The Effectiveness of Type of Scientific Texts In Conceptual Change And Epistemic Emotions In 6th Grade Elementary Students According To The Role of Gender

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Ph.D. in Educational Psychology, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran.

2 Professor of Educational Psychology, Department of Educational Psychology, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran

3 Assistant Professor of Educational Psychology, Department of Educational Psychology, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran

10.22034/trj.2023.62708

Abstract

The main purpose of the study was to investigate the long- term effectiveness of expository text, refutational text and augmented text on conceptual change changes in elementary students (a combination of male and female students). Besides, the subordinate purpose of the study was to investigate the role of gender differences between male students and female students in the effectiveness of expository text, refutational text and augmented text on conceptual change and epistemic emotions on elementary students. Refutation text has been described by Guzzetti (2000) as one of the most effective means of producing cognitive conflict that can result in a change in readers' misconceptions, which means conceptual change. These texts traditionally contain three core features: (1) a common misconception is stated (e.g., Many people believe that if you drop a coin while walking in a forward direction along a straight path, the coin will land on the ground directly beneath the point from which it was released); (2) the misconception is refuted (However, the coin will actually move forward as it falls, landing some distance ahead of its point of release), and (3) evidence is described that supports the currently-accepted scientific explanation (Newtonian mechanics explain that when the coin is dropped, it continues to move forward at the same speed as the walking person because no force is acting to change its horizontal velocity). From an educational perspective, the effectiveness of refutation text has been attributed to increasing students’ awareness of their own conceptions in relation to scientific ones. This awareness, which involves the recognition of their own conceptions as limited and scientific ones as correct, is an essential condition for conceptual change. From a cognitive perspective, the co-activation principle, posited by van den Broek and Kendeou (2008), offers the ground for understanding how a refutation text supports conflict detection between prior knowledge and new scientific information. It postulates that by explicitly presenting misconceptions and scientific conceptions in close proximity to each other, a refutation text induces their co- activation in readers’ working memory, which in turn, facilitates the detection of conflicts and efforts to resolve them.
By using the cognitive theory of multimedia learning (CTML), which posits learning from text and graphic is potentially superior to learning from text alone, an augmented text was produced. This augmented text consists of a refutation text added to an appropriate graphic. Like refutation text material, a refutation graphic should be designed to activate a misconception, refute it, and then present the correct conception. The combination of a refutation text and a refutation graphic may represent an optimal tool for knowledge revision. For multimedia learning to occur, information provided by texts should be integrated with information provided by graphics. Some crucial processes should be activated for effective multimedia learning. Specifically, selection and organization processes in the verbal and pictorial subsystems lead to the generation of a text-based model and a picture-based model. These models must then be integrated into a one-to-one mapping process, which also involves prior knowledge.
The research method was experimental. The statistical population consisted of all 6th grade elementary students in region 17 in Tehran during the 1399-1400 school year. A sample of 155 students (77 female students and 78 male students) was selected from the statistical population. The sampling method was at-hand sampling. Their average age was 11.9 years. From a socio-economical point of view, most of them were middle class or indigent. According to three types of texts, students were accidentally divided into three groups: expository text group, refutational text group, and augmented text group. In the expository text group, there were 52 students (27 female students and 25 male students); in the refutational text group, there were 50 students (24 female students and 26 male students); and in the expository text group, there were 53 students (26 female students and 27 male students). In the first phase, in order to investigate the role of gender differences between male and female students, pretest- immediate posttest method was used. In the second phase, a delayed post- test was used in order to investigate the long- term effectiveness of texts on conceptual change.  Research instruments were Epistemic Emotions Scale (pekrun et al., 2016), researcher made texts (expository text, refutational text, and augmented text) and researcher made knowledge questionnaire (these texts and questionnaire were made under supervision of supervisors and expert teachers and passed a pilot study by researcher). Differences in knowledge questionnaire grade between pretest and posttest were used to examine the conceptual change. The data were analyzed using one- way analysis of variance (to study the effectiveness of three types of texts on epistemic emotions) and one- way analysis of covariance (to study the effectiveness of three types of texts on conceptual change) in the first phase and dependant T-test in the second phase. The first phase generally showed refutational text, and augmented text have significant effects on both conceptual change and epistemic emotions in both male and female groups, but expository text has not. Secernment results showed significant differences in epistemic emotions between refutation group and expository group and also between augmented group and expository group in both male and female groups. Therefore, there are no gender differences in this part. Moreover, regarding the effectiveness of texts on conceptual change, in the male group, differences in conceptual change between both refutation group and augmented group, as well as between expository group and augmented group, were significant. In the female group, differences in conceptual change between the refutation group and both the augmented group and the expository group were significant; besides, differences between the augmented group and the expository group were significant too. The delayed posttest results in the second phase showed that differences in conceptual change between immediate posttest and delayed posttest are not significant. Thus, texts have long- term effects on conceptual change. These results are very important and applicable to writers, especially who write academic books and suggest them use more refutational and augmented texts; the results might be useful for filmmakers and suggest them use refutational methods in producing scientific movies and cartoons. 

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

Alexander, P.A., Pekrun, R., & Linnenbrink-Garcia, L. (2014). “International handbook of emotions in education”. (New York, NY: Routledge).
Ariasi, N., & Mason, L. (2014). From covert processes to overt outcomes of refutation text reading: the interplay of science text structure and working memory capacity through eye fixation. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 12, 493–523.
Carney, R. N., & Levin, J. R. (2002). Pictorial illustrations still improve students’ learning from text. Educational Psychology Review, 14, 5–26.
Cheraghikhah, Z., Kadivar, P., Hassanabadi, H., & Arabzadeh, M. (2021). "Effectiveness of expository, refutational and augmented texts in elementary students’ conceptual change and epistemic emotions". A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment for the Degree of Doctor of Educational Psychology (PhD). Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran. [in Persian]
Cordova, J.R., Sinatra, G.M., Jones, S.H., Taasoobshirazi, G., & Lombardi, D. (2014). "Confidence in prior knowledge, self-efficacy, interest and prior knowledge: Influences on conceptual change". Contemporary Educational Psychology, 39, 164–174.
Danielson, R.W., Sinatra, G.M., & Kendeou, P. (2016). "Augmenting the Refutation Text Effect with Analogies and Graphics". Discourse Processes, 53:5-6, 392-414.
Danielson, R.W., & Sinatra, G.M. (2016). "A Relational Reasoning Approach to Text-Graphic Processing". Educational Psychology Review, 29, 55–72.
Diakidoy, I.-A.N., Mouskounti, Th., Fella, A., & Ioannides, Ch. (2016). "Comprehension processes and outcomes with refutation and expository texts and their contribution to learning". Learning and Instruction, 41, 60-69.
Dole, J.A., & Sinatra, G.A. (1998). "Reconceptualizing change in the cognitive construction of knowledge". Educational Psychologist, 33:2-3, 109-128.
Frède, V. (2008). "Teaching astronomy for pre-service elementary teachers: A comparison of methods". Advances in Space Research, 42, 1819–1830.
Guzzetti, B. J., Snyder, T. E., Glass, G. V., & Gamas, W. S. (1993). "Promoting conceptual change in science: A comparative meta-analysis of instructional interventions from reading education and science education". Reading Research Quarterly, 28, 117–159.
Heddy, B.C., Danielson, R.W., Sinatra, G.M., & Graham, J. (2016). Modifying Knowledge, Emotions, and Attitudes Regarding Genetically Modified Foods. The Journal of Experimental Education, 85, 3, 513-533.
Heddy, B.C., Taasoobshirazi, G., Chancey, J.B., & Danielson, R.W. (2018). "Developing and validating a conceptual change cognitive engagement instrument". Frontiers in education, 3, 43, 1-9.
Hegarty, M. (2011). "The cognitive science of visual-spatial displays: implications for design". Topics in cognitive science, 3(3), 446-474.
Hynd, C., McWhorter, J., Phares, V., & Suttles, C. (1994). The role of instructional variables in conceptual change in high school physics topics. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 31, 933–946.
Hynd, C., Alvermann, D., & Qian, G. (1997). "Preservice elementary school teachers' conceptual change about projectile motion". Science Education, 81, 1–27.
Kendeou, P., & van den Broek, P. (2007). The effects of prior knowledge and text structure on comprehension processes during reading of scientific texts. Memory & Cognition, 35, 1567-1577.
Kendeou, P., Walsh, E. K., Smith, E. R., & O’Brien, E. J. (2014). "Knowledge revision processes in refutation texts". Discourse Processes, 51, 374-397.
Kendeou, P., Braasch, J.L.G., & Bråten, I. (2016). Optimizing Conditions for Learning: Situating Refutations in Epistemic Cognition. The Journal of Experimental Education, 84:2, 245-263.
Kowalski, P., and Taylor, A.K. (2017). "Reducing students’ misconceptions with refutational teaching: for long-term retention, comprehension matters". Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, 3, 2, 90-100.
Linnenbrink-Garcia, L., Pugh, K. J., Koskey, K. L., & Stewart, V. C. (2012). Developing conceptual understanding of natural selection: The role of interest, efficacy, and basic prior knowledge. The Journal of Experimental Education, 80(1), 45–68.
Mason, L., & Gava, M. (2007). "Effects of epistemological beliefs and learning text structure on conceptual change". In S. Vosniadou, A. Baltas, & X. Vamvakoussi (Eds.), Reframing the conceptual change approach in learning and instruction (pp. 165–197). Oxford, UK: Elsevier.
Mason, L., Tornatora, M. C., & Pluchino, P. (2013). "Do fourth graders integrate text and picture in processing and learning from an illustrated science text? Evidence from eye-movement patterns". Computers & Education, 60, 95–109.
Mason, L., Zaccoletti, S., Carretti, B., Scrimin, S., & Diakidoy, I.N. (2017a). The Role of Inhibition in Conceptual Learning from Refutation and Standard Expository Texts. Int J of Sci and Math Edu. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 17, 3, 483-501.
Mason, L., Baldi, R., Di Ronco, S., Scrimin, S., Danielson, R.W., & Sinatra, G.M.  (2017b). “Textual and graphical refutations: Effects on conceptual change learning”. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 49, 275–288.
Mayer, R. E., & Moreno, R. (2002). "Aids to computer-based multimedia learning. Learning and Instruction", 12, 107–119.
Mayer, R. E. (2009). "Multimedia learning (2nd ed.)". New York: Cambridge University Press.
Muis, K.R., Pekrun, R., Sinatra, G.M., Azevedo, R., Trevors, G., Meier, E., & Heddy, B.C. (2015). "The curious case of climate change: Testing a theoretical model of epistemic beliefs, epistemic emotions, and complex learning". Learning and Instruction, 39, 168-183.
Muis, K.R., Sinatra, G.M., Pekrun, R., Winne, P.H., Trevors, G., Losenno, K.M., & Munzar, B. (2018). “Main and moderator effects of refutation on task value, epistemic emotions, and learning strategies during conceptual change”. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 55, 155-165.
Pekrun, R., Vogl, E., Muis, K. R., & Sinatra G.M. (2016). Measuring emotions during epistemic activities: The Epistemically-Related Emotion Scales. Journal of cognition and emotion, 30, 1-9.
Pourrazagh, A., Hassanabadi, H., & Arabzadeh, M. (2017). "Epistemic emotions during math problem solving among children with specific learning disorder in mathematic". A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment for the Degree of M.Sc. Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran. [in Persian]
Sinatra, G. M., Broughton, S. H. & Lombardi, D. (2014). “Emotions in science education,” In: International Handbook of Emotions in Education. eds Alexander, P.A, Pekrun, R., & Linnenbrink-Garcia. L., (New York, NY: Routledge), 415-436.
Tippett, C.D. (2004). "Conceptual change: The power of refutation text. Unpublished master’s thesis". University of Victoria, Victoria, Canada.
Tippet, Ch.D. (2010). Refutation text in science education: a review of two decades of research. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 8, 6, 951-970.
Trevors, G.J., Muis, K.R., Sinatra, G.M., Pekrun, R., & Winne, P.H. (2016) "Identity and Epistemic Emotions during Knowledge Revision: A Potential Account for the Backfire Effect". Discourse Processes, 53, 5-6, 339-370.
Weingartner, K.M., & Masnick, A.M. (2019). “Refutation texts: Implying the refutation of a scientific misconception can facilitate knowledge revision”. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 58, 138–148.

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics