Unpacking and validating the “cell-cell communication” core concept of physiology by an Australian team

Abstract

An Australia-wide consensus was reached on seven core concepts of physiology, one of which was 'cell-cell communication' Three physiology educators from a 'core concepts' Delphi Task force, unpacked this core concept into seven different themes and sixty sub-themes. Cell-cell communication, previously 'unpacked' and validated, was modified for an Australian audience to include emerging knowledge and adapted to increase student accessibility. The unpacked hierarchical framework for this core concept was rated by twenty-four physiology educators from separate Australian Universities, using a five-point Likert scale for level of importance for student understanding (ranging from 1=Essential to 5=Not Important) and level of difficulty (ranging from 1=Very Difficult to 5=Not Difficult). Data was analysed using the Kruskal-Wallis test with Dunn's multiple comparison test. The seven themes were rated within a narrow range of importance (1.13-2.4), with ratings of 'essential' or 'important,' and significant differences between the themes (P<0.0001, n=7). The variance for the difficulty rating was higher than for importance, ranging from 2.15 ('Difficult') to 3.45 (between 'Moderately Difficult' and 'Slightly Difficult'). Qualitatively, it was suggested that some sub-themes were similar and that these could be grouped. However, all themes and sub-themes were ranked as 'important', validating this framework. Once finalised and adopted across Australian universities, the unpacked core concept for Cell-cell communication will enable the generation of tools and resources for physiology educators and improvements in consistency across curricula.