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Measuring Undergraduates’ Innovation Capacities

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Abstract

This study describes the process of developing and validating an instrument that measures students’ innovation capacities as a higher education outcome. We introduce an interdisciplinary theoretical framework used to generate items and cover extant literature drawn primarily from the fields of higher education and entrepreneurship studies. We further discuss our use of latent trait theory and item response models to guide instrument development and measure scoring. We then provide the results of a second-order confirmatory factor modeling procedure, which indicated robust model fit. We close by discussing findings and offering implications for both higher education scholars and institutional researchers.

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Notes

  1. See Mayhew et al. (2012, 2016a, b) for extended literature review and discussion regarding the extent to which innovation can be taught.

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Acknowledgement

The authors gratefully acknowledge the Merrifield Family Foundation for its generous support in funding this research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Strategic Leadership, James Madison University, 298 Port Republic Road MSC 1505, Harrisonburg, VA, 22807, USA

    Benjamin S. Selznick

  2. The William Ray and Marie Adamson Flesher Professor in Educational Administration, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA

    Matthew J. Mayhew

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  1. Benjamin S. Selznick
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Correspondence to Benjamin S. Selznick.

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Selznick, B.S., Mayhew, M.J. Measuring Undergraduates’ Innovation Capacities. Res High Educ 59, 744–764 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-017-9486-7

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