Nielson Catie, Pitt Emma, Fux Michal, Nesnera Kristin de, Betz Nicole, S Leffers Jessica, Tanner Kimberly D, Coley John D
Department of Psychology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, 02115.
Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, 02139.
CBE Life Sci Educ. 2025 Mar 1;24(1):ar11. doi: 10.1187/cbe.24-07-0198.
Previous research has shown that students employ intuitive thinking when understanding scientific concepts. Three types of intuitive thinking-essentialist, teleological, and anthropic thinking-are used in biology learning and can lead to misconceptions. However, it is unknown how commonly these types of intuitive thinking, or cognitive construals, are used spontaneously in students' explanations across biological concepts and whether this usage is related to endorsement of construal-consistent misconceptions. In this study, we examined how frequently undergraduate students across two U.S. universities ( = 807) used construal-consistent language (CCL) to explain in response to open-ended questions related to five core biology concepts (e.g., evolution), how CCL use differed by concept, and how this usage was related to misconceptions agreement. We found that the majority of students used some kind of CCL in the responses to these open-ended questions and that CCL use varied by target concept. We also found that students who used CCL in their response agreed more strongly with misconception statements, a relationship driven by anthropocentric language use, or language that focused on humans. These findings suggest that American university students use intuitive thinking when reasoning about biological concepts with implications for their understanding.
先前的研究表明，学生在理解科学概念时会运用直觉思维。生物学学习中会使用三种类型的直觉思维——本质主义思维、目的论思维和拟人化思维——并且可能导致误解。然而，尚不清楚这些类型的直觉思维或认知建构在学生对各种生物学概念的解释中自发使用的普遍程度，以及这种使用是否与对建构一致的误解的认同有关。在本研究中，我们调查了美国两所大学的807名本科生在回答与五个核心生物学概念（如进化）相关的开放式问题时，使用建构一致语言（CCL）进行解释的频率、CCL的使用如何因概念而异，以及这种使用与误解认同之间的关系。我们发现，大多数学生在回答这些开放式问题时使用了某种CCL，并且CCL的使用因目标概念而异。我们还发现，在回答中使用CCL的学生对误解陈述的认同度更高，这种关系是由以人类为中心的语言使用，即关注人类的语言所驱动的。这些发现表明，美国大学生在对生物学概念进行推理时会使用直觉思维，这对他们的理解有影响。
