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Choose Your Evidence

Scientific Thinking Where It May Most Count

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A Correction to this article was published on 13 August 2021

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Abstract

Schooling traditionally affords students more experience in learning and practicing procedures than in identifying what a situation calls for. When asked to choose appropriate numerical data to support their causal claims, college students perform surprisingly poorly. In one case we describe, almost all chose limited, inconclusive data as sufficient evidence, despite having available the more comprehensive data needed to support their claim and despite their established competence to employ such data for this purpose. Our objective in highlighting this weakness is to make a case that choosing one’s evidence warrants the status of an important metacognitive intellectual skill and educational objective, one central to but that extends well beyond the domains of scientific and mathematical reasoning and hence warrants greater attention both in and beyond the science curriculum. People may choose evidence to justify their assertions in an ill-considered way, with potential adverse effects in both private and public communication.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Columbia University Teachers College, New York, NY, USA

    Deanna Kuhn

  2. Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Anahid S. Modrek

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  1. Deanna Kuhn
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  2. Anahid S. Modrek
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Correspondence to Deanna Kuhn.

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The original version of this article was revised: The original version of this article unfortunately contains incorrect article title due to a typesetting mistake.

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Kuhn, D., Modrek, A.S. Choose Your Evidence. Sci & Educ 31, 21–31 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-021-00209-y

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