Existing research has identified gender as a driving variable of student success in higher education: women attend college at a higher rate and are also more successful than their male peers. We build on the extant literature by asking whether specific cognitive variables (i.e., self-efficacy and causal attribution habits) distinguish male and female students with differing academic performance levels. Using a case study, we collected data from students enrolled in a general education course (sample size N = 400) at a large public university in the United States. Our findings indicate that while students’ course grades and cumulative college grades did not vary by gender, female and male students reported different self-efficacy and causal attribution habits for good grades and poor grades. To illustrate, self-efficacy for female students is broad and stretches across all their courses; in contrast, for male students, it is more limited to specific courses. These gender differences in cognition, particularly in accounting for undesirable events, may assist faculty members and advisors in understanding how students respond to difficulties and challenges.

中文翻译：

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背后是什么：自我效能感、因果归因习惯和性别在影响大学生成功中的作用

现有研究已将性别确定为学生在高等教育中取得成功的驱动变量：女性上大学的比例更高，也比男性同龄人更成功。我们通过询问特定的认知变量（即自我效能和因果归因习惯）是否区分具有不同学业成绩水平的男女学生，以现有文献为基础。通过案例研究，我们收集了在美国一所大型公立大学参加通识教育课程的学生的数据（样本量 N = 400）。我们的研究结果表明，虽然学生的课程成绩和累计大学成绩没有因性别而异，但女性和男性学生报告了不同的自我效能感和对好成绩和差成绩的因果归因习惯。为了显示，女学生的自我效能感很广泛，涵盖所有课程；相比之下，对于男学生来说，更多的是局限于特定的课程。这些认知方面的性别差异，特别是在对不良事件的解释方面，可能有助于教职员工和顾问了解学生如何应对困难和挑战。