Situational Interest and Knowledge Acquisition in Problem-Based Learning

• In Event: Arming Achilles’ Heel: Instructional Strategies and Approaches for Promoting Knowledge Acquisition in Problem-Based Learning

Abstract

Objectives or purposes
The objective of the study was to investigate how situational interest develops in interaction with knowledge acquisition in Problem-Based Learning (PBL). Previous studies have shown that problems in PBL trigger students’ situational interest by evoking a feeling of knowledge deprivation, i.e. students realize that they have a knowledge gap regarding the problem-at-hand (Rotgans & Schmidt, 2011a). How situational interest develops thereafter and how it is related to knowledge-acquisition is less known.

Perspective(s) or theoretical framework
It is hypothesized that once students’ situational interest is aroused, they engage in information-seeking behavior (e.g., self-study) to close the perceived knowledge gap (Schmidt, Rotgans, & Yew, 2011). As the knowledge gap closes due to knowledge increases, situational interest is expected to decrease because there is no further impetus to seek out new information. Successful knowledge acquisition is therefore paired with a decrease in situational interest. With the present study we tested this hypothesis empirically.

Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry
The study was conducted in a number of Singapore secondary-school classrooms. The subject was history and the problem was about the fall of Singapore during WWII. During the PBL session repeated measures of situational interest as well as knowledge acquisition were administered to investigate how both develop and interact during a PBL session.

Data sources, evidence, objects, or materials
The sample consisted of 86 students from a Secondary School in Singapore that applied PBL as its instructional approach. A six-item self-report measure of situational interest (Rotgans & Schmidt, 2011b) was administered five times during the PBL session. This was done in combination with a concept recall test (Yew, Chng, & Schmidt, 2011) to enable measurement of students’ knowledge acquisition. Data were analyzed by means of repeated measures ANOVA.

Results and/or substantiated conclusions or warrants for arguments/point of view
The results of the analysis showed that once students were presented the problem their situational interest increased significantly. Subsequently however, while students gained knowledge during a self-study and a consolidation phase, their situational interest in the topic decreased significantly (see Figure 1). The findings support the idea that situational interest emerges from lack of knowledge and disappears when sufficient new knowledge is acquired. Further tests showed that students who reported that they were still interested in the topic at the end of the lesson, performed considerably lower on the concept recall test compared to the participants who reported that they were not that interested anymore, again suggesting that situational interest is a response to a knowledge deficit.

Scientific or scholarly significance of the study or work
The findings of the study provide additional evidence in support of the knowledge-deprivation hypothesis, which suggests that a problem in PBL is a means to trigger students’ situational interest by making them aware of their knowledge deficiency, which is the driving force for subsequent learning. As such, this line of research provides further insights in the underlying psychological mechanisms of PBL.

Authors

• Jerome I. Rotgans, National Institute of Education - Nanyang Technological University

• Henk G. Schmidt, Radboud University Nijmegen