ABSTRACT

Socio-scientific reasoning (SSR) is key to helping students take informed positions around socio-scientific issues (SSI). SSR comprises four competencies: recognising complexity of SSI’s, multiple perspectives around SSI’s, the need for ongoing inquiry around SSI’s, and skepticism around different parties’ claims made about SSI’s. The Quantitative Assessment of SSR (QuASSR) provides a promising measurement framework, but there are still important questions around the ability of this instrument to measure transfer across different scenarios and change in SSR over an intervention. Further, prior work suggests that the four competencies may constitute a progression. We explored the ability of the QuASSR to measure transfer of SSR across three different SSI’s using 2-faceted and multi-faceted Rasch models. We used path analysis to test the hypothesis that competencies associated with SSR formed a progression. We found transfer or neartransfer of SSR across the three scenarios, and that the competencies comprise a unidimensional hierarchy. Perspective-taking is a necessary bridge between students’ understanding of complexity and the higher-level competencies of inquiry and skepticism. Inquiry and skepticism were found to be conditionally independent upon accounting for perspective-taking, supporting the idea that seeing multiple perspectives around SSI’s is central to development of the other SSR competencies.

摘要

社会科学推理（SSR）是帮助学生就社会科学问题（SSI）采取知情立场的关键。SSR包括四项能力：认识到SSI的复杂性，对SSI的多种看法，对SSI进行持续查询的需求以及对不同方对SSI主张的怀疑。SSR定量评估（QuASSR）提供了一个有前途的衡量框架，但是围绕该工具衡量跨不同情景的转移以及干预措施中SSR的变化的能力仍存在重要问题。此外，先前的工作表明这四个能力可能构成一个进步。我们使用两面和多面Rasch模型探索了QuASSR测量三个不同SSI之间的SSR传递的能力。我们使用路径分析来检验与SSR相关的能力形成了进展的假设。我们发现，在三种情况下，SSR的转移或接近转移，并且能力包括一维层次结构。观点捕捉是学生对复杂性的理解与更高层次的探究和怀疑能力之间的必要桥梁。发现和怀疑是有条件地独立于考虑观点的考虑，支持这样的观点，即围绕SSI的观点多见是其他SSR能力发展的核心。观点捕捉是学生对复杂性的理解与更高层次的探究和怀疑能力之间的必要桥梁。发现和怀疑是有条件地独立于考虑观点的考虑，支持这样的观点，即围绕SSI的观点多见是其他SSR能力发展的核心。观点捕捉是学生对复杂性的理解与更高层次的探究和怀疑能力之间的必要桥梁。发现和怀疑是有条件地独立于考虑观点的考虑，支持这样的观点，即围绕SSI的观点多见是其他SSR能力发展的核心。