Seeing the Woods for the Trees Again: Analyzing Evolutionary Diagrams in German and US University-Level Textbooks

Schramm, Thilo; Jose, Anika; Schmiemann, Philipp

doi:10.3390/educsci11080367

Cited by 6 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 59 publications

(110 reference statements)

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“…One cause for this difference is that human perceptual tendencies lead students to interpret ladder cladograms in a way that conflicts with the scientifically accurate segregation of taxa into nested levels ( Novick and Catley, 2007 ). This research led to shifts in the presentation of cladograms in textbooks and instructional materials and, thus, to improved student learning ( Novick and Catley, 2007 ; Schramm et al. , 2021 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Putting the Pieces Together: Student Thinking about Transformations of Energy and Matter

Bhatia

Stack

Sensibaugh

et al. 2022

LSE

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Putting the Pieces Together: Student Thinking about Transformations of Energy and Matter

Bhatia

Stack

Sensibaugh

et al. 2022

LSE

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“…There are also other types of tree diagrams with various iconographies Schramm, Jose, and Schmiemann 2021). These diagrams are used in different contexts for different purposes.…”

Section: Figure 8 Three Different Types Of Tree Diagrams a Cladogram ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualizing the abyss of time : Students’ interpretation of visualized deep evolutionary time

Stenlund

2023

Studies in Science and Technology Education

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Deep evolutionary time (DET) -emergence of life over immense time scales -is a threshold concept in biology. While understanding DET might help learners and citizens contemplate their actions in the context of human existence, especially in combination with experiencing evoked affective responses, interpreting temporal aspects of DET is demanding. DET is communicated through various visualizations that include static two-dimensional representations (e.g., phylograms), interactive animations (e.g., evolution timelines), as well as touch-based interfaces (e.g., dynamic representations of phylogenetic trees). Given the importance of DET as fundamental scientific knowledge of potential societal application, there is a need for educational research on students' interpretation of visually communicated DET. This thesis explores students' interpretation of different forms of visualized DET along a continuum of interactivity, ranging from non-interactive to highly interactive visualizations.The research aim is four-fold, and probes how students interpret DET visualizations in terms of: i) temporal aspects, ii) communicated evolutionary concepts, iii) degree of visualization interactivity, and iv) generated affective responses.The work comprises four studies, which as a collective, adopt exploratory and multi-method fixed and flexible designs. A total of 505 upper secondary, college bridging-year, and university students participated. Data were collected from written and online questionnaires, task-based questions, and semi-structured interviews. Data analysis was qualitative and quantitative, and incorporated deductive and inductive approaches.In analysing students' interpretation of static two-dimensional DET visualizations such as phylograms (Paper I), an instrument for measuring knowledge about the visual representation of deep evolutionary time (DET-Vis) was developed. Emergence of a unidimensional construct during validation represents knowledge about the visual communication of DET. Inspection of item performance suggests that interpreting visualized DET requires both procedural and declarative knowledge. In moving across the continuum from static to more dynamic DET visualizations, analysis of students' interpretation of an animation communicating hominin evolution (Paper II) revealed five temporal aspects influencing interpretation, namely: events at specific times, relative order, concurrent events, time intervals, and time interval durations. A further shift across the continuum involved analysing students' interpretation of a touch-based DET visualization of a three-dimensional phylogenetic tree (DeepTree) (Paper III). Finger-based zooming was associated with movement within the tree itself (spatially orientated), or as movement in iv time (time orientated), respectively, and related to identified misinterpretations. Further analysis showed that interpreting DeepTree evoked the epistemic affective responses of awe, curiosity, surprise, and confusion (Paper IV). Affective responses were expressed in relation to ...

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“…Among the visualizations used in biology education, tree of life representations are of central importance (Catley and Novick 2008;Schramm et al 2021) since they reflect several paramount aspects of biology such as biological diversity, common descent, deep evolutionary time and biological relationships. It follows that understanding macroevolutionary concepts relies on interconnecting tree thinking with DET (e.g., Novick and Catley 2012).…”

Section: Understanding the Visual Communication Of Deep Evolutionary ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Design and validation of a deep evolutionary time visual instrument (DET-Vis)

2022

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Understanding deep evolutionary time is crucial for biology education and for conceptualizing evolutionary history. Although such knowledge might help citizens contemplate their actions in the context of human existence, understanding deep evolutionary time is a demanding cognitive endeavor for students. The enormous magnitudes of evolutionary time are often visually communicated through phylograms and timelines. Given the importance of understanding evolutionary time in various scientific domains at large, there is a need for tools to gauge students’ knowledge about visually communicated deep evolutionary time. In response, we describe the design and validation of an instrument to measure knowledge about the visual representation of deep evolutionary time. Development, expert panel evaluation, and piloting of an initial 14 questions with 139 respondents resulted in a 10-item multiple-choice questionnaire. Subsequent collection and analysis of 212 responses validated the 10-item Deep Evolutionary Time Visual Instrument (DET-Vis). Identification of a single factor suggests a unidimensional construct that represents knowledge about the visual communication of deep evolutionary time. A Cronbach’s alpha of 0.73 yielded an acceptable internal consistency of the instrument. The items of the instrument discriminate well with discrimination coefficients between 0.25 and 0.53. The instrument is of moderate difficulty with difficulty indices ranging from 0.56 to 0.81. The seven-step methodological design and validation procedure of this study yielded a unidimensional, valid, and reliable ten-item deep evolutionary time visual test instrument. The instrument items probe both procedural and declarative aspects of the construct that could warrant future psychometric exploration. Use of DET-Vis in pedagogical practice could help support the teaching of deep evolutionary time at upper secondary and undergraduate levels.

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Seeing the Woods for the Trees Again: Analyzing Evolutionary Diagrams in German and US University-Level Textbooks

Cited by 6 publications

References 59 publications

Putting the Pieces Together: Student Thinking about Transformations of Energy and Matter

Putting the Pieces Together: Student Thinking about Transformations of Energy and Matter

Visualizing the abyss of time : Students’ interpretation of visualized deep evolutionary time

Design and validation of a deep evolutionary time visual instrument (DET-Vis)

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