Can Physics Be Disguised? The Effects of Contextual Features on Students' Interest, Anxiety, and Probability of Success

• In Event: 63.084 - Roundtable Session 22
  In Roundtable Session: 63.084-1 - Role of Teachers in Supporting Student Motivation and Learning

Abstract

The use of real-life problems (i.e., context-based problems) in science education has shown to affect students’ attitudes towards science (Bennett, Lubben, & Hogarth, 2006). The aim of the current study was to examine how characteristics of context-based physics problems influence students’ motivational and affective states. Eight versions of a thermodynamics task with the factors contextualization (low/high) and transparency (low/high), were presented to 207 tenth grade students. After learning, students were tested for their situational interest, anxiety, and expectation of success. Results suggest that real life context-based problems in physics learning can contribute to students’ situational interest and reduce their anxiety. However, they do so because they disguise the abstract nature of the underlying conceptual structure to be learned.

Authors

• Marcela Gerardina Pozas Guajardo, University of Koblenz-Landau

• Wolfgang Schnotz, University of Koblenz-Landau

• Alexander Kauertz, University of Education

• Patrick Löffler, University of Koblenz-Landau