Abstract:

The aim of this study is to the model the achievements of students in the Turkey sample on the PISA exam with binary logistic regression. Some socio-cultural variables were used as explanatory variables. The dependent variable is dichotomous and indicates whether the student score is above the OECD average. The data were from PISA 2009. The PISA 2009 Turkey sample consists of 4,996 students from 170 schools selected by stratified randomized sampling according to school types. Logistic regression analysis was performed to ascertain the effects of gender, home language, number of books at home, statistical region, parents’ education level, attitude toward computer, attitude toward school, and family wealth index on the likelihood that participants belong to the “success” group. The model was statistically significant. The model explained 23.8% (Nagelkerke R2) of the variance in success and correctly classified 67.9% of cases. According to analysis, girls were 1.71 times more likely to exhibit success than boys. Students whose home language was Turkish were 1.65 times more likely to exhibit success than students with other home languages. Increase in the number of books at home, parents’ educational level, attitude toward computer, and family wealth (WEALTH) index were associated with an increase in the likelihood of belonging to success group. Attitude toward school was not statistically significant.

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