Initial and Evolving Perceptions of Value and Cost of Engaging in Undergraduate Science Course Work and Effects on Achievement and Persistence.

Undergraduates often report problematic perceptions of low value and high cost in their initial science courses. These beliefs often predict poor performance and retention, and also strengthen over time. Few studies have examined how profiles of value and cost beliefs emerge, and fewer track students' transitions across profiles over a course and their implications for learning outcomes. We observed undergraduates' value and cost perceptions for a science course at the beginning, middle, and end of a semester; fit latent profiles and latent transitions; and examined both how students' demographics predicted profile membership and transition membership, and how such membership predicted achievement and intentions to continue in one's major. Value-oriented, cost-oriented, and moderately-motivated profiles consistently emerged across time points, and 32% of students transitioned across them within the semester. Trends included stable, upward (with rising value to cost balance), downward, and fluctuating perceptions. Demographic characteristics predicted profile membership and transition likelihood. Stable value-oriented and upward transition profiles outperformed stable cost-oriented and downward transition profiles. Members of stable and increasingly cost-oriented profiles expressed stronger intentions to leave their STEM programs. Findings align to expectancy-value theory and indicate that initial and periodic surveying may be important to monitor perceptions known to impact achievement and retention. Value and cost interventions may be useful to encourage perceptions and transitions associated with positive outcomes. Educational Impact and Implications Statement: Students' perceptions of the value and costs of their course work are known to predict their achievement and influence their intention to abandon their pursuit of a STEM degree. Students' motivations are also known to change over time. We examined undergraduate science learners' motivations at the beginning, middle, and end of the semester, then established three initial profiles (moderately motivated, cost-oriented, value-oriented) and students' alignment to them at each time point. Students (32%) transitioned in ways we classified as toward stronger value, toward stronger cost, or fluctuating over time. Women, older students, and those from racial groups underrepresented in STEM tended to be value oriented, and students who stably endorsed or transitioned into this profile performed better in the course and expressed the least interest in leaving their major. The opposite was true for those in cost-oriented profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]