Characterizing and identifying influences on undergraduates’ attitudes towards organic chemistry

Abstract

Despite the important role organic chemistry plays in a wide range of industries, the undergraduate organic chemistry course sequence is considered to be difficult for and feared by students. Although work has been done to identify and address student difficulties within the cognitive and psychomotor domains, little work has focused on investigating student affect towards organic chemistry. Identifying student emotions towards the course and how these emotions impact students’ learning experiences is a key component in addressing student success in organic chemistry. In general chemistry studies, attitudes have been linked to persistence and performance in the class, but little work has been done to determine what role attitude plays in organic chemistry students’ experiences. In this qualitative study, student attitudes towards organic chemistry and the influences that shape those attitudes were explored. Students displayed a wide range of attitudes towards organic chemistry, including positive, negative, neutral, and blended attitudes. Five major influences were shown to have shaped these attitudes including the reputation of the course, students’ educators, experiences with organic chemistry, experiences with introductory chemistry, and individual experiences. Findings also indicated that many student attitudes towards organic chemistry are in place before they have begun the course, but that students’ attitudes may change after interacting with the course material. Limitations of this investigation, as well as implications for research and practitioners, are discussed.

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Introduction and background

Organic chemistry is a significant contributor to current and developing innovations in a wide range of industries including pharmaceuticals, technology, renewable energy resources, and food science. The potential applications for organic chemistry are far-reaching, and the existing applications are diverse and ubiquitous in everyday life. A thorough understanding of organic chemistry would be valuable to anyone pursuing a career in one of these fields.

In addition to the wide-ranging applications of the subject, the notoriety of the organic chemistry sequence also seems to be pervasive. This notorious reputation is referenced in chemistry education research literature, although students’ attitudes towards the course have yet to be documented outside of anecdotal evidence or in service of investigating an intervention (Hagen, 2000; Grove et al., 2008; Rocabado et al., 2019). Academic success in organic chemistry in terms of drop/fail/withdraw rates is low, with attrition rates often in the 30–50% range (Hagen, 2000; Grove et al., 2008). Other measures of academic success in the course, such as satisfaction, acquisition of desired skills, and post-college performance are either not well documented or demonstrate low levels of success (York et al., 2015). In the classroom, Graulich concluded that organic chemistry students “at all levels obviously do what we want them to do without knowing what we want them to know” (Graulich, 2015). Improving students’ experiences in the organic chemistry sequence could aid student success in the form of persistence and subsequent enrollment (Lewis, 2014). Further, improving students’ learning experiences could assist in diversifying the upcoming workforce, as it has been shown that students who have been historically and systemically excluded from science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) disciplines demonstrate increased performance after classroom interventions in comparison to their peers (National Academies Press, 2011; Basso et al., 2018; Roberts et al., 2018; van Vorst, 2018).

Before interventions can be implemented, however, possible causes of low student success in this course should be identified. Previous research has focused primarily on understanding issues associated with the content of organic chemistry courses, such as problem solving, cognitive skills, and conceptual knowledge (Cartrette and Mayo, 2011; Stieff, 2011; Grove et al., 2012; Grove and Bretz, 2012; Graulich, 2015). However, a student's learning experience does not consist of content alone – a meaningful learning experience is the culmination of the overlapping domains of cognition (thinking), psychomotor (acting), and affect (feeling) (Novak, 1977, 1998; Bretz, 2001).

Theoretical frameworks

Ausubel's assimilation theory states that for meaningful learning to occur, students must possess the relevant knowledge, perceive new information itself as important and relevant, and choose to incorporate that new information into their existing knowledge structure (Ausubel, 1963). Novak's theory of Human Constructivism builds upon Ausubel's theory, stating that meaningful learning can only occur when students are provided experiences requiring them to connect information across three domains: (1) cognitive, including thinking about concepts and using reasoning skills, (2) affective, including feelings related to that learning experience, and (3) psychomotor, including the physical doing of chemistry and dexterity (Novak, 1977, 1998). These three domains (cognitive, affective, and psychomotor) all play a role in a true meaningful learning experience; while each of these domains are distinct, they overlap with one another in an integrated fashion to create the conditions necessary for a meaningful learning experience (Fig. 1) (Novak, 1977, 1998; Bretz, 2001). To improve student success in organic chemistry, all aspects of a meaningful learning experience should be investigated, including the affective domain.

Fig. 1 A representation of Novak's theory of Human Constructivism, demonstrating how feeling, thinking, and acting are essential components to a meaningful learning (ML) experience (Novak, 1977, 1998; Bretz, 2001).

While these domains all contribute to learning experiences in organic chemistry, and all should be investigated thoroughly, students’ affect towards organic chemistry has rarely been reported (Flaherty, 2020). A review of the chemistry education research literature in the affective domain by Flaherty found only 11 studies focused within the context of organic chemistry (Flaherty, 2020). These 11 studies were concentrated on students’ laboratory experiences, motivation, self-efficacy, and attitude.

Related to students’ laboratory experiences, Galloway and Bretz investigated how students’ feelings in the laboratory impacted their meaningful learning experiences by developing the Meaningful Learning in the Laboratory Instrument (MLLI) which measures cognitive and affective expectations and experiences (Galloway and Bretz, 2015a). In a follow-up study, Galloway and Bretz administered the MLLI longitudinally and found that organic chemistry students consistently reported unfulfilled expectations in their organic chemistry laboratories (Galloway and Bretz, 2015b). Galloway and colleagues further investigated affective experiences in the laboratory through a qualitative approach; this research demonstrated that students’ affective experiences impacted their cognitive and psychomotor experiences (Galloway et al., 2015).

Related to students’ motivation, Lynch and Trujillo used the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) in a quantitative approach focused on exploring relationships between motivation and academic performance, finding that self-efficacy was most consistently correlated with end-of-semester grades (Lynch and Trujillo, 2011). Liu and colleagues further examined motivation in organic chemistry classes by altering the Academic Motivation Scale (AMS) to be used in organic chemistry (AMS-Chemistry) (Liu et al., 2018). These researchers confirmed that the AMS-Chemistry generates valid and reliable data when used in the organic classroom and found that students are more motivated in a flipped classroom, although determinations were not made about whether that motivation was intrinsic or extrinsic (Liu et al., 2018). Austin and colleagues also investigated motivation from a quantitative approach by modifying the Science Motivation Questionnaire II to create the Organic Chemistry Motivation Survey (OCMS) (Austin et al., 2018). They found that while students were highly motivated towards earning a higher grade, motivation was not strongly correlated to performance; rather, self-efficacy was correlated to performance (Austin et al., 2018). Further related to students’ self-efficacy, Villafañe and colleagues measured task-specific organic chemistry self-efficacy (OCSE) and reported a reciprocal causation relationship between self-efficacy and performance in the course (Villafañe et al., 2016). Gibbons and Raker expanded on this work by identifying that self-concept, rather than self-efficacy, is a good predictor of initial achievement assessments and that research on both of these constructs together may be necessary to gain a full understanding of students’ self-belief emotions (Gibbons and Raker, 2019). To further explore achievement in organic chemistry, Raker and colleagues developed the organic chemistry specific Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ-OCHEM) and confirmed that the data was valid and reliable for use in organic chemistry settings to investigate achievement emotions (Raker et al., 2019). More work in this area done by Gibbons and colleagues investigated anxiety and enjoyment of organic chemistry students (Gibbons et al., 2018). This study found an inverse relationship between anxiety and performance, and a positive relationship between enjoyment and performance. These studies taken as a whole demonstrate the impact that affect can have on performance in organic chemistry.

Attitude is an aspect of the affective domain that has been shown to impact performance in general chemistry settings but has not been thoroughly explored in organic chemistry education research (Flaherty, 2020). The majority of the work related to attitudes takes a quantitative approach to assessing attitudes in general chemistry courses, largely building upon the ground-breaking development of the Attitudes towards the Subject of Chemistry Inventory (ASCI) (Bauer, 2008). The ASCI provided an inventory that quantitatively measured attitudes and the underlying factors of this construct with a three-factor, two-item structure (factors – interest and utility, anxiety, and intellectual accessibility; items – fear and emotional satisfaction) (Bauer, 2008). Xu and Lewis developed the ASCIv2 by shortening the ASCI for more convenient use in classrooms. It investigated only two factors (intellectual accessibility and emotional satisfaction) and was shown to produce valid and reliable data in several settings (Xu and Lewis, 2011; Brandriet et al., 2011, 2013; Kahveci, 2015; Chan and Bauer, 2016; Montes et al., 2018). Rocabado and colleagues developed the second modification of the ASCI (ASCIv3) by switching two of the items in the inventory to ensure that having multiple items within the same subscale grouped together was not impacting data collection, finding that the change did not impact validity (Rocabado et al., 2019). Critically, some of these studies link attitude to performance and understanding in general chemistry (Brandriet et al., 2011; Xu et al., 2013; Chan and Bauer, 2014). Using the ASCIv2, Brandriet and colleagues demonstrated a positive relationship between grades in general chemistry and changes in attitude over time, but did not determine a causal or predictive relationship (Brandriet et al., 2011). However, Xu and colleagues demonstrated that attitude contributes to predictions of chemistry achievement (alongside prior conceptual knowledge), and concluded that this evidence supports fostering positive attitude is important to improve students’ performance in general chemistry (Xu et al., 2013). Chan and Bauer further explored the relationship between attitude and performance, and found that affective characteristics (attitude included) were a useful predictor of at-risk students in the course (Chan and Bauer, 2014).

Despite these important findings linking attitude and performance in general chemistry education research, there have been few studies within the literature aimed at investigating attitudes specifically towards organic chemistry. The first of these studies is a task-specific study from Supasorn and colleagues identifying how pre-laboratory visualizations of organic extractions impacted student attitudes (Supasorn et al., 2008). In this work, the researchers developed a questionnaire, the Organic Extraction Simulation Questionnaire, validated the items on the questionnaire through expert review, and collected qualitative data with the questionnaire in the form of student comments (Supasorn et al., 2008). A second study investigated the impact of a flipped organic chemistry classroom on attitudes. Mooring and colleagues used the ASCIv2 to find that, in a flipped classroom, there was an increase in students’ perceptions of intellectual accessibility and emotional satisfaction in the course (Mooring et al., 2016). The researchers also administered a qualitative end-of-semester survey investigating the students’ feelings regarding the flipped classroom, which were coded as negative, positive, mixed, and neutral (Mooring et al., 2016). While this provided a thorough investigation into students’ attitudes towards a flipped classroom in organic chemistry, the focus was not on the subject of organic chemistry itself. Finally, a third study by Rocabado and colleagues investigated how the flipped classroom impacted Black female students, who began the organic chemistry course with lower attitude scores than their peers (Rocabado et al., 2019). The authors of this study did not find that the flipped classroom was enough of an intervention “to close the attitude gap for these students” (Rocabado et al., 2019). While these three studies investigate an aspect of attitude towards organic chemistry, each of them does so with a focus on a specific facet of the course – namely extractions or the impact of a flipped classroom on student attitude.

The authors of this manuscript could not find any studies which investigate attitude toward organic chemistry using a qualitative approach; previously conducted studies use questionnaires or inventories as their primary data source and only use student comments or follow-up surveys as a secondary data source. Given the evidence that emotions impact performance in organic chemistry, and attitude has impacted performance in general chemistry, exploring this gap in the literature is an important pathway to understand potential barriers to student success in organic chemistry. Specific insight into student attitudes regarding organic chemistry is needed to create appropriate interventions that can impact students’ meaningful learning experiences. This manuscript aims to address this gap by qualitatively investigating students’ attitudes towards organic chemistry.

Defining the construct of attitude

Attitude is situated within the affective domain, but often described in terms of behavior and cognition (Bauer, 2008; Xu and Lewis, 2011). This, paired with the fact that attitude is difficult to separate from other constructs within the affective domain, has led to attitude being inconsistently defined and operationalized in education research (Osborne et al., 2003; Bauer, 2005, 2008; Xu and Lewis 2011). Therefore, it is key to determine an appropriate framework and definition when investigating attitude.

The authors of this paper determined that the most apt definition of attitude within chemistry education research comes from Bauer, stating that attitudes are: “the tendency to approach or avoid—to react negatively or positively—to the subject or discipline of chemistry” and that this tendency may be expressed through belief, feelings, or behavior (Bauer, 2008). This definition of attitude captures the complex way that attitude can be expressed beyond the affective domain, but recognizes that these are still expressions of a general feeling towards the attitude object. To operationalize attitude, the authors incorporated the work of Xu and Lewis, who acknowledge that attitude has been conceptualized as a tripartite construct, but because behavioral components are less abstract than thinking and feeling domains, Xu and Lewis determined that a two-component theoretical framework consisting of cognition and affect was the most appropriate for investigating attitudes in the chemistry classroom setting (Xu and Lewis, 2011). Different aspects of attitude related to cognition identified by Xu and Lewis include the difficulty, challenge, complexity, and level of confusion the course presented, while aspects related to affect included the comfortability, satisfaction, pleasantness, and level of organization the students felt. This framework for attitude is less broad than the Bauer definition and does not seek to investigate students’ expressions of attitude in behavior, but focuses instead on students’ statements regarding thought and feeling.

In order to gain a deeper understanding of student attitudes in the organic chemistry setting, the authors used a combination of the Bauer definition and Xu and Lewis framework to design an instrument and interpret the results. The Attitudes Towards Organic Chemistry (ATOC) instrument consists of two parts, a qualitative portion and a quantitative portion. The qualitative portion gives space for students to describe their attitudes towards organic chemistry and what may be influencing those attitudes. These responses are characterized broadly by students’ tendency to react positively or negatively, in line with the Bauer definition of attitude, but aspects of the Xu and Lewis framework are present throughout students’ responses. The quantitative portion of the ATOC investigates specific cognitive and affective aspects of attitude in line with the Xu and Lewis framework. This manuscript focuses on the qualitative results only; the results of the quantitative portion will be reported separately.

Using the Xu and Lewis framework, a two-pronged approach to understanding students’ attitudes towards organic chemistry was employed. This approach consisted of creating an instrument, the Attitudes Towards Organic Chemistry (ATOC) instrument, with both a qualitative portion (focusing on how students describe their feelings towards learning organic chemistry), and a quantitative portion (focusing on what students think about organic chemistry). The present manuscript focuses on results from the qualitative portion of the instrument.

Research questions

Using a qualitative approach, this study investigated students’ attitudes towards organic chemistry and the factors that influence those attitudes, guided by the following two research questions:

(1) How do students characterize their attitudes towards learning organic chemistry?

(2) What influences students’ attitudes towards learning organic chemistry?

Methods

Statement of positionality

The authors would like to call to attention that with any research study, the identities, backgrounds, biases, and positionalities of the researchers may impact outcomes of the study (Foote and Gau Bartell, 2011). Therefore, it is important to reflect on and disclose these identities. This study was conducted by five authors, all women, with a background in chemistry. Author MAC was a graduate student who had completed a master's degree in organic chemistry and was working towards a PhD in chemistry education research during the course of this research study. MAC served as an organic chemistry teaching assistant and instructor of record during the course of this research study. Her experiences as an undergraduate student in organic chemistry, a graduate student in organic chemistry, and an instructor were the inspiration for the study. Authors LAR and JEF were both undergraduate women preparing to become high school educators in chemistry while attending a large public research university in the Southern United States. Both LAR and JEF had taken organic chemistry previously as undergraduate students before participating in the research study as additional coders. This was the first research experience for both LAR and JEF. Author RW holds a PhD in chemistry with a focus on computational physical chemistry, and was an instructor of general chemistry and physical chemistry throughout the course of the study. Author MBA holds a PhD in chemistry with a focus on education research and inorganic chemistry and was an instructor of general chemistry throughout the course of the study. Both RW and MBA were involved in the design of the study, and were involved in conversations with JEF, LAR, and MAC revolving around difficulties with coding and development of themes.

Given the knowledge that identities can impact interpretation of data, steps were taken to fully preserve the credibility of the data generated by the ATOC instrument. This was done through using multiple coders from a variety of backgrounds, consensus meetings involving in-depth conversations regarding each keyword in coding, and a committee of experts to review the construction of the themes.

Instrument design

The instrument was administered in an initial pilot study at a large, public Texas research university to students enrolled in first-semester organic chemistry at the beginning of Spring 2020 via the software Qualtrics (Qualtrics XM–Experience Management Software, n.d.) with the following prompt: “Describe, in your own words, how you feel about learning organic chemistry.” Student responses to this open-response item yielded a surprising number of comments regarding not only how the students felt about organic chemistry, but also related to what the students had heard about organic chemistry, impacting their feelings towards the subject. Considering these findings, a second open-response item was added to create the finalized version of the instrument:

(1) “Describe, in your own words, how you feel about learning organic chemistry.”

(2) “What made you feel the way you do about organic chemistry?”

The inclusion of these two items, paired with follow-up interviews, was determined to be the best methodology to approach this topic, as a broad overview of students’ attitudes was desired. Follow-up interviews served the purpose of allowing the researchers to ask clarifying questions as needed (Deng et al., 2021). The ATOC also included questions regarding demographic information, including gender identity, racial identity, age, career aspirations, if the student had taken organic chemistry before, first-generation college student status, and if the student had any non-traditional aspects about their college experience (i.e., has dependents, works 40 hours a week, is financially self-supporting, is working an off-campus job). This demographic information can be found in Appendix 1.

Data collection

Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval was obtained prior to the collection of any data from students to protect the rights and confidentiality of all participants in the research study. Each time the instrument was administered, participants were given the opportunity to provide informed consent or decline for their data to be used in the study. To further protect the participants, gender neutral pseudonyms were assigned randomly when discussing results. Following its pilot and revision, the instrument was administered in Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 at the same institution where the pilot study was conducted, in both first-semester (OC1) and second-semester (OC2) organic chemistry courses (Fig. 2). At this institution, organic chemistry is taught using the traditional functional groups approach. Additionally, the laboratory and lecture courses at this institution are two distinct courses. The instrument was administered in the laboratory course, due to complications from COVID-19 (discussed further in the limitations section), during the first experiment of the semester. When the instrument was administered, the research personnel specified that the study was regarding learning organic chemistry as a whole to ensure that students did not assume the questions were associated with either the laboratory course or the lecture course only.

Fig. 2 Timeline of the development and administration of the instrument, including sample sizes for each semester of the study. OC1 = first-semester organic chemistry; OC2 = second-semester organic chemistry.

Codebook development

Based on the pilot study, an initial codebook was developed through open coding (Miles et al., 2018) to analyze student responses to Item One, “Describe, in your own words, how you feel about learning organic chemistry.” The resulting codes are negative, neutral, positive, or blended designation for each student response. This codebook was refined after additional data was gathered in Fall 2020; specifically, the blended designation was modified to clarify which codes were present (i.e., specifying blended (negative/neutral) rather than just blended). While this codebook was developed inductively, it is in line with Bauer's definition of attitude as a “tendency to react positively or negatively” to the attitude object, and a similar codebook was developed in a previous study regarding attitudes in a flipped organic chemistry course, with codes of positive, negative, neutral, or mixed (Mooring et al., 2016), thus lending a degree of credibility to this analysis. The initial data sets (OC1 and OC2 from Fall 2020) were coded by two or more coders, using analytic memos to document the developing codebook, thoughts about the raw data, and the coded data (Lincoln and Guba, 1985; Ary et al., 2002; Rogers, 2018; Watts and Finkenstaedt-Quinn, 2021). Certain words were unclear regarding the participant's intention in their statement, including the words/phrases “not a fan,” “challenge,” and “time consuming.” The researchers determined that these statements should be characterized as inherently neutral unless the context was definitive, and responses containing these phrases were clarified in follow-up, response process interviews when possible. The coders met regularly to come to complete consensus on all of the overlapping student responses (Cohen, 1960; Watts and Finkenstaedt-Quinn, 2021). Subsequent data sets from Spring 2021 were divided between raters with a portion of the data overlapping to ensure the raters still maintained strong interrater reliability. For this overlapping data, the raters met to come to complete consensus.

For the analysis of Item Two, “Why do you feel the way you do about organic chemistry?”, student responses were inductively coded using the constant comparative method by three individual and independent coders (Corbin and Strauss, 2008). Similar codes were combined using thematic analysis to construct themes (Corbin and Strauss, 2008). These codes and themes were refined throughout the course of data collection. At the close of analysis of the data from OC1 and OC2 for both semesters of the study, no new themes were apparent.

Follow-up interviews

Follow-up, response process interviews were also conducted to gain a more robust understanding of students’ responses (Deng et al., 2021). Students were randomly selected and invited to participate for compensation in the form of a nominal gift card. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the follow-up interviews were conducted via Zoom (Zoom Video Communications, Inc, n.d.). Students were asked to read the instrument questions aloud, and then answer them aloud, after which the researcher would ask clarifying questions about their statements. This process was repeated until data saturation was reached, for a total of 7 interviews conducted (Saunders et al., 2018).

These interviews were then transcribed and reviewed for any mis-transcriptions. For analysis, close attention was paid to statements made by the student that had been flagged by coders as neutral, with the interviewer clarifying whether the student viewed these statements as negative or positive. A variety of responses provided evidence for the credibility of the researchers’ interpretation of these items as neutral. For example, when Jacky (OC2) was asked to clarify if they meant the phrase “not a fan” as a negative, positive, or neutral statement they said: “I feel like it's neutral only because, I did well and I liked, I didn't really mind chem one and two, but it wasn't like, um, my favorite class or anything, like ‘yay chemistry!’ I was just, kind of like, you know, go to class do good, but it wasn't something that I was really excited about or anything.” On the other hand, when Ale (OC1) was asked to categorize their statement of “not a fan,” their response was: “So I’d say definitely more negative just because of how- how much time it takes me and how I feel, uh, I just don't like the not knowing that if I do good or not on certain stuff. With chemistry it's kind of 50/50 like I’ll think I know what I’m doing, but then, when the test comes I may forget or I’ll find out if I really did not know what I was doing.” The difference in these students’ intentions with the same statement lends credence to their coding as neutral. Similar phenomena were observed with the other phrases that were deemed difficult to initially categorize.

Results and discussion

Characterizing student attitudes

In response to Item One, “Describe, in your own words, how you feel about learning organic chemistry”, students gave a full range of attitudes towards organic chemistry, including those characterized as negative, positive, neutral, and blended. Table 1 contains descriptions and examples of the positive, negative, neutral, and blended responses. Because students were responding to this item on an instrument with no space limitations, sometimes these responses were brief and sometimes they were extensive; all quotes included are complete student quotes.

Table 1 An example of each code for student responses to Item One on the instrument: “Describe in your own words how you feel about learning organic chemistry.” Responses are coded as positive, negative, neutral, or blended. Positive statements are bolded, negative statements are bold italicized, and neutral statements are italicized. OC1 = first-semester organic chemistry; OC2 = second-semester organic chemistry

Code	Example quotes
Positive	“I enjoy learning organic chemistry.” – Taylor (OC1)
	“I’m excited to learn organic chemistry.” – Jordan (OC2)
Negative	“Slight dread” – Erin (OC1)
	“I absolutely hate it.” – Pat (OC2)
Neutral	“I feel like our experiences with learning organic chemistry depend on the professor. Right now, I am content with how I am learning organic chemistry because my professor provides review questions after every class and also a practice test before the exam so we know what to expect.” – Mel (OC1)
	“Indifferent” – Kay (OC2)
Blended (Positive/Negative)	“Pretty good but nervous for the difficulty of it.” – Rene (OC1)
	“Excited but somewhat nervous/anxious.” – Blake (OC2)
Blended (Positive/Neutral)	“While it may take time to grasp some concepts, I find it exciting to learn about organic chemistry.” – Bene (OC1)
	“I find the content slightly interestingbut I’m mainly taking it to prepare for the MCAT.” – Yesi (OC2)
Blended (Negative/Neutral)	“Required but not happy about it.As a biology major, I’d rather not do chemistry at all.” – Cameo (OC1)
	“It's not something I enjoy, I do it because I have to in order to pursue my career.” – Jay (OC2)
Blended (Positive/Negative/Neutral)	“Organic chemistry is an intricate and challenging subject. It can at times feel vast or intimidating, but the way it helps explain the nature of our universe is awesome.” – Val (OC1)
	“It's interesting. Sometimes scary, but doable with the right teachers.” – El (OC2)

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Positive statements consisted of interest, excitement, or other positive attitudes towards organic chemistry. Examples of positive responses are given by Taylor (OC1) and Jordan (OC2). Negative statements consisted of anxiety, dread, nervousness, or other generally negative attitudes towards organic chemistry, with examples of negative responses given by Erin (OC1) and Pat (OC2). Neutral statements generally consisted of students commenting that they are enrolled in the course for their career, that the material is manageable or doable, or that they feel fine, content, or neutral. Examples of neutral responses are given by Mel (OC1) and Kay (OC2). Blended responses consisted of multiple attitudes towards organic chemistry and are coded with a distinction of which attitudes (positive, negative, or neutral) are present in the statement. For example, El (OC2) gives a blended response comprised of positive, negative, and neutral attitudes. In El's response, “interesting” is coded as positive, while “sometimes scary” is coded as negative; El's final statement “doable with the right teachers” is coded as neutral, creating the overall response code of blended (positive, neutral, negative). Many of the blended responses included comments that consisted of a sense of excitement or curiosity, tempered by a sense of intimidation or nervousness.

Regarding the prevalence of codes (shown in Fig. 3), OC1 student responses were most commonly positive, negative, and blended, though all types of responses were present. For both on-sequence and off-sequence OC1 students, there were already a wide range of attitudes expressed towards the subject, even though they had not yet interacted with the course material itself at the time of data collection. After at least one semester of organic chemistry, OC2 students also gave a wide range of responses, though it was noted that the off-sequence OC2 students responded with overwhelmingly negative comments. These results suggest that many undergraduate students are arriving in organic chemistry with at least a partially negative attitude towards learning the subject, despite having limited interaction with the content. Interacting with the subject matter may change these attitudes, and a future longitudinal study following the same cohort would provide evidence on how students’ attitudes could change.

Fig. 3 Percentages of coded student responses to Item One on the instrument, “Describe, in your own words, how you feel about learning organic chemistry.” Sample sizes have been indicated below each column, with the left side of the graph representing OC1 student responses for both semesters of the study, and the right side of the graph representing OC2 student responses for both semesters of the study. Note: Fall 2020 OC1 and Spring 2021 OC2 students are considered “on-sequence”, while Spring 2021 OC1 and Fall 2020 OC2 students are considered “off-sequence”.

Overall, results from Item One provide evidence that student attitudes are potentially shaped by factors outside of the classroom when they enroll in organic chemistry courses. While the prevalence of student responses gives some insight, it is worthwhile to note that in the context of qualitative research methods, each student response is valued within the data pool despite how often that response is expressed. Further, these percentages may be impacted by limitations in participant recruitment and attrition rates, explored further in the limitations section.

Influences on student attitudes

Students’ responses to Item Two, which asks “What makes you feel the way you do about organic chemistry?” were organized and interpreted into themes and subthemes, outlined in Fig. 4. While these themes were consistent in both OC1 and OC2, the frequency of student responses representing those themes varied between the first- and second-semester course. Additionally, differences in subthemes were evident when analyzing responses from OC1 and OC2 students. Some student responses represented multiple themes and/or subthemes, and these were coded under both themes that were appropriate in order to fully capture all aspects of the response. Complete student quotes are included in the discussion below to ensure that the response is not misrepresented without context. Whenever there is a student quote included that was coded under multiple themes, it will be denoted with a footnote. It is also important to note that many of these themes and subthemes, while distinct, are interconnected. A detailed list of the themes and subthemes, with representative student quotes, can be found in Appendix 2.

Fig. 4 An overview of themes and subthemes identified in the data generated in response to Item Two, “What made you feel the way you do about organic chemistry?”

Theme 1 – reputation

Theme 1 is characterized by students referencing or describing what they have heard about organic chemistry from others, including both external sources (such as friends, previous students, family members, and social media) and unspecified sources (where students broadly discussed things they have heard). These comments around the reputation of the course often revolved around the cognitive aspects of attitude, specifically the difficulty of the course (Xu and Lewis, 2011). For example, Mai (OC1) referenced external sources such as previous students and Google searches: “Students in the past and if you google the hardest class in college, organic chemistry is the top option.” Ash (OC2) cited what they had heard from fellow students: “The reputation I have heard from fellow students who have completed the class.” Students like Tate (OC1) focused on what they had heard from family members rather than from other students: “My sister took the class at [another university] and said they barely got by with a low B and that it was the hardest class they ever took.” Carter (OC1) did not point to a specific source, but broadly noted that everyone they have spoken with has indicated the difficulty of the class: “Everyone I have talk to says this class is difficult.” Theme 1 presented strongly in OC1 and persisted in OC2, despite students having more of their own organic chemistry experiences to drawn upon.

The finding that reputation influences attitude, in conjunction specifically with the OC1 negative responses to Item One, provides evidence that students have developed an opinion of organic chemistry based on factors outside the classroom before they encounter the material. This suggests that students’ attitudes towards the course are shaped prior to their start in the course and they are specifically influenced regarding the difficulty of the course. This is also concerning, as anxiety has been shown to have an inverse relationship with performance in organic chemistry, so the focus of students on difficulty of the course prior to taking it may be negatively impacting performance (Gibbons et al., 2018).

Theme 2 – educators

Theme 2 is characterized by students describing the influence their educators have had on their feelings towards organic chemistry. This includes students discussing current organic chemistry professors, previous chemistry professors, high school teachers, teaching assistants (TAs) and/or tutors. Theme 2 was present in both OC1 and OC2, but showed a higher prevalence in OC2, with more specific comments about current instructors. Some statements in Theme 2 were positive, some negative, and some did not specify the nature of the educator's influence. Students like Roni (OC1) reflected positively on their general chemistry professor: “I had a really good general chemistry professor and they made me like and understand chemistry.†” Ian (OC1) cited a previous experience with his high school instructor where they felt the instruction was lacking: “My high school teacher could have taught me better.” Alexis (OC2) noted not only the impact of their instructors, but also the influence of their TAs: “Great professors and TA's.”

The emphasis that student responses placed on educators indicates that students’ attitudes are shaped by the educators themselves, rather than solely the content of the course that the educators are presenting. This further reinforces the finding from Theme 1 that factors outside of the course material are impacting students’ attitudes towards the course.

Theme 3 – experiences with organic chemistry

Theme 3, divided into six subthemes, is characterized by students’ experiences in the organic chemistry classroom and laboratory. Although instructors certainly shape experiences within these courses, Theme 3 (Experiences with Organic Chemistry) is separate from Theme 2 (Educators) due to two main distinctions. First, students refer to the concepts and material covered in the course as different from their professors; this is evident in a statement by Yi (OC2) who separated out the information from the professor: “I had a professor that I feel did not teach me very well, and I’ve found the information hard to understand a lot of times.” Similarly, Casey (OC2) differentiated between understanding concepts and poor teaching: “Struggling to understand concepts, and some poor teaching.” As a second distinction, the instructors referenced in Theme 2 (Educators) often encompass more than simply the students’ current professors, extending to high school teachers, TAs, and general chemistry instructors. Responses in Theme 3 imply that students separate this instructor influence from their experiences with the organic chemistry course content. For Theme 3, the focus is on the course material and the way that material is presented.

The subthemes that were identified within this theme (outlined in Fig. 4) include: General Experiences, Material and Content, Impacts of COVID-19 on Classroom Experience, Experiences in Previous Organic Chemistry Courses, Experiences in the Laboratory, and Grades.

Subtheme 3.1 – general experiences. Subtheme 3.1 is focused on general student feedback about how being in the organic chemistry classroom impacted them. This theme demonstrates how student attitudes are impacted by their experiences in the course, even when the student does not specify what aspect of the course it was that impacted them. In all these examples, there were not specific statements about particular aspects of the course. However, these students’ comments were clear that being in the organic chemistry class had shaped their attitudes. For example, Nat (OC1) mentioned simply being in the class, as well as the course reputation, when responding to Item Two: “Other students giving me their take on it as well as being in an OChem class.‡” Dallas (OC2) revealed that the course is generally overwhelming without focusing on any particular aspect of it: “I think just the course being overwhelming.”

Subtheme 3.2 – material and content. Subtheme 3.2 consisted of student responses related to the content and materials delivered in the class. Students discussed the perceived difficulty, volume, and pace of the materials delivered. Within this subtheme, students also frequently commented on the amount of time it takes them to study and that they are required to memorize a large volume of material. A quote that demonstrates students’ comments on the perceived difficulty of the materials, as well as other influencing factors, came from Kendall (OC1): “Organic chemistry is a difficult subject and not very interesting, but I need it to graduate.§” Rather than focusing on interest in response to Item Two, Sloan (OC1) only spoke about the difficulty and pace of the materials: “it's a very [fast] paced class and difficult material.” Taraji (OC2) commented on the time commitment rather than the difficulty: “It can be very time consuming,” whereas Ali (OC1) focused on both the challenge as well as the amount of studying required: “It is a challenging course that requires a lot of attention and studying.” Andy (OC2) did not comment on the difficulty but stated that the amount of material was overwhelming: “Overwhelming amount of information.” These students focused primarily on the volume, time commitment, and difficulty of the materials, while Carla (OC2) noted the element of memorization in response to Item Two: “The work load and memorization.” Sydney (OC2) expanded on this by noting more specifically what they struggle with memorizing: “I hate memorizing chemical formulas and structure.”

Subtheme 3.3 – impacts of COVID-19 on classroom experience. This data was collected over the 2020–2021 academic year, meaning that the courses surveyed were conducted online due to COVID-19. Historically, the institution where this data was collected offered no online organic chemistry courses. Subtheme 3.3 consists of responses related to the mode of delivery of the course, indirect impacts of the pandemic, and/or direct impacts of the pandemic on student perceptions of learning. For example, students like Gray (OC2) stated how the online delivery of the course impacted them: “I was not able to manage online organic chemistry.” Thomas (OC2) mentioned COVID-19 specifically in addition to the impact the online class had on their learning: “Covid. Online learning organic chemistry is really hard and I think I would succeed better face to face in a classroom.” Logan (OC2) mentioned online learning in addition to the impact of their professor (also coded under Theme 2 (Educators)): “My organic chemistry professor, [they are] a good professor but I just find online learning more challenging.¶” Willow (OC1) expanded on the impact of the pandemic by noting the pace, also coded under Subtheme 3.2 (Material and Content), in addition to the delivery mode of the course: “How fast paced it is and it being online.||”

Subtheme 3.4 – experiences in previous organic chemistry courses. Subtheme 3.4 is characterized by responses related to students’ experiences in first-semester organic chemistry or their failure to complete a previous attempt at organic chemistry. Responses within this subtheme were more commonly elicited from OC2 students, likely because these students have more previous experiences to draw upon. Students like Tucker (OC2) reflected positively upon their first semester of organic chemistry: “Organic Chemistry 1 was kind of fun,” while others, like River (OC1) did not have a positive experience: “I already took a semester and it was really tough, I hated it.” Some students, like Sawyer (OC2), reflected more specifically on how their performance in first-semester organic chemistry impacted their current experience: “The first part of ochem went too fast for.me [and] i did not get a good grasp at the material an[d] now trying to remember and relearn som[e] of [t]he basic makes me feel like i'm falling behind once again.**”

Subtheme 3.5 – experiences in the laboratory. For both OC1 and OC2, students acknowledged that their laboratory courses shaped how they felt about organic chemistry, comprising Subtheme 3.5. For this theme, students either broadly stated that the laboratory impacted them or gave more specific insight. For example, Les (OC2) broadly stated in response to Item Two: “Ochem Lab,” while students like Bren (OC1) commented positively about their organic chemistry laboratory experience: “The lab, I think it made it a bit more bearable.” Students like Alex (OC1) were negatively impacted by the disorganized nature of the laboratory course which made them feel uncertain they had completed everything required: “Previous [teachers] describing this as the make or break class, teachers seem unapproachable, info is unorganized in lab section and makes me worried i'm missing something important.††” Similarly, students like Kris (OC2) remarked on how they feel the laboratory course does not facilitate learning: “The labs for sure as they never really feel like I learn anything but overall [my professor] makes the actual lecture understandable and bearable.‡‡”

Subtheme 3.6 – grades. Subtheme 3.6 included responses from students related to their grades. Understandably, this subtheme was most prevalent in OC2, when students had more experience with grades to draw upon. Students like Harper (OC2) alluded to grades in a positive manner when responding to Item Two: “Making good grade and understanding the concept.” However, students like Carter (OC1) reflected negatively on how their grades impact their attitudes towards the course: “My grades are not always the best they can be in orgo.”

Overall, student responses related to the course content and material within each of these subthemes indicate that students’ attitudes are impacted by the course material, despite initial attitudes being formed as a result of other influences. As with Theme 1 (Reputation), students’ comments within Theme 3 are in line with aspects of attitude identified by Xu and Lewis (Xu and Lewis, 2011). However, unlike responses in Theme 1, these comments seemed to incorporate all of the cognitive aspects of attitude, as well as some affective aspects (Xu & Lewis, 2011). In many of the subthemes, students made comments related to the difficulty, the chaotic or unorganized nature, the challenging pace, the complexity, feelings of frustration, and/or the level of confusion the course presented, while the comments in Theme 1 (Reputation) focused primarily on the difficulty of the class. This evidence suggests that students’ attitudes may become shaped by a more complex interaction of influences as they progress through the course.

Theme 4 – experiences with introductory chemistry

Theme 4 is characterized by student responses to Item Two regarding their experiences in introductory chemistry. This includes both first-year undergraduate chemistry, often referred to as general chemistry, and high school chemistry classes. These statements ranged from positive to negative in nature, with some students commenting more broadly on their introductory chemistry courses and others focusing on specific concepts from their chemistry experiences. Responses in Theme 4 were from both students in OC1 and OC2, but responses from OC2 students corresponding to experiences with introductory chemistry were expressed at a diminished rate. Students like Mai (OC1) provided more positive viewpoints shaped broadly by general chemistry: “Because it's my favorite things from gen chem.” Students like Trinity (OC1) commented broadly with a more negative viewpoint of chemistry: “Wasn't a fan of general chemistry so not much of an organic chemistry fan.” Madison (OC1) specifically brought up the math from general chemistry: “I had a really hard time in Gen Chem 2 because of the speed and advanced math, as I learn math at a slower pace. I'm hoping Organic Chemistry is better.” Morgan (OC2) remarked on the foundation general chemistry provides as the source of their feelings towards organic chemistry: “I think I don’t have a strong general chemistry background, so I have been struggling since the beginning.” Additionally, students like Patron (OC2) noted recognizable differences between general chemistry and organic chemistry: “After taking organic chemistry for a semester, I realized how different it was compared to general chemistry. I had a tough time retaining the information.§§”

These responses indicate that students’ organic chemistry experiences may be shaped by their general chemistry experiences, and that may influence their attitudes towards learning organic chemistry. This further supports the idea that student attitudes towards organic chemistry may be shaped by factors outside of the organic chemistry course content, as evidenced in Theme 1 (Reputation) and Theme 2 (Educators). However, the diminished rate of general chemistry-focused student comments in the data collection from OC2 supports the finding that these experiences may have less of an impact on students’ attitudes as the students spend more time with the organic chemistry material, also noted in the results from Theme 3 (Material and Content).

Theme 5 – individual experiences

Theme 5 encompasses several subthemes that were affective, personal, and/or related to students’ individual experiences, rather than external factors such as the course itself, educators, or what students have heard about the course. Theme 5 demonstrates that students’ interest, self-belief, and utility value impact their attitudes, despite these being unique constructs, an idea which has been explored in literature previously (Osborne et al., 2003; Bauer, 2008). The subthemes that were identified within this theme (outlined in Fig. 4) include: Impact on Career Path, Self-Belief, and Interest and Enjoyment.

Subtheme 5.1 – impact on career path. Subtheme 5.1 consists of students reflecting on how organic chemistry prepares or does not prepare them for their goals. This includes students commenting on the course as a major requirement, whether the course will help them meet their goals in post-graduate studies, or whether they think the course is relevant to their intended career. Students like Tong (OC2) mentioned that organic chemistry is helpful for the major they are pursuing: “It's useful in my major.” Callaway (OC1) commented on their goals beyond the university experience: “Organic Chemistry is a required course for Pre-veterinarian so I need to understand this course better if I want to achieve what I dream.” Some students offered statements related to their perception that organic chemistry would or would not be helpful in their intended career path. Via (OC1) stated: “It does not have to do with what I want to study/get a job as in the future.”

Subtheme 5.2 – self-belief. Subtheme 5.2 consisted of students stating what they believe about their own abilities in response to Item Two. These students generally discussed their lack of abilities in chemistry or their beliefs about how they might perform in chemistry. For example, students like Ryan (OC2) expressed thoughts on their previous struggles, saying, “I usually struggle with chemistry courses.” Students like Pendo (OC1) commented on their natural abilities: “Chemistry doesn’t come naturally to me, so I have to work harder to understand.” Similarly, Nicole (OC1) said: “I do not get chemistry that easily.”

Subtheme 5.3 – interest and enjoyment. Subtheme 5.3 is characterized by students describing their interest and enjoyment in organic chemistry specifically, in chemistry overall, and learning in general. Student responses in Subtheme 5.3 ranged from a lack of interest and enjoyment to a high level of interest and enjoyment. For example, students like Sam (OC1) brought up a general love of learning new things without mentioning chemistry: “I love learning how things work and come about.” Other students, like Autumn (OC2), stated broadly that they enjoy chemistry as a whole: “General love towards chemistry.” Ting (OC1) referenced their disinterest in chemistry overall in response to Item Two: “People who have previously taken the class and my lack of interest in chemistry.” Other student responses were focused on organic chemistry specifically. Zend (OC2) noted a lack of interest in organic chemistry: “I don’t understand it and have no real interest in it.” Meanwhile, Robbie (OC2) cited an enjoyment of organic chemistry, helping them overcome the hard work required: “It's rigorous but beautiful when you get it down.” Jaime (OC2) brought up an enjoyment of learning and doing organic chemistry, regardless of their other responsibilities: “I started taking orgo last semester and it was actually great. I love how creative it feels to have to problem solve difficult problems. But I’m just stressed now with having to do orgo II, the rest of my classes, and studying for the MCAT. So I’m currently not enjoying myself too much, but it is what it is.”

The student responses within Theme 5, like Theme 3, represent aspects of attitude as presented by Xu and Lewis. Students in this theme talk about pleasantness or enjoyment of the subject or science in general, satisfaction in problem solving, and the difficulty of the subject. Particularly interesting is Subtheme 5.3 which revolves around enjoyment, as enjoyment has been shown to be correlated with performance in organic chemistry (Gibbons et al., 2018). Ultimately, the personal nature of the responses within each of these subthemes imply that each student will have a unique perspective based on their identities that may impact their attitudes towards organic chemistry as they move throughout the course sequence.

Conclusions

This research study aimed to understand how students characterize their attitudes towards learning organic chemistry and potential influences on those attitudes. The ATOC instrument was developed and administered to elicit student ideas related to their learning within the context of organic chemistry and to better recognize how to develop meaningful learning experiences for students in organic chemistry courses. Responses to the open response items indicate that organic chemistry students experience a range of attitudes towards the course and often have pre-conceived negative attitudes towards the course prior to first-semester organic chemistry. This provides evidence that factors external to the course may be shaping students’ attitudes toward organic chemistry, in addition to the course itself having an impact on students’ attitudes. This qualitative inquiry is significant as it presents a novel investigation into the affective domain of students’ experiences in organic chemistry courses, gives new insight into how students describe their attitudes towards learning organic chemistry, and elucidates the factors that have shaped those attitudes.

These findings further give insight into the process of meaningful learning for organic chemistry students. For meaningful learning to occur, the material itself must be meaningful, students must have relevant prior knowledge to connect new information to, and students must choose to incorporate that new information into their existing frameworks (Novak, 1977, 1998). Negative attitudes towards organic chemistry may be inhibiting the process of meaningful learning by: (1) hindering students from choosing to incorporate new information into their existing knowledge structures and (2) contributing to the belief that organic chemistry is not relevant to the knowledge that they currently hold. However, the findings of this study indicate that students do not ubiquitously hold negative attitudes towards organic chemistry, suggesting that students’ attitudes can shift after interaction with the course content.

The findings that students hold negative attitudes prior to the course, in combination with Theme 1 (Reputation), emphasizes two factors that are strongly interwoven and were found previously to underlie the construct of attitudes – anxiety and intellectual accessibility (Bauer, 2008). Responses to Item Two show that students may be experiencing anxiety based on their beliefs about the intellectual accessibility of the course, beliefs that may have been developed based on reputation prior to their experience with the material itself.

Implications for research and practice

With these insights into student attitudes and the origins of these attitudes, there are implications for: (1) future research, (2) new potential avenues for interventions in organic chemistry to improve student experiences within the affective domain and their meaningful learning experiences overall, and (3) organic chemistry instruction.

The findings reported herein suggest that future research studies should be intentionally designed to investigate attitudes held by students about organic chemistry, as a large portion of students hold negative attitudes towards the course and attitudes have been previously found to impact performance (Osborne et al., 2003). Thus, determining how attitudes impact performance in organic chemistry would be a worthwhile inquiry. Future research studies should also determine how attitudes shift over the organic chemistry course sequence to better understand external influences that may cause students’ attitudes to change, as well as to develop interventions that target improving students’ attitudes towards learning course content. One method of developing interventions could revolve around each of the five thematic areas identified in the analysis of data from Item Two. For example, an intervention targeting the information students hear about organic chemistry before they arrive to the course would potentially relate to Theme 1 (Reputation) in an aim to improve attitude upon arrival to the course and reduce possible anxiety associated with these attitudes. Future research could explore the impacts of this type of intervention on students’ attitudes and performance without changing the existing course structure. Another example of an intervention could focus on the findings in Theme 5 (Individual Experiences), such as an assignment that works towards elucidating the relevancy of the course to students’ prospective career path and identifying the impact that may have on learning experiences and ultimately performance. Finally, findings from Theme 4 (Individual Experiences) provide further evidence that other constructs within the affective domain, such as self-efficacy and interest, are intertwined with attitudes, as has been noted in previous investigations (Osborne et al., 2003; Bauer, 2005, 2008; Xu and Lewis, 2011). Future research should investigate the possibility that interventions targeting additional aspects of student affect in organic chemistry might simultaneously contribute to an improvement in attitude as well.

The findings from this research study also posit several implications for teaching organic chemistry. While Theme 2 (Educators) most directly relates to teaching, there are several ways instructors can incorporate practices directly into their classrooms based on evidence from this research study. Results suggest that educators should assess their own impact on the classroom, as this is potentially the sole theme that educators have control over when they are not given institutional freedom with curriculum or other classroom considerations. Educators can reflect and/or use a tool such as the ATOC instrument to assess any potential effects they may see in the classroom. This can be difficult to do objectively, as students may not feel inclined to be honest or may be very subjective themselves; however, an anonymous survey could help elucidate students’ perceptions of educator influence. A further beneficial practice may be to specifically ask students how the instructor can help to have a positive impact on them, using an anonymous approach.

Another factor that students cited as influencing their attitudes towards learning organic chemistry is the classroom experience. Findings from this work suggest that organic chemistry educators should assess how the course structure may be impacting students’ attitudes towards the course. The pace and content were often an area that students mentioned, which may mean that changes need to be made beyond the individual classroom, such as assessing what material is standardized and considering a shift from breadth of material to depth. Such a shift may aid in negating the student perception that they are being required to memorize excessive amounts of material, as well as potentially allowing more time to be devoted to a deeper understanding of the content. The need for this type of curricular reform has already been recognized, and corresponding curricula have been developed for general chemistry and organic chemistry, such as the Chemical Thinking curriculum, the Chemistry, Life, the Universe and Everything (CLUE) curriculum, and the Organic Chemistry, Life, the Universe and Everything (OCLUE) curriculum (Talanquer and Pollard, 2010, 2017; Cooper et al., 2019).

De-emphasizing the breadth of material covered in organic chemistry could allow more time for interventions which target the affective domain. For example, the student comments in Theme 5 (Individual Experiences) indicate the importance of context-based learning and the inclusion of content that improves interest or enjoyment of the subject based on students’ pre-existing knowledge or interests, a founding principle of responsive teaching (Robertson et al., 2016). Instructors hoping to improve an organic chemistry course may want to identify specific things that interest their students (such as hobbies or career paths) and focus on providing organic chemistry examples within those contexts. The necessity of incorporating this type of approach to chemistry education is well documented, with situated cognition and systems thinking emerging as possible methods for bringing context-based learning into the classroom (Bodner and Orgill, 2007; Orgill et al., 2019). Unfortunately, embedding direct context-based and relevant examples into each unit of coursework, or assigning context-based examples as homework, is often not a realistic/practical option due to the volume of material that is covered in a semester. Shifting the emphasis from breadth to depth could give time to improve in this area as well.

Finally, findings from this study related to the impact of general chemistry experiences on student attitudes towards learning organic chemistry suggest that non-organic chemistry educators may impact students’ attitudes towards organic chemistry. Educators who encounter students before they enter the organic chemistry classroom should recognize their potential influence on students’ attitudes within other course contexts.

Limitations

The authors would like to acknowledge that the context of data collected is an inherent limitation of the study. This data was collected at a large, public research university in Texas. Therefore, these findings may not be generalizable to other settings which are considerably different. It is important to consider these contexts before generalizing findings from a research study conducted within a specific context.

Though qualitative data is more robust than quantitative data, there are also limitations in collecting qualitative data via an instrument. Clarifying follow-up questions could not be asked when students posited neutral or vague statements, and in some instances, best judgements had to be made by the researchers. This is exemplified by the complexity of the words “challenged,” “difficult,” and “time consuming” when coding responses, with students using these words in negative, positive, and/or neutral ways depending on the context surrounding the word. In order to mitigate this limitation, the authors selected the best approach in the coding process of these words/phrases through conducting follow-up, response process interviews to better understand students’ connotations related to specific statements. However, because the response process interviews were limited in number, the authors are aware that this inherently means that there are populations and viewpoints within the class that may not have been represented, and some of these vague statements may have been interpreted in a way that they were not intended. This is a natural challenge with any form of qualitative data, and multiple coders, follow-up interviews, and consensus meetings were used to preserve the credibility of the data analysis.

Recruitment of student participants and obtaining a representative sample was an additional limitation in this study. With low response rates from online lecture courses in Fall 2020, recruitment was shifted into the laboratory course in Spring 2021, yielding much higher response rates. These response rates may have impacted the overall percentages for student responses to Item One. While these percentages still do give some insight, it is possible students with a more negative attitude did not persist in the course sequence, therefore skewing overall percentages. Further, it is not possible to know how well this research study sample represented the total students enrolled in the course, as the demographic information of the course was not available to the authors. Another issue in recruitment of students resulted from COVID-19. To accommodate physical distancing practices, the laboratory classes were on a schedule which had only half of each section attend in-person each week, creating an alternating/rotating A-B schedule. This meant the whole class was not sampled at the same timepoint in the semester, providing a limitation in the data collection approach. Another limitation of the study was inherently created by the switch to remote learning due to COVID-19; all data in this study was collected from students who were taking the organic chemistry course online, which differs from the experiences that most organic chemistry students at the institution in this study have had in the past or may have in the future. More work should be done regarding future collection of data in subsequent semesters to help minimize this potential limitation.

Finally, the wording of Item Two presented a limitation in this research study, where the attitude object of the item was stated as “organic chemistry” rather than “learning organic chemistry.” To determine the impact of the insertion of the word “learning”, students in the follow-up, response process interviews were asked if their response to Item Two would be different if the question was phrased “learning organic chemistry.” Results from these interviews indicated that students’ responses would not be changed by altering the attitude object in this way; future research could potentially probe this further.

Author contributions

In an effort to normalize the practice of transparency in the preparation of this work, the specific contributions of all authors are described as follows: Study Design – MAC, RW, MBA; Data Collection – MAC, LAR, MBA; Coding – MAC, LAR, JEF; Analysis – MAC, LAR, JEF, RW, MBA; Interpretation of Results –MAC, LAR, JEF, RW, MBA; Writing – MAC, RW, MBA; Editing – MAC, RW, MBA; Funding and Resources – MBA.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts to declare.

Appendices

Appendix 1

A detailed breakdown of demographic information for students who took the Attitudes Towards Organic Chemistry instrument, presented by semester. Note, for all tables OC1 is first-semester organic chemistry, OC2 is second-semester organic chemistry. F20 is Fall 2020 semester, F21 is Fall 2021 semester, S20 is Spring 2020 semester, S21 is Spring 2021 semester. n = number of participants. N/A is not applicable or not answered.

What is your intended career path?

n	OC1 F20 (%)	OC1 S21 (%)	OC2 F20 (%)	OC2 S21 (%)
	87	145	24	304
Academia	3.45	4.14	0.00	3.95
Forensics	5.75	4.83	8.33	0.66
Industry	10.34	8.28	16.67	8.88
Medical	59.77	61.38	50.00	70.72
Unsure	4.60	7.59	12.50	6.91
Other	1.15	8.28	8.33	6.25
N/A	14.94	5.52	4.17	2.63

What is your gender identity?

n	OC1 F20 (%)	OC1 S21 (%)	OC2 F20 (%)	OC2 S21 (%)
	87	145	24	304
Agender	1.15	0.69	0.00	0.00
Bigender	1.15	0.00	0.00	0.00
Female	33.33	68.28	50.00	62.50
Gender Fluid	0.00	0.69	0.00	0.00
Male	24.14	22.07	41.67	31.91
Nonbinary	0.00	1.38	0.00	1.32
N/A	17.24	6.90	8.33	4.28

What is your racial identity?

n	OC1 F20 (%)	OC1 S21 (%)	OC2 F20 (%)	OC2 S21 (%)
	87	145	24	304
Asian/Pacific Islander	16.09	14.48	12.50	19.74
Black	11.49	24.14	16.67	14.14
Latino	17.24	20.00	16.67	24.01
Middle Eastern	5.75	2.07	4.17	3.29
Native American/Alaskan	1.15	1.38	0.00	2.96
White	47.13	40.69	54.17	45.07
Unknown	0.00	0.00	4.17	0.00
Prefer not to answer	0.00	2.76	4.17	1.64

What is your age?

n	OC1 F20 (%)	OC1 S21 (%)	OC2 F20 (%)	OC2 S21 (%)
	87	145	24	304
18–21	62.07	72.41	37.50	74.67
22–30	21.84	19.31	45.83	20.39
31–45	1.15	2.07	8.33	2.30
46+	0.00	0.69	4.17	0.00
N/A	14.94	5.52	4.17	2.63

Other aspects of student experience:

Note: percentages represent the number of students who responded to that question with a “Yes.”

n	OC1 F20 (%)	OC1 S21 (%)	OC2 F20 (%)	OC2 S21 (%)
	87	145	24	304
Are you first generation? (neither parent has completed a four year degree)	31.03	40.69	33.33	37.83
Do you have dependents?	16.09	11.72	20.83	12.83
Are you enrolled in less than 12 hours of courses?	10.34	8.97	12.50	6.91
Do you work 40+ hours a week?	14.94	13.79	29.17	13.16
Are you financially self-supporting?	26.44	26.90	50.00	28.95
Do you work a job off campus?	78.16	82.07	95.83	90.46
Are you a STEM major?	78.16	82.07	95.83	90.46
Have you taken OC1 or OC2 or the equivalent before?	12.64	20.00	91.67	91.78

Appendix 2

A detailed description of themes, subthemes, and representative student quotes identified in the data generated in response to Item Two, “What made you feel the way you do about organic chemistry?” are shown below.

Themes	Description	Subthemes	Representative quote
Theme 1 reputation	Characterized by students referencing what they have heard from others about organic chemistry	N/A	“Everyone I have talk to says this class is difficult” – Pedro (OC1)
Theme 2 educators	Characterized by students mentioning their organic chemistry instructors, general chemistry instructors, teaching assistants, tutors, high school instructors	N/A	“I had a really good general chemistry professor and she made me like and understand chemistry” – Eronia (OC1)
Theme 3 experiences with organic chemistry	Characterized by students describing how the course itself impacts their attitudes toward organic chemistry	3.1: General experiences in the organic chemistry classroom	“Organic chemistry is a difficult subject and not very interesting, but I need it to graduate.” – Abbey (OC1)
		3.2: Material and content	“Overwhelming amount of information” – Andy (OC2)
		3.3: Impacts of COVID-19	“Making good grade and understanding the concept” – Harper (OC2)
		3.4: Experiences in previous organic classrooms	“I already took a semester and it was really tough, I hated it” – Ari (OC2)
		3.5: Experiences in the laboratory
		3.6: Grades
Theme 4 experiences with introductory chemistry	Characterized by students mentioning their introductory chemistry experiences	N/A	“I had a really hard time in Gen Chem 2 because of the speed and advanced math, as I learn math at a slower pace. I’m hoping Organic Chemistry is better.” – James (OC1)
Theme 5 individual experiences	Characterized by students sharing personal stories or experiences that are independent of their course experience	5.1: Impact on career path	“Organic Chemistry is a required course for Pre-veterinarian so I need to understand this course better if I want to achieve what I dream.” – Miriam (OC1)
		5.2: Self-belief
		5.3: Interest and enjoyment

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the University of North Texas for funding this research, the organic chemistry students who took time to participate in the research study, and the organic chemistry instructors who allowed us to use class time to distribute the instrument. The authors would also like to thank Dr Uyen Tran-Parsons for her support as an educator and committee member, Dr Adriana Corrales for all their support in preparing this manuscript, and the administrative staff of the University of North Texas Department of Chemistry.

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Footnotes

† This response was also coded under Subtheme 5.3 (Interest and Enjoyment).

‡ This response was also coded under Theme 1 (Reputation).

§ This response was also coded under Theme 5.1 (Impact on Career Path) and Theme 5.3 (Interest and Enjoyment).

¶ This response was also coded under Theme 2 (Educators).

|| This response was also coded under Theme 3.2 (Material and Content).

** This response was also coded under Theme 3.2 (Material and Content).

†† This response was also coded under Theme 2 (Educators).

‡‡ This response was also coded under Theme 2 (Educators).

§§ This response was also coded under Theme 3.1 (General Experiences).

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