Conceptions and backfire effects related to human biology myths and their relevance for school-based health education

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Finja Grospietsch
• Subject Area: General and Domain-Specific Teaching and Learning
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 554471715

The investigation of subject-specific conceptions among school students, pre-service and in-service teachers is an important strand within teaching and learning research from a pedagogical content knowledge perspective. Conceptual change is defined as a learning process through which learners convert their misconceptions into scientifically appropriate conceptions and can be supported through the conceptual change strategy of direct refutation, for example. The current research discourse primarily focuses on the positive effects of instructional materials (e.g., conceptual change texts) and thus neglects the fact that a conceptual change cannot be initiated among all research subjects and some research subjects revert back to their misconceptions in the long run. Myths related to human biology (MytHs) are a specific kind of misconception that are based on a "kernel of truth", yet lead in applied contexts (such as learning) through a chain of erroneous conclusions to inappropriate recommendations for concrete actions related to the body. Thus, they are unable to meet the demands of reflexive health literacy, and first empirical findings indicate that they are robust to formal education. This project’s goal is to systematically describe the prevalence of MytHs within the educational system, compare students’, pre-service, and in-service biology teachers’ misconceptions, and identify new explanatory approaches for "failed" conceptual change processes. Specifically, Sub-study 1 (N = 1548) will investigate in a survey analyzed via classical test theory which MytHs the three groups of subjects endorse and to what extent their endorsement is influenced by cognitive aspects of school-based health education. Sub-study 2 (N = 60) will consist of two parts (interviews and think-aloud) and focus more strongly on emotional-affective and social-performative factors. It will investigate via systematic qualitative content analysis how members of the three groups rationalize their endorsement of prevalent MytHs and how they react to instructional materials that refute them. These two substantively and methodologically interwoven studies at the intersection of instructional research and research on the teaching profession will provide new insights into whether pre-service and in-service biology teachers share the same subject-related misconceptions as their students in the area of health education and whether backfire effects, understood as unintended repercussions, can explain the contradictory findings on learning processes in response to the conceptual change strategy of direct refutation. Based on seven research questions, implications for biology instruction and biology teacher education will be generated that have the potential to optimize students’, pre-service and in-service teachers’ health-related learning.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants