Utsey CJ, Wolters, CA, Yu, S, Burridge, A; University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX and University of Houston, Houston, TX. cutsey@utmb.edu.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to determine factors that predict academic success for students in health care professional education programs. SUBJECTS: Participants were first-year students from Nursing (n = 6 or 12 %), Occupational Therapy (n = 5 or 10 %), Physician Assistant Studies (n = 26 or 51 %), and Physical Therapy (n = 14 or 27%) programs at a major medical university in the southeast. Participants were predominantly white (78%) females (86%) with a mean age of 26 years (range 20 – 46). Hispanics represented 14% of the participants with African Americans 4%, and "other" 4%. Prerequisite grade point average (PGPA) for these students ranged from 2.06 to 4.0 out of 4.0. METHOD AND MATERIALS: Students were given information concerning this study and completed consent forms prior to participation. PGPA was obtained from student records by the associate dean of student affairs from each school (nursing and allied health). At the end of the academic semester, students completed the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) (Pintrich, Smith, Garcia, & McKeachie, 1991) and demographic information. The MSLQ is a valid and reliable 81 item self-report questionnaire used to assess college students’ motivation beliefs and learning strategies. Using a 7-point Likert scale, students responded to questions pertaining to a specific course. Final course grades were obtained from course instructors. ANALYSIS: Descriptive analysis including means and standard deviations for all variables were calculated. Correlation coefficients for the variables were obtained. A multiple regression was used to determine the relation of self-efficacy, task value, elaboration, regulation of strategies, and PGPA to the final course grade. RESULTS: Response rate to the MSLQ online questionnaire was 26%. The sample multiple correlation coefficient (R^{2 =} .65, F(5,43)=6.44, p=.001) indicated that approximately 43% (adjusted R² = 36%) of the variance of the final course grade was explained by the linear combination of PGPA, task value, self-efficacy, elaboration and self-regulation. PGPA, task value and self-efficacy positively predicted final grade, but elaboration and regulation of strategies did not. CONCLUSIONS: These findings for PGPA, task value and self-efficacy were consistent with previous research findings predicting academic achievement. Students at the professional level of education may be highly motivated to perform well in classes, but they may lack appropriate strategies to accomplish this goal. Further studies are necessary to determine if students are aware of strategy use, and if higher level strategies are incorporated in complex learning tasks. FUNDING SOURCE: None.

Copyright 2004 by the American Physical Therapy Association

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