THE EFFECT OF THE USE OF COMPUTER SIMULATIONS AND VIRTUAL PHYSICS LABORATORY IN GENDER PERFORMANCE OF PHYSICS LEARNING

Physics course and lab activities role are that the students acquire Physics easily by using computer simulations and Virtual Physics Laboratory (VPL). To investigate this claim, we have conducted a statistical study for the academic years 2013-2014 until 2017-2018 which involved 798 1st year students of the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Building Services of “Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University, Iasi (Romania). Among the students that were the subject of the statistical survey 155 (19.42 %) were female and 643 (80.58 %) male. We have collected descriptive statistical data from students studying both in Romanian (RO) and in English (EN). Our investigation probed for gender differences in the students’ results at the physics laboratory tests and in final exams. Our statistical analysis showed that, usually, the female students (RO + EN) have got average marks higher than the male students (RO + EN). Moreover, the difference between female students (RO + EN) and male students (RO + EN) averages of scores in final exams is from -0.632 to 0.749. Also, technical applications of physics phenomena in Civil Engineering appeared to interest more male students, while female students were attracted to Physics more as a life science. Further, we discuss the efficiency of computer simulations and Virtual Physics Laboratory (VPL) in fostering the success of our engineering students in the introductory Physics course.