Table 3.
Rotated factor loadings for the LCASa
| In this course, I was encouraged to … | Collaboration | Discovery and relevance | Iteration | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | discuss elements of my investigation with classmates or instructors. | 0.767 | — | — |
| C2 | reflect on what I was learning. | 0.694 | — | — |
| C3 | contribute my ideas and suggestions during class discussions. | 0.893 | — | — |
| C4 | help other students collect or analyze data. | 0.708 | — | — |
| C5 | provide constructive criticism to classmates and challenge each other's interpretations. | 0.617 | — | — |
| C6 | share the problems I encountered during my investigation and seek input on how to address them. | 0.954 | — | — |
| In this course, I was expected to … | ||||
| DR1 | generate novel results that are unknown to the instructor and that could be of interest to the broader scientific community or others outside the class. | — | 0.938 | — |
| DR2 | conduct an investigation to find something previously unknown to myself, other students, and the instructor. | — | 0.592 | — |
| DR3 | formulate my own research question or hypothesis to guide an investigation. | — | 0.421 | — |
| DR4 | develop new arguments based on data. | — | 0.462 | 0.306 |
| DR5 | explain how my work has resulted in new scientific knowledge. | — | 0.701 | — |
| In this course, I had time to … | ||||
| I1 | revise or repeat work to account for errors or fix problems.b | — | — | 0.822 |
| I2 | change the methods of the investigation if it was not unfolding as predicted. | — | — | 0.589 |
| I3 | share and compare data with other students. | — | — | 0.451 |
| I4 | collect and analyze additional data to address new questions or further test hypotheses that arose during the investigation. | — | — | 0.702 |
| I5 | revise or repeat analyses based on feedback. | — | — | 0.764 |
| I6 | revise drafts of papers or presentations about my investigation based on feedback. | — | — | 0.779 |
| Cronbach's alpha | 0.8 | 0.82 | 0.85 | |
| Factor correlations | ||||
| C | — | |||
| DR | 0.409 | — | ||
| I | 0.453 | 0.528 | — | |
aFactor loadings less than 0.25 were omitted. All collaboration items had four response options: “never,” “one or two times,” “monthly,” and “weekly.” All other items had six response options ranging from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.” All items also included additional response options of “I don’t know” and “prefer not to respond.”
bFor item I1, the item stem is “In this course, I was expected to ...,” unlike the other items in this set.