Those experiences upon which
students build their efficacy must be identified. Once these experiences are
more thoroughly understood, research focus can be turned toward developing
useful intervention strategies that will provide engineering programs with the
means to promote the development of accurate efficacy beliefs among their
students. The introduction of strategies of this nature also offers educators the
opportunity to include the use of innovative teaching and learning in the
classroom – a measure that holds promise for increasing the attractiveness of
engineering. This mixed-methods study therefore employed both a quantitative
efficacy measurement tool and in-depth, open-ended interviews with students to
identify how students’ experiences as first- and second-year engineering
students influenced their confidence in engineering success.