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Reproducible gains in student attitudes toward biology from a single in‐class case study (531.1)
Author(s) -
Hines Justin,
Serrano Antonio,
Liebner Jeffrey
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.28.1_supplement.531.1
Subject(s) - mirroring , class (philosophy) , variety (cybernetics) , biological sciences , mathematics education , psychology , medical education , biology , medicine , computer science , computational biology , social psychology , artificial intelligence
The study objective was to test a case study which simulates scientific inquiry within the limits of a single course period and which can be used in large lecture‐format courses. Students unknowingly take the roles of the initial investigators of the Kuru epidemic of Papua New Guinea in 1957 and work in groups to iteratively conduct simulated investigations, evaluate the results, and form hypotheses regarding the nature of the disease. The activity culminates in a mock‐scientific conference, in which student groups collaborate by sharing findings, mirroring real events which led to the discovery of prion diseases. Learning goals focus on student opinions, attitudes and skills related to the nature of science, causes of disease epidemics, and prions as atypical infectious agents. The activity has been implemented successfully at a variety of schools and courses which span five fields: biology, microbiology, genetics, zoology, and biochemistry. Aggregated data from five courses shows overwhelmingly positive affective responses from students. Most importantly, in two sequential offerings of Introductory Biology in 2012 and 2013 we were successful in using a modified CLASS ‐BIO survey to reproducibly measure statistically significant objective changes in attitudes toward biology as a result of the activity alone. We hope that both the activity and approach can be used broadly by life sciences educators.