These investigators will conduct a cross-sectional study of mathematics achievement of fifth-and eleventh-graders in Hungary. The performance of these students will be compared to that of American, Chinese and Japanese students who are part of a longitudinal study. A total of 240 11th-graders and 240 fifth-graders would be chosen at random from representative schools. In addition, the students, their mothers, and teachers will be interviewed about their beliefs, expectations, and attitudes about the children's achievement in mathematics. An additional sample of 300 eleventh-graders will be given the test of mathematics achievement and a questionnaire containing selected questions from the student interview. In other cross-national comparisons, Hungarian students have been among the top performers, and enrollment in advanced mathematics courses by Hungarian girls differs little from that of boys. Thus, inclusion of Hungarian students in a comparative study would add important information about the correlates of high achievement in mathematics and would offer additional insight into our understanding of gender differences in enrollment in mathematics courses. These data will also allow a comparison with similar data being collected on 5th and 11th graders in Japanese, Chinese and the United States.
