The relationship between students' perception towards their own character strengths and their academic achievement at science-based technology Vocational College-Chonburi, Thailand

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between students' perception towards their own character strengths and their academic achievement at Science-Based Technology Vocational College – Chonburi. The study was based on the PERMA Theory (positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning and achievement) and the 21st century skills, and instrument is in line with the survey of character strengths as that used by VIA Survey of Character Strengths which is psychometrically validated personality test that measures an individual’s character strengths. Descriptive statistics and Pearson’s product-moment correlation coefficient test were used to examine the objectives of the study. It was found that students have unequal amounts of moderate and high perceptions of their strengths. The strength of teamwork scored the highest while leadership had the lowest. Out of the ten character strengths surveyed, two character strengths scored moderate (1) perseverance and (2) leadership while eight strengths were interpreted as high namely zest, self-regulation, social-intelligence, teamwork, gratitude, creativity, curiosity, and open-mindedness. Students’ academic achievement in terms of their GPA was found very high. As to the correlation between students' perception towards character strengths and their academic achievement, it was found that there was no significant relationship. Based on the findings, future research should include more questions which surveyed the strengths to reveal additional data and more comparisons.