Socioeconomic and gender differences in students' perceptions of physics in Mexican Schools

To understand gender and socioeconomic differences in scientific and technological areas, studies that deepen the understanding of each culture or region are necessary. This paper contributes to the knowledge of high-school students' perceptions about physics by gender and different socioeconomic statuses in Mexico. To do this, the authors present data obtained from the implementation of a 5-point-Likert-scale survey regarding the perception of physics by 9th grade (13 to 15-years old) Mexican students (161 female and 157 male) from two different and demographically contrasting states within the country, Nuevo Leon (220 students) and Chiapas (98 students). We used student t-tests for parametric data to determine the statistical significance of the results among three factors: gender, state, and socioeconomic status of the school (marginalization level). The overall results indicate that the most significant differences occur in the comparison of the states, and the least differences arise in the comparisons of gender. Moreover, the differences in gender are related to the states the students are in, with contrasting results. There is still much to do to achieve equity in academic studies and professional life in STEM areas, so work like this leads to the type of profound understanding that is essential to achieve gender and socioeconomic equity.