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A Role for Epistemic Insight in Attitude and Belief Change? Lessons from a Cross-curricular Course on Evolution and Creation

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Abstract

This paper presents findings from a quasi-experimental study evaluating future teachers’ attitudes and beliefs in response to a cross-curricular university course on evolution and creation bridging biological and Christian theological perspectives. Based on previous findings, we hypothesized that a course providing learning opportunities for epistemic insight within this multidisciplinary arena might have effects on attitudes and beliefs relevant to the field. Hence, the main research question was the following: To what extent do student teachers’ attitudes and beliefs change by attending a cross-curricular course on evolution and creation intended to develop student teachers’ epistemic insight into the nature of science and into the relationship between science and theology? The answer from this quasi-experimental evaluation study (pre–post-design; test group n = 26, control group n = 24) is as follows: It depends upon the variable investigated! Pre–post-analysis using a repeated measures ANOVA revealed that the cross-curricular course integrating epistemic insight induced changes in creationist beliefs, in students’ perception of conflict, and in acceptance of evolution. In contrast, there was no effect on attitudes toward evolutionary theory, on attitudes toward the Biblical accounts of creation, or on scientistic beliefs. However, when student responses were analyzed individually, case-based evidence for belief change in students with scientistic positions emerged. Among the reasons for those different effects, we discuss conceptual differences between attitude and acceptance, features of the student teacher sample, and the particular content of the course explicitly addressing creationism but not scientism. In conclusion, the paper corroborates the role of epistemic insight in the multidisciplinary field of evolution and creation and provides initial evidence that epistemic insight possesses a particular potential concerning positions at both ends of the spectrum.

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Notes

  1. From a scholarly point of view, it would be more precise to use the term “science and theology” instead of “science and religion,” indicating that the two scholarly disciplines act on the same level. This does not imply that “religion” is not a scholarly discipline, but that it usually refers to the study of religion as an anthropological or sociological phenomenon rather than studying the particular beliefs and doctrines which usually make up the study of theology. Importantly, the term science and religion is far more commonly used. Consequently, we decided to use the more common term within the theoretical background linking this study to previous research, but to use the more precise term in the scientific accompanying research.

  2. As there is no explicit research tradition on attitudes toward evolutionary theory, we report studies on acceptance of evolution which is a closely related construct. In contrast to our conceptualization of attitude, the construct “acceptance of evolution” is typically more rational and cognitive in nature (Konnemann et al. 2012a).

  3. The studies classified as “evolution + epistemic insight” generally do not contain an explicit reference to the concept of epistemic insight but were classified into this category according to the learning opportunities described in the respective papers, including, for example, activities on NOS or on different ways of relating evolution and creation.

  4. Means and standard deviations refer to the whole sample of n = 49 student teachers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Biology Education, University of Muenster, Schlossplatz 34, 48143, Muenster, Germany

    Christiane Konnemann, Roman Asshoff & Marcus Hammann

  2. Institute for Theologies, University of Education Freiburg, Kunzenweg 21, 79117, Freiburg, Germany

    Christian Höger

  3. Institute for Biology and Biology Education, University of Education Freiburg, Kunzenweg 21, 79117, Freiburg, Germany

    Werner Rieß

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  1. Christiane Konnemann
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  2. Christian Höger
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  4. Marcus Hammann
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Correspondence to Christiane Konnemann.

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Konnemann, C., Höger, C., Asshoff, R. et al. A Role for Epistemic Insight in Attitude and Belief Change? Lessons from a Cross-curricular Course on Evolution and Creation. Res Sci Educ 48, 1187–1204 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11165-018-9783-y

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