Effect of Philosophical Mentality on Solving Math Problems by Male and Female Third-grade Students in Hamedan Junior High Schools

The present paper aims at examining the effect of philosophical mentality on solving math problems in third grade male and female students of Hamedan junior high schools. The research adopts a causal-comparative methodology. 8229 students from junior high schools in Hamedan، in 2011-2012، formed the population of the study. From among these، 367 students were selected through classified sampling with proper allocation. The instruments for data collection included two questionnaires for the evaluation of philosophical mentality and the ability to solve math problems. The Cronbach''s Alpha Reliability scores obtained for the said questionnaires were 0. 864% and 0. 730% respectively. The data were analyzed using SPSS 20، in two sections of descriptive statistics (frequency، percentage، mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (Spearman Correlation Coefficient، two-way ANOVA – between subjects design، Bonferonni Test and Multivariate Regression). The findings of the research confirmed that philosophical mentality does affect students’ ability of solving math problems and showed this effect to be of great magnitude. The results also indicated that greater philosophical mentality leads to greater ability of solving math problems. However، there was no significant relationship between gender and the ability to solve math problems. The contrastive effect of philosophical mentality and gender on the ability to solve math problems did not prove significant either. Moreover، penetration، compared to comprehensiveness and flexibility، had a significantly more impact on the ability to solve math problems.