This document is concerned with determining student attitudes towards the support of scientific research. It is divided into three major topics. The first section briefly summarizes recent concern in the scientific community over public attitudes toward science. Section two reviews public opinion data on attitudes towards science, and three…

Experimental designs address themselves to two concerns: providing answers to research questions and controlling variance. The latter involves threats to internal and external validity. The threat to internal validity constitutes the greatest difficulty because of maturation, history, experimental mortality, and differential selection. Examples of…

Describes a program being conducted within the chemistry department of Xavier University, New Orleans, Louisiana, to improve the abstract reasoning abilities of freshmen science majors. The project is based upon the philosophy developed by Jean Piaget. (SL)

The extent to which styles of research could account for academic ideologies among academic researchers in sociology, psychology, political science, and education are discussed. The hypothesis maintains that researchers who favor styles of research that compete successfully are likely to take a conservative attitude toward student and faculty…

Three methods for improving scientific-pedagogical research are suggested: (1) increase the role of theoretical inquiry in the study of pedagogical phenomena, (2) unite the analysis of theoretical ideas with the study of typical features of pedagogical practice, and (3) evaluate critically the conclusions and recommendations of research.…

The Science Summit reinforced a question upon which many of us in science education are focused: How can we, the science education community of researchers, practitioners, and consumers, lead policy? We include a brief review of the No Child Left Behind Act and its implications for teachers, and elaborate about one ongoing and growing effort to…

In view of the research on education--and subject-related education in particular--that has been conducted in recent years, it would seem useful to describe the current state and future trends of research on science teaching and learning. In the present article, research findings are described, the deficits of science education are analyzed, and…

This article highlights the British Educational Research Association (BERA) conference, which took place on September 15-18 at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST) campus in Manchester. In this conference, delegates were told that the UK teaching profession needs to develop new "standards of evidence"…

The enactment of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has pushed to the forefront the ever-present need to conduct high quality research and translate our research findings to practice by emphasizing evidence-based practices for schools and related settings. Currently, much of the discussion surrounding evidence-based practices has focused on defining…

Included in this study are two principal tasks: (1) the preparation of a computerized roster containing relevant program information on essentially all former trainees and fellows supported by the National Institutes of Health back to the inception of the training programs in 1938, and (2) the analysis of these data and related data to determine…

This publication is designed to inform practicing science teachers of recent, relevant research results in the field of science education. Articles are written to identify ideas of practical application in the science classroom, to inform science teachers of the kinds of research which need to be done to supply answers to current concerns, and to…

Introductory educational research courses are often based on the scientific model of research derived from natural science. Scientific research using theoretical constructs and measurement of variables establishes a body of verified knowledge through replication of experiments. The conceptualization of the introductory research course presented in…

Federal funds support approximately 75% of the research programs conducted at institutions of higher education. When viewed from the standpoint of scientific productivity, these programs have substantially expanded the science base of the US, increased the scope of graduate and professional education, and enriched general education. But the…

In the first paper of this set, a paradigm which was developed in communication and diffusion research is adapted to define the educational innovation process in the form of producer-product-dissemination-users-adoption. Dissemination and adoption are subject to a number of factors, which can be further detailed. Previously innovation was seen as…

Reports that recent research has shown that family socioeconomic status is less a factor in a youngster's IQ score than is the non-economic home environment. (SL)