Genetics and Cinema: Personal Misconceptions that Constitute Obstacles to Learning

Muela, Francisco Javier; Armenteros, Antonio Quesada

doi:10.1080/21548455.2013.817026

Cited by 11 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…A critical issue in this respect is that biology education has to deal with critical conceptions about GM, often labeled as Bpreconceptions.^These preconceptions or Bpreinstruction conceptions^often stem from the frequent use of GM related terms in news media and popular culture. Muela and Abril (2014) refer for example to preconceptions influenced by movies. As children lack the experience to interpret these-often decontextualized-messages, their preconceptions might turn into misconceptions when there is a mismatch with the correct scientific conception (Smith and Knight 2012).…”

Section: Variables Affecting Gm Acceptancementioning

confidence: 99%

Variables Affecting Secondary School Students’ Willingness to Eat Genetically Modified Food Crops

et al. 2017

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A large-scale cross-sectional study (N = 4002) was set up to determine Flemish secondary school students' willingness to eat genetically modified food (WTE) and to link students' WTE to previously identified key variables from research on the acceptance of genetic modification (GM). These variables include subjective and objective knowledge about genetics and biotechnology, perceived risks and benefits of GM food crops, trust in information from different sources about GM, and food neophobia. Differences between WTE-related variables based on students' grade level, educational track, and gender were analyzed. The students displayed a rather indecisive position toward GM food and scored weakly on a genetics and biotechnology knowledge test. WTE correlated most strongly with perceived benefits and subjective and objective knowledge. The results have clear implications for education, as they reiterate the need to strengthen students' scientific knowledge base and to introduce a GM-related debate at a much earlier stage in their school career.

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Section: Variables Affecting Gm Acceptancementioning

confidence: 99%

Variables Affecting Secondary School Students’ Willingness to Eat Genetically Modified Food Crops

et al. 2017

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“…Sin embargo, a pesar de su relevancia e incidencia en la vida cotidiana, numerosos estudios dan cuenta que este tema se ubica entre los más difíciles de comprender para los estudiantes de distintos niveles educativos. Por ejemplo, diversos trabajos documentan las ideas previas que alumnos de secundaria y bachillerato tienen al respecto (Albaladejo & Lucas, 1988;Bugallo-Rodríguez, 1995;Hackling & Treagust, 1984;Kinnear, 1983;Lewis, Leach, & Wood-Robinson, 2000b, 2000cLewis & Kattmann, 2004;Muela & Abril, 2014) y son concepciones que, en general, no son compatibles con conocimiento científico. Así, se ha reportado, por ejemplo, que hay alumnos que consideran que no todos los organismos vivos tienen información genética, otros que identifican la meiosis como el proceso de fertilización, entre muchas otras ideas previas.…”

Section: La Importancia De Los Modelos En El Aprendizaje De La Genéticaunclassified

Modelos Parciales Posibles De La Herencia Genética en Estudiantes De Bachillerato

García-Rivera,

Gallegos-Cázares,

Flores-Camacho

et al. 2023

IENCI

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Este trabajo analiza los modelos mentales desde la perspectiva de los Modelos Parciales Posibles (MPP), que permiten conocer el funcionamiento de los procesos explicativos de los estudiantes para una determinada fenomenología. La muestra se conformó por 186 alumnos de bachillerato que cursaban la asignatura de Biología V, quienes resolvieron un cuestionario previamente validado. Los resultados evidenciaron tres modelos. Los MPPI y MPPII revelan concepciones sustancialistas y estáticas de los procesos genéticos, que llevan al alumno a generar explicaciones lejanas al conocimiento científico. Los alumnos con el MPPIII realizan inferencias más completas y cercanas al conocimiento científico, estableciendo relaciones entre los mecanismos de herencia y los procesos meióticos. Estos hallazgos permiten reconocer que todos los estudiantes de la muestra pueden, dentro de un MPP, construir explicaciones sobre la herencia genética y pone de manifiesto la importancia que hagan explícitos sus razonamientos para identificar los principales problemas de comprensión de este tema.

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“…For instance, it was shown that students can hold unrealistic expectations about the potential of genetic engineering for curing diseases by simply replacing a gene (Mills Shaw et al, 2008). Interestingly, such misconceptions are often hard to address because inaccurate knowledge about heredity can be conveyed by various means, such as textbooks (Gericke et al, 2014; Gericke & Hagberg, 2010), mass media (Muela & Abril, 2014), or even teachers themselves (Castera & Clement, 2014; Smith, 2014). In sum, it is well established that understanding hereditary phenomena is difficult and a real challenge for biology education, as students' erroneous conceptions about heredity can stem from various sources.…”

Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

“Genes for a role,” “genes as essences”: Secondary students' explicit and implicit intuitions about genetic essentialism and teleology

2022

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Biology education research has shown that deeply rooted intuitions can influence students' understanding of biological phenomena. One example is design teleology, the intuition that organisms' traits were designed to fulfill a goal. Another example is psychological essentialism, the intuition that organisms have fixed essences. Past research has found both of these intuitions to be conceptual obstacles for understanding evolution. In our study, we investigated whether conceptions stemming from these two intuitions are also expressed in the context of genetics. So, we used two tests to identify teleology and essentialism conceptions in the context of genetics: a multiple‐choice questionnaire (Genetic Essentialism and Teleology Questionnaire) and an implicit test (Genetic Essentialism and Teleology Implicit Association Test [IAT]). The development and validation process of these two tests are presented elsewhere. The present article presents the results of the administration of both tests to 332 secondary school students. It was found that: (1) those students exhibited teleology and essentialism conceptions in the context of genetics; the former, but not the latter, were less frequent the older students were; (2) teleology and essentialism conceptions were not correlated; and (3) measures from the explicit and implicit tests were not correlated with each other. Recommendations to improve teaching about genetics are made; for instance, we suggest that students' genetic essentialism conceptions could be addressed by emphasizing the existence of variation within populations and species, and the impact of mutations on phenotypic outcomes. We also recommend that teachers address design teleology and psychological essentialism conceptions independently from each other.

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Genetics and Cinema: Personal Misconceptions that Constitute Obstacles to Learning

Cited by 11 publications

References 61 publications

Variables Affecting Secondary School Students’ Willingness to Eat Genetically Modified Food Crops

Variables Affecting Secondary School Students’ Willingness to Eat Genetically Modified Food Crops

Modelos Parciales Posibles De La Herencia Genética en Estudiantes De Bachillerato

“Genes for a role,” “genes as essences”: Secondary students' explicit and implicit intuitions about genetic essentialism and teleology

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