Epistemology and Science Education: A Study of Epistemological Views of Teachers

Research in Science & Technological Education, Volume 28, Issue 2, pages 149 - 166.

By Alexandros Apostolou and Vasilis Koulaidis

The aim of this paper is to study the epistemological views of science teachers for the following epistemological issues: scientific method, demarcation of scientific knowledge, change of scientific knowledge and the status of scientific knowledge. Teachers' views for each one of these epistemological questions were investigated during semi-structured interviews. These issues were studied according to the following epistemological positions: empirico-inductivism, hypothetico-deductivism, contextualism and relativism. In general, the analysis of the interviews showed that a mixture of empirico-inductive and contextualist positions were dominant among science teachers for most epistemological issues. The hypothetico-deductive views appeared to have little support. For the question of scientific method teachers appear to have eclectic views. 

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