The Relationship Between Some Psychological Factors and their Effect on the Performance of Grid Questions and Word Association Tests

The Effect of Three Cognitive Variables on Students’ Understanding of the Particulate Nature of Matter and its Changes of State

“…Field independent students were those who performed better. This result is consistent with other findings in previous studies, which showed that field independence is an intellectual asset concerning general achievement in science (Lawson, 1983;Johnstone & Al-Naeme, 1995;Niaz, 1996;Tinajero & Paramo, 1998;Bahar & Hansell, 2000;Danili & Reid, 2004;Kang et al, 2005;Tsaparlis, Danili & Reid, 2006). It can be inferred that field independent pupils' ability to separate readily the significant information from its context (Witkin & Goodenough, 1981) or the signal from the noise offered them a serious advantage, either in their study or during teaching.…”

“…Furthermore, academic performance in various disciplines such as language, mathematics, natural sciences, social sciences, art and computer sciences was examined in relation to FDI, leading to the conclusion that "in general field-independent subjects perform better than field-dependent subjects, whether assessment is of specific disciplines or across the board" (Tinajero & Paramo, 1998). Following, many research findings were in accordance with the above conclusion (Bahar & Hansell, 2000;Danili & Reid, 2004;Kang et al, 2005;Tsaparlis, 2005;Danili & Reid, 2006).…”

The role of mathematical homework and prior knowledge on the relationship between students’ mathematical performance, cognitive style and working memory capacity

“…Field-independent subjects possess more analytical abilities and tend to 'break' information, paying attention to the partial, while field-dependent subjects focus their attention preferably upon the global aspects of the given information (Grigorenko & Sternberg, 1995;Tinajero & Páramo, 1998). Therefore, FD/I cognitive style appears important in learning science: problem-solving and conceptual understanding (Bahar & Hansell, 2000;Kang, Scharmann, Noh & Koh, 2005;Tsaparlis, 2005 (Witkin et al 1971). The GEFT is a traditional visuo-spatial test that involves figure ground segregation, which requires observers to find simple figures hidden in complex visual configuration.…”

Evidence for a Role of Executive Functions in Learning Biology

“…with tasks that measure storage and processing) has provided much more consistent evidence than studies examining storage only for a role of central executive processes in science learning. A study which examined verbal executive working memory in a sample of 101 Scottish biology school pupils (aged 16-17 years) revealed that those with superior working memory were more accurate on a biology grid assessment (Bahar & Hansell, 2000). The task used in the study required pupils to store and manipulate phonological information in memory and thus went beyond simple storage processes assessed in previous studies.…”