Investigating Differences in Experts’ Chemistry Knowledge Structures and Comparing Them to Those of General Chemistry Students

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the impact of years of experience and field of expertise on the development of chemistry knowledge structures from STEM experts comprising 103 professors, 10 postdocs, and 146 doctoral students. Of these participants, 127 were specialized in chemistry and the rest were from various science and engineering disciplines. Although most participants were part of a research university located in Northern California, the pool included a small group of experts from different universities and countries. The main source of the data was a Word Association Test generated with 17 keywords that refer to major topics or concepts commonly introduced in the general chemistry curricula. The knowledge structures were examined to determine if the contents and the orientations of the clusters varied between the expert groups. In addition, their analysis was enriched with the consideration of chemistry triplet designations and central terms identified by eccentricity values on each structure. The overall expert knowledge structure generated in this study was also compared to undergraduate structures determined by using the same instrument and methodology. The investigation of the structures revealed several differences between expert groups and provided insight into the transformation of novices into experts. The paper also presents practical suggestions for educators on how to utilize structures while teaching, informing their instructional practices, and reforming teaching materials.

Mapping Pre-Service Chemistry Teachers’ Group Cognitive Structure Concerning the Topic of Physical and Chemical Change via the Word Association Method

“…41 This situation can be partially resolved by collecting data from a group of experts using a WAT to be used in the study and by making an expert cognitive structure mapping based on these data rather than creating the expert map by only one expert. As a matter of fact, Gulacar et al 41 conducted a study revealing this situation by creating a group cognitive structure obtained from experts with a WAT. In order to minimize this limitation, an analysis of some aspects of cognitive structure was added in this study.…”

“…This situation has been shown by some researchers as a limitation for data interpretation related to WATs. Gulacar et al 41 drew attention to this situation and stated that in most cases, researchers had difficulty in interpreting students' knowledge structures due to the lack of a reliable and valid standard or reference. 41 This situation can be partially resolved by collecting data from a group of experts using a WAT to be used in the study and by making an expert cognitive structure mapping based on these data rather than creating the expert map by only one expert.…”

“…Gulacar et al 41 drew attention to this situation and stated that in most cases, researchers had difficulty in interpreting students' knowledge structures due to the lack of a reliable and valid standard or reference. 41 This situation can be partially resolved by collecting data from a group of experts using a WAT to be used in the study and by making an expert cognitive structure mapping based on these data rather than creating the expert map by only one expert. As a matter of fact, Gulacar et al 41 conducted a study revealing this situation by creating a group cognitive structure obtained from experts with a WAT.…”

“…Also, if the same associations are repeated, it indicates that it would enable the understanding of future information. In addition to these explanations regarding the positive aspects of using a WAT in assessing students’ knowledge structure, several researchers have indicated that ideas communicated within a word association procedure are spontaneous productions subject to fewer constraints than typically assessed in interviews or closed questionnaires, and thus it may be possible to extract less biased results. − …”

Using a combination technique for the assessment of students’ cognitive structures on acid–base chemistry

“…Even though the term ''cognitive structure'' does not have a single accepted definition and little information is known about how they develop (Taber, 2008), the term is still used in numerous studies for a long time now (e.g., West and Pines, 1985;White, 1985). Cognitive structures are described by different interpretations and terms, such as structural knowledge (Jonassen et al, 1993 cited in Liu andEbenezer, 2002) or knowledge structures (Gulacar et al, 2022). Structural knowledge is described as how information and concepts in a domain are related to each other (Liu and Ebenezer, 2002).…”