Twenty-fifth International Conference on Learning

Abstract

Over the past several decades, there has been growing interest in student engagement and its influence on student persistence, retention, and overall success in higher education. The National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) is one of the most widely used measures of student engagement in North America. In 2013, the NSSE underwent a major revision; however, the psychometric properties of the instrument have not been thoroughly investigated and validated for the instruments intended uses and score interpretations. The researcher sought to address this research gap through an in-depth psychometric analysis, utilizing item response theory and confirmatory factor analysis, of one university’s 2015 NSSE data. Pre-existing secondary data were obtained for 1,592 freshman and senior students. The study investigates the psychometric soundness of the revised NSSE’s items and construct structure. This study contributes to the field by addressing the dearth of research exploring whether the uses and interpretations of the revised NSSE scores are psychometrically sound. Research has shown that changes to the content of a measurement instrument can have significant influences on the psychometric properties of the instrument, and therefore when an instrument undergoes major revisions, its psychometric properties must be reexamined.