The comprehension through process-object conceptions. A study on the concepts involved in the resolution of optimization problems

Abstract

This article presents the results of a study on the comprehension of concepts about growth and decrease intervals and relative extremes of a function and its impacts in the results of optimization problems for Engineering students. Conceptions Process-Object defined by Ana Sfard were used as theoretical reference. In this study, 27 teams formed by two students each participated in the study. Throughout the Analysis of Main Components technique, the number of variables was reduced and the teams were grouped according to their characteristics. Among the main results, we observed that those teams that highlighted the two conceptions could solve the optimization problems. The reduced variables allowed us to characterize the Process-Objects conceptions for the above-mentioned concepts.