UNDERSTANDING THEORIES: EXPLICITLY TEACHING THE PROCESS OF SCIENCE TO ADDRESS COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS

Public mistrust of scientific findings often stem from two things: (1) misunderstanding of the process of science itself, and (2) conflation of scientific and colloquial meanings of words. A prime example is the word “theory”. The rigorous process involved in developing a scientific theory, which is supported by multiple lines of evidence and has predictive power, does not match the colloquial definition of “an idea”. As a result, major foundational concepts like evolution are dismissed by non-scientists as “just” a theory and ideas with little supporting evidence may be seen as equivalent to well-tested scientific theories. In addition, there is widespread misunderstanding of the reliability and use of non-experimental methods, such as modeling in climate science, leading to distrust and dismissal of findings.

These misconceptions about the process and nature of science must be addressed explicitly in order for learners to develop new conceptions. Most often, however, instruction focuses on the content of scientific findings without going into explicit detail about the process that produces those findings.

In order to address this deficiency, we have developed a series of free, web-based readings and associated resources that explicitly describe the process of science, available at http://www.visionlearning.com. These materials emphasize the history and development of science and use in-depth examples to illustrate how science really works. The modular format allows the readings on different concepts to stand alone or be integrated into topical science courses.

We have assessed the impact of these materials in a variety of courses. In an introductory geology course, students were assigned readings on research methods other than experimentation (such as modeling) and self-reported that the readings were concise, helpful, and informative. In introductory biology and chemistry courses, a treatment group received readings and explicit instruction in the nature of scientific theories in addition to content (DNA structure/function and atomic theory, respectively) while a control group received standard textbook content. In both cases, the treatment groups showed greater learning gains than the control groups in the nature of scientific theories without sacrificing content knowledge.