Physics Education Research Conference
Cognitive Science and Physics Education Research

Targeted Poster Session: TP-A

Experimental Paradigms from Cognitive Science to Learn About Learning

Organizer:

Jose Mestre: University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign

When/Where: 

Thursday, August 2 from 8:15 - 9:45 a.m. in Sheraton Hotel, Augusta B

Thursday, August 2 from 1:45 - 3:15 p.m. in Sheraton Hotel, Augusta B

Theme:  This session features 4 presentations tied by the underlying theme, 'experimental paradigms to learn about learning.' The studies use experimental methods that are common in cognitive science but which have not become mainstream in physics education research (PER), largely because PER is a relatively young field of research. Presenters (and co-authors) will include physics education researchers, educational psychologists, and cognitive scientists. Brookes (collaborating with Mestre and Stine-Morrow) will present a reading study of physics text in which target sentences are timed, and reading times are interpreted in view of a mental model of text comprehension. This paradigm is ideal for studying both text processing and learning in circumstances when the text presented conflicts (or not) with students' concepts (e.g., Newton's Third Law). Heckler explores how learning and transfer depend on context. By cleverly manipulating the context of the learning task from a within-subjects design he is able to draw conclusions about how learning varies when viewed along a concrete/abstract dimension. Schwartz (collaborating with Sears) will describe how a 'preparation for future learning' approach to measuring learning and transfer reveals learning that would otherwise be missed in a traditional treatment-followed-by-assessment design. What is perhaps most interesting about this paradigm is that floundering at a complex task (and thus displaying little learning following it by traditional measures) prepares students to learn from a lecture much more than simply presenting the lecture without the initial task. Sherin will shed new light on a paradigm that has been used extensively in PER, namely the clinical interview. He will argue that interpreting what students say in an interview is not as clear cut as many believe, but requires a careful analysis not only of what students report about their understanding but also of the dynamics of the interview itself.

Goals:  Attendees will be able to explore in-depth with leading researchers experimental approaches from cognitive science for learning about learning that could be applied in novel ways in physics education research. Although researchers in our PER community commonly read physics education, and science education journals, only a handful keep up with the psychology or cognitive science journals, resulting in little exposure to experimental approaches that could be fruitful for our community to explore. This session will cover ground that will be new to most in our community, and which should be of interest to those planning future studies of physics learning.

Individual Poster Abstracts

TP-A1
Reading Time as Evidence for Mental Models in Understanding Physics

David Brookes, Jose Mestre & Elizabeth Stine-Morrow University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign

Abstract: We will present preliminary results from a reading study that show the usefulness of probing physics students¿ cognitive processing by measuring reading time. According to contemporary discourse theory, when people read a text, a network of associated inferences is activated to create a mental model. If the reader encounters an idea in the text that conflicts with existing knowledge, the construction of a coherent mental model is disrupted and reading times are prolonged, as measured using a simple self-paced reading paradigm. We used this inconsistency effect to study how 'physics-naïve' and 'physics-fluent' students create mental models of conceptual systems in physics as they read texts related to the ideas of Newton's third law, energy, and momentum. We found significant differential effects of students' prior knowledge state on patterns of reading time, suggesting that students attempt to actively integrate physics texts with their existing knowledge.

Back to Top

TP-A2
Using Context as a Tool to Investigate Student Learning, Transfer and Understanding
Andrew Heckler, The Ohio State University (heckler@mps.ohio-state.edu)

Abstract: A variety of studies have demonstrated that student performance depends on the specific context of the questions posed. Consequently, the variation of context may be used as a tool for gaining insight into the processes of student learning and transfer and the nature of student understanding. Furthermore, by applying within-student designs, one can also gain insight into the hierarchical nature of contextual dependence. An example is provided, varying the contextual dimension of abstract vs. concrete in both the learning domain and the assessment.

Back to Top

TP-A3
Instrumentation in Learning Research
Daniel Schwartz & David Sears, Stanford University  (danls@stanford.edu)
 

Abstract: In empirical physics research, a great deal of effort is spent calibrating instruments. These include instruments that precipitate some event, and instruments that measure the effects of those events. Design research in the learning sciences often focuses on precipitating learning events, but it does not pay equal attention to designing effective measures. We present the results of study that compared two types of instruction on students working alone or in pairs. We show how one measure, common to most studies of learning, failed to detect any effects. Then we show how a second measure, called a Preparation for Future Learning measure, detected important differences. Specifically, pairs working to invent solutions to problems in statistics were more prepared to learn about new, related types of statistics than pairs who were shown how to solve the original problems, as well as individuals who invented or were shown how to solve the original problems.

Back to Top

TP-A4
The Dynamics of Interviews
Bruce Sherin, Northwestern University (bsherin@northwestern.edu

Abstract: One of the main tools that we have for studying students' physics conceptions is the one-on-one interview. In these interviews, the experimenter asks questions, the student responds, and then the experimenter asks follow-up questions. Clearly, we cannot think of these interviews as tools that illuminate student knowledge in a straightforward way. Instead, the interviews are themselves dynamic interactions. In this work we argue that these dynamic interactions must be understood if we want to use the cognitive interview as an experimental apparatus for the study of student conceptions.

Back to Top