Keywords
academic skills
students
atypical profile
master's cycle
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Abstract
Many students apply for admission to a Master's program in a different field at the end of their Bachelor's degree. Since the Bachelor's degree is where the fundamentals of a discipline are taught, it might seem easy for a student who hasn't completed this cycle to experience difficulties adapting to the Master's level. However, we have observed that students who entered new programs after obtaining a Bachelor's degree in another field perform better in the Master's program than some students who remained in the same program. The objective of this study is to determine whether self-efficacy influences the development of academic skills in students with atypical profiles. The theory of self-efficacy developed by Bandura (2003) forms the theoretical basis of this research. The study adopts a quantitative design; data were collected through a questionnaire administered to 100 students with atypical profiles at the University of Douala. Analysis of the data using Pearson's correlation yielded the following results: HR1: rxycal = 0.378 with a probability of P = 0.000. HR2: rxycal = -0.102 with a probability of P = 0.004. HR3: rxycal = 0.638 with a probability of P = 0.000. HR4: rxycal = -0.238 with a probability of P = 0.001. These results lead us to conclude that persuasive communication is the source of personal effectiveness that most influences the development of academic skills in atypical Master's students.
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