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When Memorization Fails: Insights into Students’ Attitudes toward Statistics

  • Feb 14, 2026
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Abstract Book of the 10th International Conference on New Trends in Teaching and Education

Year: 2026

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When Memorization Fails: Insights into Students’ Attitudes toward Statistics

Michalis Linardakis

ABSTRACT:

This study examined the psychometric properties of the SATS-36 (Scale of Attitudes Toward Statistics) in a Greek pedagogical department context characterized by a strong tradition of rote learning. Data were collected at the end of an introductory statistics course (N = 193). The original six-factor structure failed to achieve acceptable fit in confirmatory factor analysis, leading to an exploratory factor analysis. Bartlett’s test and KMO indicated excellent factorability (KMO = .882). Parallel analysis supported a four-factor model reflecting Value/Interest, Perceived Difficulty/Low Cognitive Competence, Effort, and Negative Value/Avoidance. An additional item assessing reliance on rote learning (“ability to memorize text verbatim without understanding”) was positively associated with Perceived Difficulty/Low Cognitive Competence (r = .304, p < .001) and Negative Value/Avoidance (r = .142, p = .048). Beyond attitudes, rote learning correlated strongly with various forms of evaluation anxiety—including written (r = .125) and computer-based assessment (r = .191)—and with technological anxiety more broadly (r = .526, p < .001). Students who relied on memorization also exhibited signs of an illusion of understanding, reporting stronger agreement that theory helps them understand practice (r = .410, p < .001) despite experiencing significant conceptual difficulties. These findings suggest that memorization-based learning cultures hinder conceptual engagement with statistics and may explain the collapse of the original six-factor model. Implications for teaching statistics in contexts dominated by rote learning are discussed.

Keywords: Evaluation Anxiety; Exploratory Factor Analysis; Rote learning; SATS-36; Statistics Education