in Berlin, Germany completed…

Academic self-concept is positively related to individual achievement but negatively related to class- or school-average achievement: the big-fish--little-pond effect (BFLPE). This contrast effect results from social comparison processes. The BFLPE is known to be long-lasting, universal and robust. However, there is little evidence regarding its…