Recent studies on text sequencing found learning advantages of interleaving over blocking in terms of high-level inferences. We conducted a 2 × 2 × 2 mixed factorial experiment with college students (n = 117) by manipulating text sequence (interleaved vs. blocked) and self-questioning activity while reading (spontaneous vs. prompted) between…

Problem-solving involves both cognitive and physiological changes. Since most prior work has focused on examining the cognitive side of problem-solving, there is more to explore on the physiological side, including skin conductance. The present study examined skin conductance reactivity (SCR) to the moment participants solved three different types…

Chemical thinking is a powerful tool for making sense of the material world and acting on it. But developing competence in chemical thinking may be challenging for students as it varies in several dimensions. This contribution seeks to guide and help chemistry educators in the design of learning experiences that support the development of…

Abduction and abductively-driven research approaches have been foregrounded by researchers as a way to introduce new concepts, ideas and insights. This paper argues that while abduction allows for the introduction of new concepts, ideas and insights, abduction as articulated by many scholars is welded to representational thought, which stifles the…

In this article, I present an analysis of the epistemic value of the students' conceptions, as employed in the current constructivist research. I focus on the conceptions about natural kinds. Since natural kind terms are a crucial part of the discourse of the natural sciences, my conclusions are particularly relevant in science education. To…

This study examined the use of analogy in architectural design. Its main goal was to provide an understanding of how experts and novices alike used visual analog thinking to generate satisfactory solutions during their design process. A series of controlled experiments were conducted in order to examine how this cognitive strategy contributes to…

In this study we consider a classic paradox of infinity and its variations and suggest how the sources of misleading intuition can be analysed using the concept of uniform convergence of functions. We then examine how six mathematics honour students engage with a variation of the paradox. Despite their advanced mathematical training, the…

This paper reports the first empirical investigation of the hypothesis that epistemic appraisals form part of the structure of concepts. To date, studies of concepts have focused on the way concepts encode properties of objects and the way those features are used in categorization and in other cognitive tasks. Philosophical considerations show the…

This study compared the analogical reasoning of three groups that differed in their creative expertise: professional actors, undergraduate acting majors, and nonactors. Using an Analogy Finding Task, in which participants identified valid and nonvalid verbal analogies, three aspects of participants' analogical reasoning were measured: the number…

Pseudo-profound bullshit pertains to grammatically and syntactically correct but meaningless sentences, that, due to syntactical correctness appear as made to communicate something and research shows that people deem them profound. However, the effect of differing source credibility on bullshit profoundness evaluations has, to our knowledge, not…

This developmental account of executive function (EF) argues that domain-general analogical processes build a functional hierarchy of skills, which vary on a continuum of abstraction, and become increasingly differentiated over time. The paper begins by showing how a functional hierarchy can capture important aspects of EF development, including…

The ability of school students to use health-related knowledge for their and their community's needs is referred to as health literacy and is regarded as a combination of knowledge and motivational factors. In the case of cancer literacy, high-school students have some knowledge about risk factors, but not much is known about their understanding…

Proportional reasoning has been greatly influencing the development of students' mathematical abilities. Along with the area conservation ability, it helps elementary students comprehend area measurement. This exploratory study aimed to produce qualitative-descriptive data on elementary students' proportional reasoning in solving the conservation…

In the context of a rapid digital transformation, digital competence is now regarded as a fourth cultural skill complementing reading, writing, and arithmetic. We argue that a well-structured and sound competence model is needed as a shared foundation for learning, teaching, pedagogical diagnostics and evaluative schemes in the school system.…

The present study has two main goals. First, it aims to examine the analogies an instructor uses about "DNA conservation across generations" in a university-level General Biology course. Second, it aims to examine the analogies used in those lessons according to Thiele and Treagust's framework. A qualitative case study design is adopted…