The Effect of Being a Student-Athlete on Academic Performance

The purpose of this experiment was to examine academic performance differences among student-athletes and other students at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). The construct of confidence was examined to provide a mechanism for any academic performance differences that were to occur. The data was obtained by having 92 UIC students, 46 of whom were student-athletes and 46 of who were other students, complete a survey. The survey consisted of questions pertaining to gender, type of student, GPA, and confidence questions scored on a Likert scale. The survey produced significant results, F (3, 92) = 2.887; p =.040, in terms of confidence differences.  There was specifically significant confidence differences between student-athletes and the other students, F (1, 92) = 5.180; p = .025 as well as between male student-athletes (M= 33.69, SD= 4.47) and the other male students (M= 30.13, SD= 4.98); t (30) = -2.13, p =.041. However, there were no significant results regarding differences in academic performance among student-athletes and other students at UIC. Therefore, one could conclude that confidence does not significantly influence academic performance among the UIC students surveyed.