Refutations in science texts lead to hypercorrection of misconceptions held with high confidence

Loon, Mariëtte H. van; Dunlosky, John; Gog, Tamara van; Merriënboer, Jeroen J. G. van; Bruin, Anique B. H. de

doi:10.1016/j.cedpsych.2015.04.003

Cited by 67 publications

(81 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…Two recent studies shed light on this objective. Evidence from van Loon, Dunlosky, van Gog, van Merriënboer, and de Bruin (2015) shows that confidence in misconceptions is not a sufficient condition for the backfire effect via refutation text. Rather, van Loon et al (2015) found that high confidence in science misconceptions that were the subject of refutation texts lead to hypercorrection, wherein refutation texts showed enhanced correction of high-confidence misconceptions compared with both expository texts and low-confidence misconceptions.…”

Section: Effects Of Self-concept In Controversial Knowledge Revisionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Identity and Epistemic Emotions During Knowledge Revision: A Potential Account for the Backfire Effect

Trevors

Muis

Pekrun

et al. 2016

Discourse Processes

107

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Recent research has shown that for some topics, messages to refute and revise misconceptions may backfire. The current research offers one possible account for this backfire effect (i.e., the ironic strengthening of belief in erroneous information after an attempted refutation) from an educational psychology perspective and examines whether emotions mediate the relationship between self-concept and learning from refutation texts. In an experimental design, 120 undergraduate students responded to a questionnaire focused on their dietary self-concept and were randomly assigned to read an expository or refutation text on the topic of genetically modified foods. Immediately after reading, participants self-reported their emotions followed by completing post-test measures of their knowledge and attitudes of the topic. Results showed an interaction between self-concept and text condition on emotions wherein self-concept predicted negative emotions (i.e., confusion, anxiety, frustration) while reading a refutation text specifically. Further, negative emotions significantly mediated relations between self-concept and post-test knowledge and attitudes. Implications for educational design and future research are discussed.

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Section: Effects Of Self-concept In Controversial Knowledge Revisionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Identity and Epistemic Emotions During Knowledge Revision: A Potential Account for the Backfire Effect

Trevors

Muis

Pekrun

et al. 2016

Discourse Processes

107

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Tsai and Chang (2005) found that introducing discrepant and critical events to generate dissatisfaction with misconceptions was effective in promoting learning. Van Loon et al (2015) found that misconceptions held with high confidence were most effectively corrected by a combination of refutation text and correct text. In the words of Carsten-Conner et al (2015),…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the reasons for the seasons using Google Earth, 3D models, and plots

Paor

Dordevic

Karabinos

et al. 2016

International Journal of Digital Earth

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Public understanding of climate and climate change is of broad societal importance. However, misconceptions regarding reasons for the seasons abound amongst students, teachers, and the public, many of whom believe that seasonality is caused by large variations in Earth's distance from the Sun. Misconceptions may be reinforced by textbook illustrations that exaggerate eccentricity or show an inclined view of Earth's near-circular orbit. Textbook explanations that omit multiple factors influencing seasons, that do not mesh with students' experiences, or that are erroneous, hinder scientifically valid reasoning. Studies show that many teachers share their students' misconceptions, and even when they understand basic concepts, teachers may fail to appreciate the range of factors contributing to seasonal change, or their relative importance. We have therefore developed a learning resource using Google Earth, a virtual globe with other useful, weather-and climate-related visualizations. A classroom test of 27 undergraduates in a public research university showed that 15 improved their test scores after the Google Earth-based laboratory class, whereas 5 disimproved. Mean correct answers rose from 4.7/10 to 6/10, giving a paired t-test value of 0.21. After using Google Earth, students are helped to segue to a heliocentric view. ARTICLE HISTORY

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“…The sample of the pilot study consisted of one second (N = 20) and one fourth grade classroom (N = 15), with children in the same age as children at T 2 . The texts and questions we used in this pilot study were translated and adapted from studies by De Bruin et al (2011) and Van Loon et al (2015). Texts for fourth graders were longer and more complex, and questions were more difficult for fourth graders than for second graders.…”

Section: Pilot Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Internal consistency of the true-false questions is rather low, however, low internal consistency is not uncommon for text comprehension tests (cf. Engelen et al 2018;Van Loon et al 2015). It lies in the very nature of metacognitive research that questions for which monitoring judgments are gathered, cover the entire variation of difficulty to allow tapping the whole range of monitoring processes.…”

Section: Materials and Proceduresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To assess performance, answers to true-false and open-ended questions were scored as correct (1) or incorrect (0). In accordance with Van Loon et al (2015), comprehension was emphasized when scoring open-ended questions. Therefore, verbatim responses showing the literal text content as well as gist responses showing that children understood the meaning were both scored as correct.…”

Section: Dependent Measures and Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Development of Children’s monitoring and control when learning from texts: effects of age and test format

Steiner

Loon

Bayard

et al. 2019

Metacognition Learning

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This study investigated elementary school children's development of monitoring and control when learning from texts. Second (N = 138) and fourth (N = 164) graders were tested in the middle (T 1 ) and end (T 2 ) of the school year. The study focused on the cross-sectional and longitudinal development of monitoring and control, and aimed to investigate the development of metacognition for two test formats. After reading expository texts, children completed a comprehension test consisting of open-ended and true-false questions. They monitored their test performance by making confidence judgments, and controlled performance by deciding whether to maintain or withdraw their given answers. Overall, monitoring and control accuracy was higher for open-ended questions than for true-false questions. For open-ended questions, results indicated higher metacognitive accuracy for fourth graders than second graders. No such age effects were found for monitoring and control for true-false questions. Longitudinally, children of both age groups improved their monitoring and control accuracy from T 1 to T 2 , for open-ended and true-false questions. For both test types, improvement mainly occurred for the monitoring and controlling of incorrect, rather than correct answers. Additionally, the results indicated inter-individual stability of performance, but no stability of monitoring and control accuracy over time. The findings indicate that developmental as well as task-related factors affect children's metacognitive accuracy. Keywords Monitoring . Control . Development . Test format . Stability Learning from texts and adequately retrieving and reproducing that information when answering questions during test taking is important in daily school life. Effective learning and test taking behavior are characterized by accurate monitoring (i.e., evaluation of ongoing mental

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Refutations in science texts lead to hypercorrection of misconceptions held with high confidence

Cited by 67 publications

References 46 publications

Identity and Epistemic Emotions During Knowledge Revision: A Potential Account for the Backfire Effect

Identity and Epistemic Emotions During Knowledge Revision: A Potential Account for the Backfire Effect

Exploring the reasons for the seasons using Google Earth, 3D models, and plots

Development of Children’s monitoring and control when learning from texts: effects of age and test format

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