Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 17, Issue 1, Article 4 (Jun., 2016) Ángel VÁZQUEZ-ALONSO, María-Antonia MANASSERO-MAS, Antonio GARCÍA-CARMONA and Marisa MONTESANO DE TALAVERA Diagnosing conceptions about the epistemology of science: Contributions of a quantitative assessment methodology Contents Next

Diagnosing conceptions about the epistemology of science: Contributions of a quantitative assessment methodology

 

Ángel VÁZQUEZ-ALONSO
University of the Balearic Islands, SPAIN

María-Antonia MANASSERO-MAS
University of the Balearic Islands, SPAIN

Antonio GARCÍA-CARMONA
Department of Science and Social Science Education, University of Seville, SPAIN
E-mail: garcia-carmona@us.es

Marisa MONTESANO DE TALAVERA
National Secretary of Science, Technology and Innovation, PANAMA

Received 19 Aug., 2015
Revised 3 Jun., 2016

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Contents

• Abstract
• Introduction
• The Nature of Science as the global framework for epistemology in Science Education
• Evaluation of epistemology conceptions within the Nature of Science framework
• Recent evaluation instruments
• Method
  • Participants and context
  • Research instrument
  • Procedures
  • Response and metric
  • Statistical analysis
• Results
• Validity issues
• Correlation analyses
• Discussion and Conclusions
  • Acknowledgments
• References
• Appendices

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Abstract

This study applies a new quantitative methodological approach to diagnose epistemology conceptions in a large sample. The analyses use seven multiple-rating items on the epistemology of science drawn from the item pool Views on Science-Technology-Society (VOSTS). The bases of the new methodological diagnostic approach are the empirical psychometric scaling of the item sentences in accordance with experts’ criteria, the implementation of a multiple-rating model of answering (the respondent appraises each item sentence), and a scoring procedure that computes standardized indices from the multiple-rating responses and the sentence’s scaling. These standardized indices represent the extent to which the respondent's conceptions about the epistemology of science are informed (the higher the index, the more informed the conception). The approach is applied to evaluate the conceptions of a large and diverse national sample through its standardized indices, which provide statistical hypothesis-testing across individual sentences, items, groups, or studies, computation of reliability indices, the correlations between items, and an exploratory factor analysis that may complement qualitative analysis. Finally, the most relevant features of the new approach, its potential for applications to teacher training and curricular development in the science classroom and the method's power to make easy, quick, and economic evaluations of conceptions about the nature of science, are discussed.

Keywords: epistemology of science; evaluation methodology; hypothesis testing; instrument reliability; nature of science (NOS)