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Impact of Chinese Culture on Pre-service Science Teachers’ Views of the Nature of Science

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Abstract

This study examines Chinese pre-service teachers’ (N = 30) views on the nature of science (NOS) and how Chinese culture influences their views. Participants were from two teachers’ universities in eastern China. As an exploratory and interpretive study, a scenario-based interview approach was adopted. The results indicated that the participants held unique views about the five key aspects of NOS. Many participants have alternative and contemporary views of NOS, but few possess classical views. In fact, teachers adopted features of the Confucian Doctrine of the Mean either consciously or unconsciously to account for their views of NOS. This research reflects that the Doctrine of the Mean affected Chinese teachers’ views of NOS, making them rather deficient in their understandings of classical NOS. Based on empirical data, it is argued that science teacher training in China should focus on the content and objectives of classical NOS, rather than just teaching contemporary views of NOS. Taking Chinese culture into consideration, science teacher education in China cannot entirely import the strategies of teaching the classical views of NOS from the developed world, but should develop, design and contextualize local strategies that are suitable for the training of Chinese science teachers. Some issues for further investigation of learners’ views of NOS in non-Western contexts are suggested as implications from this study.

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Notes

  1. A technique for finding research subjects. One subject gives the researcher the name of another subject, who in turn provides the name of a third, and so on (Vogt 1999).

  2. The principle of Chinese medicine is based on the theory of Yin and Yang which is a kind of dialectic worldview in Chinese traditional philosophy. It holds that all things have two opposites, but interdependent sides and mutual conversion of the dialectical unity (Wu and Lin 2005; Yang and Lin 2012), which is a universal law of the physical world. Each of the two sides is at one end of the spectrum so they cannot exist without each other. In terms of Chinese medicine, it is believed that every organ in the human’s body has elements of Yin and Yang within it.

    Chinese medicine generally treats the process of the human body as an inseparable whole. The four traditional diagnostic methods, i.e. watching, listening to, dialoguing with and feeling the pulse of patients, are commonly used by traditional Chinese doctors to judge the balance between Yin and Yang of the body. According to Chinese medicine, all diseases are caused by an imbalance between the Yin and Yang, so one needs to adjust the body to reach a state of equilibrium. In the process of drug treatment, Chinese medicine, for a certain disease, is usually taken by mixing several types of herbs. In Chinese medicine, the herbs are never taken separately. Instead, the herbs are mixed and taken orally to ensure their interaction will produce the potent medicinal effects. The effectiveness of Chinese medicine has often been the result of the individual Chinese medicine practitioners’ “trial and error” methodologies without any control experimentation. It was through the accumulation of generations of such individual practitioners’ practical knowledge that makes up the long history of Chinese medicine that spans thousands of years.

    Many Chinese medical scholars believe that Chinese medicine has the same principle as the Doctrine of the Mean and the cultural tradition (Chen et al. 2006; Fang 1990; Wu et al. 2013).

  3. Author: Mencius, translator: James Legge (2016). Jin Xin I. In Mencius (Ed.), the Works of Mencius (p.488). Beijing: Zhongzhou press.

  4. Author: Zi Si, translator: James Legge (2016). The Doctrine of the Mean. The great learning (p.4). Beijing: Zhongzhou Press.

  5. Author: Confucius, translator: Liu Dianjue (2008). Xian Jin In Confucius (Ed.), The Analects. (p.186). Beijing: Zhonghua Shujun press.

  6. Author: Mencius, translator: James Legge (2016). Jin Xin I. In Mencius (Ed.), the Works of Mencius (p. 468). Beijing: Zhongzhou press.

  7. Author: Lu J. Reviewer: Zhong Z. (1980). Nian Pu, In J.Lu (Ed.), The Works of Lu Jiuyuan (Vol. 36) (pp. 481–482), Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju press.

  8. Author: Confucius, translator: Liu Dianjue (2008). Xue Er. In Confucius (Ed.), The Analects (p. 8). Beijing: Zhonghua Shujun press.

  9. Author: Confucius, translator: Liu Dianjue (2008). Su Er. In Confucius (Ed.), The Analects (p. 118). Beijing: Zhonghua Shujun press.

  10. Author: Zi Si, translator: James Legge (2016). The Doctrine of the Mean. The great learning (pp. 70–71). Beijing: Zhongzhou press.

  11. Author: Confucius, translator: Liu Dianjue (2008). Xue Er. In Confucius (Ed.), The Analects (p. 8). Beijing: Zhonghua Shujun press.

  12. Author: Confucius, translator: Liu Dianjue (2008). Zi Lu. In Confucius (Ed.), The Analects. (pp. 240–242). Beijing: Zhonghua Shujun press.

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Acknowledgements

The authors express their gratitude to the anonymous reviewers for their constructive and comprehensive comments on earlier versions of our manuscript. The authors also thank Dr. Subramaniam Ramanathan and Dr. Tan Kok Siang for their help in polishing the language of this article. This research is sponsored by the “Qing Lan Project” from Jiangsu Province, China.

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  1. School of Education Science, Jiangsu Second Normal University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China

    Dongsheng Wan

  2. Institution of Education, Nanjing University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China

    Hongshia Zhang

  3. Faculty of Education, The University of Macau, Macau, SAR, China

    Bing Wei

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Correspondence to Bing Wei.

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Table 11 Corresponding connections between views of five aspects of NOS and interview topics
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Wan, D., Zhang, H. & Wei, B. Impact of Chinese Culture on Pre-service Science Teachers’ Views of the Nature of Science. Sci & Educ 27, 321–355 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-018-9968-9

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