Teachers trust educational science - Especially if it confirms their beliefs

Abstract

Teachers around the world are increasingly required by policy guidelines to inform their teaching practices with scientific evidence. However, due to the division of cognitive labor, teachers often cannot evaluate the veracity of such evidence first-hand, since they lack specific methodological skills, such as the ability to evaluate study designs. For this reason, second-hand evaluations come into play, during which individuals assess the credibility and trustworthiness of the person or other entity who conveys the evidence instead of evaluating the information itself. In doing so, teachers' belief systems (e.g., beliefs about the trustworthiness of different sources, about science in general, or about specific educational topics) can play a pivotal role. But judging evidence based on beliefs may also lead to distortions which, in turn, can result in barriers for evidence-informed school practice. One popular example is the so-called confirmation bias, that is, preferring belief-consistent and avoiding or questioning belief-inconsistent information. Therefore, we experimentally investigated (1) whether teachers trust knowledge claims made by other teachers and scientific studies differently, (2) whether there is an interplay between teachers' trust in these specific knowledge claims, their trust in educational science, and their global trust in science, and (3) whether their prior topic-specific beliefs influence trust ratings in the sense of a confirmation bias. In an incomplete rotated design with three preregistered hypotheses, N = 414 randomly and representative sampled in-service teachers from Germany indicated greater trust in scientific evidence (information provided by a scientific journal) compared to anecdotal evidence (information provided by another teacher on a teacher blog). In addition, we found a positive relationship between trust in educational science and trust in specific knowledge claims from educational science. Finally, participants also showed a substantial confirmation bias, as they trusted educational science claims more when these matched (rather than contradicted) their prior beliefs. Based on these results, the interplay of trust, first-hand evaluation, and evidence-informed school practice is discussed.

A cautionary note on aggregation in educational psychology and beyond

“…By contrast, it should not only be the practitioners' responsibility to make sense of educational psychologists' findings; it should also be educational psychologists' responsibility to facilitate transferring educational insights into practice. Along this line, scholars have shown that carefully framing and preparing educational insights can indeed lead teachers to trust insights from educational research more than from other sources (Schmidt et al, 2022).…”

The Grading Process in System 1 and System 2 of Thinking: A Behavioral Economic Approach to Evaluation

“…Yet the most prevalent misjudgment may be confirmation bias, which refers to the tendency of individuals to seek, interpret, and remember only information that aligns with their preexisting beliefs or expectations while overlooking or dismissing contradictory data [42]. In the field of grading, confirmation bias can exert a substantial influence on teachers' perceptions as they may favor evidence that reinforces their initial judgments of students' capabilities, which may lead, in turn, to an inaccurate assessment of students' true potential [43]. Recognizing the presence of confirmation bias in grading is therefore pivotal for creating fair and objective evaluation systems, allowing educators to mitigate its effects and provide all students with equitable opportunities for learning and growth.…”

General and special education teachers’ attitudes towards evidence-based practice

“…Mistaken beliefs are particularly problematic because they can influence teachers' trust in evidence and shape their initial evaluation of it. Teachers tend to trust evidence more when it is consistent with their prior beliefs than when it contradicts them (Schmidt et al, 2022). Schmidt et al (2022) therefore conclude that the problem does not lie in a general distrust of empirical research, but rather in the fact that (also flawed) beliefs and presuppositions filter and distort the assessment of the credibility of research findings.…”

“…Teachers tend to trust evidence more when it is consistent with their prior beliefs than when it contradicts them (Schmidt et al, 2022). Schmidt et al (2022) therefore conclude that the problem does not lie in a general distrust of empirical research, but rather in the fact that (also flawed) beliefs and presuppositions filter and distort the assessment of the credibility of research findings. Moreover, prospective teachers often view research as something done by others rather than engaging with it themselves.…”