Determined developmental level to be a major factor at lower level chemistry courses but not as important for higher level ones. Suggests Lawson's test to be a useful tool in studying the basics of chemical education, evaluating courses as to the appropriate level, and in counseling individual students. (Author/JN)

Reported is a study of the relationships between scholastic grades of 419 junior and senior high school students and their ability to perform formal operational tasks. A Piagetian Task Instrument (PTI) was constructed to assess the formal thinking ability of the students. Face validity of the instrument was obtained after a literature review.…

The procedures, major findings, and conclusions of the Adolescent Reasoning Project are summarized in this final report to the National Science Foundation. Eleven different experiments were conducted to investigate the role of naturalistic and laboratory task content on scientific reasoning. Participants involved 1500 seventh, ninth, eleventh, and…

Three cognitive preference instruments were administered to 71 college students and 37 tenth graders to measure cognitive preferences in a natural information processing (learning) situation and to assess convergent validity of cognitive preference construct and instrument validity of conventional tests. Strong evidence of convergent validity was…

Reports results of the Second International Science Study concerning achievement in physics of U.S. high school students. Makes comparisons between students of 13 other countries and U.S. students, between first- and second-year U.S. physics students, and between U.S. students tested in the mid-1980s and those tested in 1970. (MDH)

Examines content and problem effects of formal thought in 13-year-olds (N=120). Three controlling variables tasks with different content and two question-type tests (analysis and controlling questions) were administered. Findings, among others, indicate that content and problem effects contribute to variance on formal reasoning problems.…

One hundred and forty students in grades 6 and 7 were asked to process 32 science statements. Half of the statements were consistent with their prior knowledge, whereas the remaining facts were inconsistent with it. Half of the students were instructed to read the sentences for understanding (reading controls). The remaining students were…