Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) plays a key role in introductory organic chemistry, spanning theory, concepts, and experimentation. Therefore, it is imperative that the instruction methods for NMR are both efficient and effective. By utilizing eye tracking equipment, the researchers were able to monitor how second-semester organic chemistry students solved NMR items. Graduate and advanced undergraduate students were used as a comparison group. The students in the course were characterized as novices, while the comparison group served as "experts" in statistical comparisons of problemsolving strategies. This study examines aspects of proton NMR spectra that each group considered while matching organic structure with a provided spectrum. Significant differences between the expert and novice groups as well as within the novice group were observed. The participants' search patterns (i.e., gaze frequency and gaze order) were interpreted in terms of a problem-solving approach. These results can provide subtle information about the learner's attention and cognition.
This paper presents a permutation test that statistically compares two groups of scanpaths. The test uses normalized Levenshtein distances when the lengths of scanpaths are not the same. This method was applied in a recent eye-tracking experiment in which two groups of chemistry students viewed nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopic signals and chose the corresponding molecular structure from the candidates. A significant difference was detected between the two groups, which is consistent with the fact that students in the expert group showed more efficient scan patterns in the experiment than the novice group. Various numbers of permutations were tested and the results showed that p-values only varied in a small range with different permutation numbers and that the statistical significance was not affected.
To my little butterfly, Chantel Without whom I never would have had the strength to get this far iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation is what it is today because of the many individuals who supported me during this journey. I first need to thank my husband, Joe. You laughed with me in the good times, and you struggled with me in the bad times. You lived with me, and you brought out the best in me always. You comforted me when I was downhearted, and you shared in all of my accomplishments. And for you I am the most that I can. You, Chantel, and Hailey were with me the entire time and words cannot describe how thankful I am to the three of you.
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