Trautwein Ulrich, Lüdtke Oliver
Center for Educational Research, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany.
Br J Educ Psychol. 2007 Dec;77(Pt 4):907-34. doi: 10.1348/000709906X169012.
Epistemological beliefs are subjective theories of the structure and acquisition of knowledge. The instruments used to measure epistemological beliefs in educational psychology (see Duell & Schommer-Aikins, 2001) typically consist of questionnaires tapping general, decontextualized beliefs about knowledge or knowledge acquisition in a specific field or in general.
Using specific theories as stimuli, we determine the degree of topic-specificity of certainty beliefs as well as the association between certainty beliefs and the learning environment.
Participants were 662 upper secondary school students (Study 1) and 211 college students (Study 2).
A global instrument and a topic-specific instrument were used to collect responses to up to 10 stimulus theories. Factor analysis, multiple regression analysis and multi-level modelling were carried out.
Students' topic-specific certainty beliefs varied markedly across the stimulus theories. Furthermore, students in different academic environments differed more strongly on global certainty beliefs than on topic-specific certainty beliefs, and global certainty beliefs were only loosely connected to topic-specific certainty beliefs.
Researchers should critically assess the validity of decontextualized global questionnaires for assessing certainty beliefs. If possible, global measures should be complemented by topic-specific measures.
认知信念是关于知识结构和获取的主观理论。教育心理学中用于测量认知信念的工具（见杜埃尔和肖默 - 艾金斯，2001）通常由问卷组成，这些问卷挖掘的是关于特定领域或一般知识或知识获取的普遍的、脱离情境的信念。
以特定理论作为刺激因素，我们确定确定性信念的主题特异性程度以及确定性信念与学习环境之间的关联。
参与者为662名高中生（研究1）和211名大学生（研究2）。
使用一份通用工具和一份主题特定工具来收集对多达10种刺激理论的反应。进行了因子分析、多元回归分析和多层次建模。
学生的主题特定确定性信念在不同刺激理论之间差异显著。此外，不同学术环境中的学生在通用确定性信念上的差异比在主题特定确定性信念上的差异更大，并且通用确定性信念与主题特定确定性信念的联系较为松散。
研究人员应批判性地评估用于评估确定性信念的脱离情境的通用问卷的有效性。如果可能的话，通用测量应辅以主题特定测量。
