Psychological Characteristics of Students Taking Programming-Oriented and Applications-Oriented Computing Courses

John P. Charlton and Paul E. Birkett
Journal of Educational Computing Research, Vol 18 No 2, 1998, p. 163-182

The characteristics of students taking programming-oriented and applications-oriented higher education courses are compared. Relative to the latter students, the former students' personalities are shown to be of a more schizoid nature, this providing an explanation of these students' greater computer engagement, programming experience and computing aptitude, at least as far as males are concerned. The extent to which programming experience is accumulated by females is concluded to be a major factor explaining the greater gender imbalance in enrollment on the programming-oriented course. Psychometric measures are found to be useful over and above cheaper, more easily obtainable, informationin discriminating between the two types of students. However, psychometric measures are not found useful in increasing the association between correctness of course classification subsequent to Discriminant Function Analysis and success/failure on the courses. Finally, the same set of characteristics, involving among other things, greater involvement in computing, is found to be associated with success irrespective of course.

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