Pre-Academic Learning Self-Efficacy Revisited: Validation in the Danish Academy Profession Degree Context and Differences Across Degree Programs

The relevance of academic self-efficacy for educational outcomes is well documented. Pre-academic self-efficacy has hardly been studied, and only one study was found to include an assessment of the measurement invariance of the scale used. The aims were to validate the Pre-Academic Learning Self-Efficacy (PAL-SE) scale in a non-university higher education context, and assess the psychometric properties of the scale using Rasch measurement models, and to determine whether PAL-SE differs across groups of students admitted to multiple degree programs. Data consisted of 3757 students admitted to 22 different Academy Profession Degree programs in the Danish higher education context. The PAL-SE scale was found to have locally dependent items and to be affected by differential item functioning relative to age groups and degree programs. Reliability and targeting varied across degree programs. PAL-SE scores adjusted for differential item functioning differed across degree programs.