TY - JOUR
T1 - Assessing Students' Misclassifications of Physics Concepts
T2 - An Ontological Basis for Conceptual Change
AU - Slotta, James D.
AU - Chi, Michelene T.H.
AU - Joram, Elana
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by a grant from the Mellon Foundation. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the position of the sponsoring agency, and no official endorsement should be inferred.
PY - 1995/9/1
Y1 - 1995/9/1
N2 - Physics novices and experts solved conceptual physics problems involving light, heat, and electric current and then explained their answers. Novices were ninth- grade students with no background in physics; experts were two postgraduates in physics and two advanced physics graduate students. Problems were multiple choice, with one correct response and three alternative responses representing possible misconceptions. For each conceptual physics problem, an isomorphic material-substance problem was constructed by imagining a materialistic conception of the physics topic and creating the resulting version of the problem. In each physics problem, one of the incorrect choices corresponded to the correct choice in the isomorphic material-substance problem. The empirical question was whether novices would reason about the physics problem as if it were conceptually similar to the substance isomorph. This question was addressed by comparing subjects' responses in the problem pairs, as well as by examining their explanations concerning all problems. A content analysis of subjects' explanations revealed that physics novices were strongly inclined to conceptualize physics concepts as material substances, whereas expert protocols revealed distinctly nonmaterialistic representations. A theory of conceptual change involving ontologically distinct categories is substantiated by these findings.
AB - Physics novices and experts solved conceptual physics problems involving light, heat, and electric current and then explained their answers. Novices were ninth- grade students with no background in physics; experts were two postgraduates in physics and two advanced physics graduate students. Problems were multiple choice, with one correct response and three alternative responses representing possible misconceptions. For each conceptual physics problem, an isomorphic material-substance problem was constructed by imagining a materialistic conception of the physics topic and creating the resulting version of the problem. In each physics problem, one of the incorrect choices corresponded to the correct choice in the isomorphic material-substance problem. The empirical question was whether novices would reason about the physics problem as if it were conceptually similar to the substance isomorph. This question was addressed by comparing subjects' responses in the problem pairs, as well as by examining their explanations concerning all problems. A content analysis of subjects' explanations revealed that physics novices were strongly inclined to conceptualize physics concepts as material substances, whereas expert protocols revealed distinctly nonmaterialistic representations. A theory of conceptual change involving ontologically distinct categories is substantiated by these findings.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0010161969&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=0010161969&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1207/s1532690xci1303_2
DO - 10.1207/s1532690xci1303_2
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:0010161969
SN - 0737-0008
VL - 13
SP - 373
EP - 400
JO - Cognition and Instruction
JF - Cognition and Instruction
IS - 3
ER -