Measure Development: The Children's Attitudes toward Technology Scale (CATS)

The impact of technology on the current and future lives of society's youth makes it especially important to understand technology from their perspective. Although today's children have become the benefactors of an evolving technological society, few studies have addressed the assessment o...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of educational computing research 2002, Vol.26 (3), p.249-263
Main Authors: Frantom, Catherine G., Green, Kathy E., Hoffman, Eleanor R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Academic Aptitude
Computer Attitudes
Elementary School Students
Elementary Secondary Education
Gender Issues
Measures (Individuals)
Middle School Students
Rural Areas
Sex Differences
Student Attitudes
Student Interests
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The impact of technology on the current and future lives of society's youth makes it especially important to understand technology from their perspective. Although today's children have become the benefactors of an evolving technological society, few studies have addressed the assessment of their attitudes toward technology. This study describes the development of the Children's Attitude Toward Technology Scale (CATS) with 574 children in a rural school district. Principal components analysis of the CATS followed by varimax rotation indicated that item intercorrelations could be explained by two factors entitled “interest/aptitude” and “alternative preferences.” Subscales at two test administrations demonstrated good internal consistency and moderate test-retest stability. Significant differences were found on interest scores when comparing elementary and middle school students and on items reflecting alternative preferences. In addition, attitudes varied according to gender on subscales. Initial analyses suggest this new measure to effectively assess children's interests/aptitudes toward technology. Further study is needed to validate the measure.
ISSN:0735-6331
1541-4140
DOI:10.2190/DWAF-8LEQ-74TN-BL37