Perception of educational environment as a predictor of academic performance in physiotherapy students

BACKGROUND: Students' perception of their academic environment has a substantial influence on their actions, academic accomplishments, satisfaction, goal attainment, and behavior. The study was carried out to evaluate the perception of academic environment in physiotherapy students, and to identify the specific domains which could act as predictors of academic performance. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This descriptive, cross-sectional research was conducted over 12 months using total population sampling. Three hundred and forty-three (139 postgraduate and 204 final year) final year and postgraduate physiotherapy students from five colleges of Mumbai and Navi Mumbai, who conformed to the inclusion benchmarks, participated in the study. Perception of educational environment was evaluated using Dundee Ready Education Environment Measure (DREEM). Academic performance was evaluated using the percentage obtained in the last university examination. Data were entered in MS Excel (©Microsoft, USA) and converted to Stata Version 15.1© StataCorp, College Station, for further analysis. The mean values and standard deviations for perception of educational environment were calculated and linear regression models were used to conduct multivariate analysis for each item in the questionnaire. RESULTS: The mean total DREEM score of physiotherapy students was 129.97 ± 22.72. Students whose Students' Academic Self-perception scores were in the “Feeling more on the positive side” category showed a 4.17 point increase in percentage scores as compared with those who reported feeling like a total failure/had many negative aspects to their academic self-perception (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.46, 5.89; P < 0.001). Students whose Students' Perception of Learning (SPoL) scores were in the “Teaching highly thought of” category showed a 2.75 point increase in percentage scores as compared with those who viewed teaching poorly/negatively (95% CI: 0.44, 5.06; P = 0.02). CONCLUSION: Physiotherapy students had a “more positive than negative” view of the academic environment; however, a few “problematic areas” need to be remediated. Efforts to improve students' academic self-perception may improve their academic performance since this was the strongest predictor of their academic performance, followed by total DREEM scores and SPoL.