Investigation on the relationships between gender, mental capacity, reasoning ability, and chemistry achievement

CHED 504

Esme Hacieminoglu, hesme@metu.edu.tr1, Elvan Sahin, ealp@metu.edu.tr2, and Hamide Ertepinar, hamide@metu.edu.tr2. (1) Department of Elementary Education, University of Selcuk, Konya, Turkey, (2) Department of Elementary Education, Middle East Technical University, Education Faculty, Ankara, 06531, Turkey
The present study aimed to investigate how well reasoning ability, mental capacity, and gender related to university students' chemistry achievement on the topics of gases and chemical reactions. The data were collected from 265 students at the department of Elementary Science Education and Elementary Mathematic Education by the administration of Chemistry Achievement Test, Test of Logical Thinking, Figural Intersection Test. The results of multiple regression analysis showed that students' chemistry achievement was significantly related to their reasoning abilities. However, gender and mental capacity of the participants was not a significant predictor for their chemistry achievement. The findings of the study supported that students having greater reasoning ability had greater understanding on chemistry topics of gases and chemical reactions. This indicates that some strategies to improve students' reasoning abilities are strongly needed to enhance students' understandings of scientific concepts.
 

General Papers
1:00 PM-4:05 PM, Thursday, August 23, 2007 Seaport -- Plaza A, Oral

Division of Chemical Education

The 234th ACS National Meeting, Boston, MA, August 19-23, 2007