Does Attendance Affect Student Achievement?

1194 Words5 Pages

A large literature has grown around the question of whether ( and to what extent) attendance affects student achievement. Several studies have mainly investigated the correlation between attendance and grades. Findings of these studies are fairly consistent, regardless of the course subject. For instance, in basic mathematic courses, Callahan (1993), found a correlation between grades and attendance. In undergraduate psychology courses a moderate correlation between attendance and grades was found by Van Blerkom (1992). Hammen and Kelland (1994) found similar results in introductory human physiology. Silvestri (2003) found a significant correlation between absences and grades in his study conducted on pre-service teaching students in a teaching …show more content…

Durden and Ellis (1995), controlling for student differences in background, motivation and ability, focused on the number of absences that lead to worse grades and failure and found a nonlinear effect of attendance on grades. Results of the study showed that while a few absences do not lead to worse grades, excessive absences do. Similar to Durden and Ellis (1995), Silvestri (2003) focused on the number of the absences that significantly affect grades and found a significant but weak negative correlation between the number of absences and course grades for students who missed three or fewer classes but found a strong negative correlation between the number of absences and course grades for students who missed four or more classes. A very early study attempt by Robert Schmidt (Robert Schmidt, 1983) concluded that the time spent in class was the primary factor to affect student grades and the secondary factor was the time spent in individual study followed by the time spent in exam preparation. Results of a more recent and reliable study by Marburger ( Marburger, 2001) supported the findings of Robert Schmidt. Marburger (2001) concluded that students gave wrong answers to the questions belonging to the material covered in non-attended lectures compared to the questions belonging to the lectures they attend. Although Park and Kerr (1990) suggested that the ability ( provided by prior academic achievement) has a significant independent effect on grades exceeding the effect of attendance and students' GPA and college entrance exam scores are more important factors overall, they found that higher attendance is associated with higher

Open Document