Cross-Sectional Study on Chinese Secondary School Students’ Epistemic Beliefs and Fallacy Identification

Individuals hold different epistemic beliefs at different ages, and these beliefs can affect a wide range of reasoning tasks. The present study examined Chinese secondary school students’ epistemic beliefs at different grade levels, and how these related to the students’ abilities to identify variou...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Asia-Pacific education researcher 2017-04, Vol.26 (1-2), p.11-19
Main Authors: Lee, Wincy W. S., Chan, Victor C. W.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Academic Ability
Belief & doubt
Beliefs
Cohort Analysis
College Students
Education
Educational Policy and Politics
Epistemology
False information
Foreign Countries
Grade 10
Grade 11
International and Comparative Education
Learning and Instruction
Longitudinal Studies
Misconceptions
Multivariate Analysis
Predictor Variables
Questionnaires
Regular Article
Secondary School Students
Sociology of Education
Task Analysis
Thinking Skills
Undergraduate Study
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Summary:Individuals hold different epistemic beliefs at different ages, and these beliefs can affect a wide range of reasoning tasks. The present study examined Chinese secondary school students’ epistemic beliefs at different grade levels, and how these related to the students’ abilities to identify various forms of fallacy with the use of a cross-sectional design. One hundred and forty-six Chinese secondary school students (Grade 7  N  = 32, Grade 9  N  = 40, Grade 10  N  = 36, and Grade 11  N  = 38) completed a 14-item Epistemic Beliefs Questionnaire and a set of fallacy tasks. CFA showed that the questionnaire measured the four dimensions of the secondary school student samples adequately. A non-linear trend of epistemic beliefs across different grades was found and analyses using MANOVA showed significant grade differences in the dimension of Certainty (Grade 7 vs. 10 vs. 11). χ 2 tests showed only significant grade difference in the fallacy of Appeal to Authority (Grade 7 vs Grade 9; Grade 7 vs. 10). Finally, only grade, but not epistemic beliefs, predicted fallacy identification (Appeal to Authority) when all variables were considered in the ordinal logistic regression model. The issue of epistemic dimensions change and students’ informal reasoning ability are discussed in light of the Chinese culture.
ISSN:0119-5646
2243-7908
DOI:10.1007/s40299-016-0322-1