A key part of the practice of chemistry is the analysis of chemical composition, including through gravimetric analysis and spectrophotometry. However, the complexity of doing multiple calculations to obtain analytical evidence, such as that required to determine an empirical formula, presents a challenge if such analytical methods are to be…

The research presented in this dissertation looks at how students in general chemistry reason about atomic emission spectroscopy. Situated within the context of a transformed general chemistry curriculum called "Chemistry, Life, the Universe, and Everything" (CLUE), the goal of this study was to (1) characterize the various ways in which…

This dissertation describes the results of an investigation into introductory student understanding of special relativity in the context of the relativity of simultaneity. The research probes the extent to which students are able to use concepts from both Galilean and special relativity to determine, for multiple reference frames, the time…