Gender Differences in Socio-Emotional and Socio-Cultural Perspectives of Middle School Students in STEM Learning

This study investigated the socio-emotional and socio-cultural perspectives of 137 middle school students toward STEM learning in the U.S. Through a 27-item 5-point Likert scale, students’ responses were gathered to complete factor analysis, compute descriptive analysis, and calculate statistical differences found between genders. In socio-emotional learning, female participants scored higher than male participants in the grit and social-awareness factors, while both genders scored similarly in the self-efficacy factor. In socio-cultural learning, male participants scored higher than female participants in the socio-cultural influences factor while both genders scored similarly in the personal focus in STEM factor. However, a statistically significant difference was only found between male and female participants in the social-awareness factor, and female participants scored significantly higher than male participants in this factor. Both male and female participants expressed that teachers were the most influential regarding their STEM learning