Author Identifier (ORCID)
Abstract
Secondary school students, and particularly girls, may avoid enrolling in higher-level mathematics courses despite having the competence to succeed in these courses. Understanding the reasons behind these choices is essential to addressing this concern. In this study, the teachers of Western Australian Year 10 students (n=886) nominated the mathematics course in which they believed each participating student could succeed in Year 11 with participants grouped into four achievement cohorts on this basis. Then each teacher course nomination was compared to participants’ own course selection with participants classified as either aspiring below or at/above their judged potential achievement level. We then examined whether motivation factors based on Situated Expectancy-value Theory, sense of belonging, mindset, and a context-specific utility value factor (named strategic utility value) differed across gender and aspiration groups. Participants who under-aspired demonstrated lower intrinsic, general utility, and strategic utility value than those who did not. Competency beliefs and sense of belonging also differentiated under-aspirers and other students in the two highest achievement cohorts. Girls reported lower competency beliefs than boys irrespective of achievement cohort, with those in the two highest achievement cohorts also reporting a lower sense of belonging, and those in the highest cohort reporting lower levels of intrinsic value, than boys within the same cohort/s. In the second highest cohort, girls placed more value than boys on the strategic utility value of different mathematics courses. These results may assist educators to understand the constellation of factors that encourage and deter mathematics courses choices in the secondary years.
Keywords
aspiration, higher-level mathematics courses, mathematics course choice, school students, situated expectancy-value theory
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of Publication
7-1-2026
Article Number
21582440261474713
E-ISSN
21582440
Volume
16
Issue
3
Publication Title
Sage Open
Publisher
Sage
School
School of Education
RAS ID
100638
Funding Information
This research is supported by an Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Kirkham, J., & Chapman, E. (2026). Why are Western Australian girls less motivated than boys to study senior secondary higher-level mathematics courses? Relationships between gender, prior achievement, and mathematics course aspirations. Sage Open, 16(3). https://doi.org/10.1177/21582440261474713