Antecedents of Statistics Anxiety in a Higher Education System

Abstract

This study contended that learning statistics and its rudiments were perceived as complicated compared to some other courses offered at the university level. Further, this investigation contested the existence of statistics anxiety among postgraduate students in an in-site university setting. Relationships and differences were determined in this study utilizing the constructs of antecedents of statistics anxiety namely academic procrastination, perfectionism, and gender. The objectives were (1) to establish the relationship between academic procrastination and statistics anxiety; (2) to find out the relationship between perfectionism and statistics anxiety; and (3) to investigate the differences between gender and statistics anxiety. The data from randomly selected 136 postgrad students (Kampala International University, Uganda) referring to dispositional (procrastination and perfectionism) and environmental antecedents (gender) and statistics anxiety were scientifically elicited, processed and analyzed utilizing the quantitativepost positivist's research paradigm model. The findings revealed a positive but insignificant relationship between academic procrastination and statistics anxiety; a significant adverse correlation between perfectionism and statistics anxiety; an insignificant positive correlation existed between gender and statistics anxiety, and differences in statistics anxiety between the female and male students existed. Notably from the results then, academic procrastination did not significantly affect the students' statistics anxiety; the students with higher levels of perfectionism tended to have lower levels of statistics anxiety while the levels of statistics anxiety among the female students were slightly greater than that of the male students.

Fertilizer Response and Environment Interactions of Yield and Yield Components of Clonal Tea (Camellia Sinensis) in Kenya

“…Maximum, minimum, wet and dry bulb temperatures were recorded at 09.00 h and 15.00 h local time daily using mercury in glass thermometers (Cassella (London) Ltd., UK). Relative humidity (RH %) was derived from wet and dry bulb temperature readings using relevant tables [46] . The wet and dry thermometer readings recorded as described above and the data were used to derive saturated vapour pressure deficit (SVPD) using the formula SVPD = ew-e'.…”