Date of Award

Summer 8-23-2025

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Engineering Education

First Advisor

Kelly Crittenden

Abstract

This dissertation develops a framework and new, valid, abbreviated instruments for researching engineering identity formation as an evolving relational and attitudinal development process rather than a fixed outcome. The framework centers on “posture”, a mediating effect analogous to physical posture in human factors engineering. The investigation was unique, and developed evidence for a structural model using an interdisciplinary, systems-oriented approach. Methodologically, a clinical measure of internal emotional states from the Marriage and Family Therapy literature was administered alongside existing scales for perseverance, perceived workload, and psychological ownership. This study used the broad coverage of the clinical instrument to search for latent constructs associated with internal emotional states, many of them burdened or associated with negative valence, in the context of undergraduate STEM learners. The investigation established construct validity for a number of latent variables using exploratory factor analysis. Validated measures for internal burdened states were significantly correlated with students’ perceived workload, perceived performance, frustration, perceived mental demand, and persistence. Although there was no significant mediator of perceived workload observed in this study, which the original analogy and research question had hoped to investigate, the study found full mediation between internal states and perceived performance through two factors. These factors were further explored, and two subfactors were observed for each. The two subfactors were associated with work-orientation and self-assuredness. Using a multiple linear regression model, the two subfactors were found to significantly explain 32% of the variance in perceived performance. This evidences structural validity of internal burdened states, as well as a structural model for how students develop those states in the context of attitudes, specifically their beliefs and behaviors about their work. This dissertation provides a new and abbreviated instrument for these two mediating factors consisting of only eight items. By viewing engineering identity through an additional lens of internal states, mediating attitudes, and perception, this work offers a useful model and abbreviated measures for how student engineers may develop their sense of self in the context of engineering educational challenges. This framework offers a student-centered perspective for evaluating engineering education interventions and support systems by their effect on the development of attributes of engineering identity over time, and may complement existing outcomes-oriented instruments.

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