Effect of Hypothesis Type on Scientific Literacy in Nonscience Majors

Authors

Sharon SchmidtFollow
Leanne DavisFollow
Danyelle N. Dehner-Aganovic, University of North Georgia, Dahlonega, GA, 30597Follow
Margaret (Meg) Smith, University of North GeorgiaFollow

Abstract

The University System of Georgia has undergone nine consolidations of institutions of higher education in the past seven years. One consequence of a consolidation is that faculty from historically different institutions are brought together to work in newly-created units, and this requires merging of ideas, particularly at the departmental level. In the Department of Biology of our own institution, this manifested as differences in the types of hypotheses taught in nonmajors classes in which scientific literacy is a learning outcome of high priority. Data can be useful for resolving such differences, but there was limited data on the effect of teaching different types of hypotheses on scientific literacy. To help inform our decision, we tested whether teaching null hypotheses and statistics versus teaching an alternate hypothesis without statistics affected achievement of scientific literacy in two nonmajors classes. We found that, in general, scientific literacy gains were not greatly impacted by treatment (null hypothesis with statistics versus alternate hypothesis without statistics), but rather, were more strongly impacted by instructor. We conclude that since variation among instructors had a greater impact on scientific literacy learning gains than type of hypothesis, the type of hypothesis taught could be left up to the discretion of the individual instructors.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank members of the Biology Department at the University of North Georgia who participated in this study as well as Dr. Bryan Dawson for advice on statistical analysis of the data.

Recommended Citation

Schmidt, Sharon; Davis, Leanne; Dehner-Aganovic, Danyelle N.; and Smith, Margaret (Meg) (2020) "Effect of Hypothesis Type on Scientific Literacy in Nonscience Majors," Georgia Journal of Science, Vol. 78, No. 2, Article 12.
Available at: https://digitalcommons.gaacademy.org/gjs/vol78/iss2/12