Assessing Engineering Students’ Ethics Learning: Model of Domain Learning Framework

Abstract

The aim of this work was to examine the use of the Model of Domain Learning (MDL) framework to determine the level of students’ ethics learning during their progress in the engineering curriculum, considering three constructs through which learning is gained: knowledge, strategic processing, and interest. The MDL has been validated and used in different fields to predict the stages of student development and its relation to important constructs contributing to learning. This study was conducted to demonstrate that the MDL framework is effective in assessing ethics learning in engineering education. For this purpose, a questionnaire was developed based on the MDL framework and administered to 940 students from freshmen to seniors. The questionnaire consisted of 31 items divided into three sets of questions: (1) demographics, (2) multiple choices to measure knowledge and strategic processing, and (3) Likert scale to measure students’ interest level in ethics. The results revealed that there is a progressive increment in knowledge and strategic processing as students advance in their studies, while the level of interest remains statistically the same, and a significant correlation between knowledge and strategic processing in the development of ethical awareness and reasoning in engineering students. Consequently, the assessment instrument based on the MDL framework can be used to effectively measure the ethics learning in engineering education in a progressive form, taking into consideration the components and stages of learning.