Development and Psychometric Validation of Geography Interest Inventory for Secondary School Students

Erutujiro Goodluck
Federal Government Girls College Onitsha, Nigeria
DOI – http://doi.org/10.37502/IJSMR.2021.4603

Abstract 

In recent times, the number of students’ academic performance in geography in secondary schools in Delta State, Nigeria has been on the declined. Therefore, it becomes imperative to know the student’s interest level in the subject. The study is on development and psychometrics validation of geography interest inventory. The instrument has 27 items.  The instrument was administered to a sample of 494 secondary students in Delta State, Nigeria. The sample was randomly split in two halves. The first sample 247 was used for Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA). The results of the Exploratory Factor Analysis resulted in Four Factor Solution that is emotion, value, Knowledge, and engagement. To validate the structure of factors obtained from the EFA, confirmatory factor analysis was conducted using a second sample of 247. The result of model fit in terms of TLI (0.904), CFI (0.917), RMSEA (0.066) and SRMR (0.63) were above the recommended cut of o.90 for CFI, TLI, and less than 0.08 for RMSEA and SRMR respectively.  Furthermore, the study also indicates that items loading in the respective dimension were significant. Therefore, the geography interest inventory is valid and reliable.

Keywords: Geography, psychometrics, validation, inventory, and interest.

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