Turkish primary students' perceptions about scientist and what factors affecting the image of the scientists

Abstract

Students' views of science and scientists have been widely studied. The purpose of this study is to analyze image of scientist from drawn picture of scientists using The Draw-a-Scientist Test (DAST) by 5th grade students and to analyze where this image comes from students' minds in changing Turkish educational perspective. Two hundred eighty seven students from sixteen different primary schools, located in the same city, participated in this study. Like previous studies, the findings generally showed that scientists are male, Caucasians, elderly-aged, working indoors with chemistry. On the contrary, the image of scientists, having glasses and facial hair and/or crazy hair, wearing lab coats, and doing dangerous and secrecy things decreased but smiling scientists and indicator of technology increased in young Turkish students' drawings. Eventually, stereotypical images of the scientist are a slightly lesser than revealed in previous studies. The impact of science teachers and textbooks has shaped what a scientist is and what a scientist does to young students' minds. Notwithstanding, the influence of media (movies, magazines, television, etc.) has been pointed to as not significant source of information by students. Copyright © 2008 by Moment.