How Accurate Are Students in Self-Assessing Their Conceptions of Evolution?

Abstract

Evolution is challenging to understand for students. Frequently, students hold coexisting intuitive conceptions based on cognitive biases and scientific conceptions of evolution. For the self-regulation of intuitive and scientific conceptions, metacognitive awareness is fundamental. However, students are mostly unaware of their conceptions. A criteria-referenced self-assessment of one's intuitive and scientific conceptions is one way to develop this metacognitive awareness and enhance conceptual knowledge. We investigated in a study with N = 432 upper secondary students how accurate students are in self-assessing intuitive and scientific conceptions of evolution, which possible explanations for inaccurate self-assessments exist, and which variables are related to self-assessment accuracy (e.g., prior conceptual knowledge, metaconceptual awareness and regulation, and self-efficacy). We found that self-assessment accuracy was moderate, with students self-assessing more intuitive and scientific conceptions than present. Possible explanations for inaccurate self-assessments were incorrect understandings of concepts, excessive self-assessments (of an intuitive concept in a context where it is appropriate; of a scientific concept despite incompleteness), and mix-ups of concepts. Self-assessment accuracy was predicted mainly by prior conceptual knowledge in terms of scientific conceptions and, in some analyses, by prior conceptual knowledge in terms of intuitive conceptions and self-efficacy. The findings have important implications for using self-assessment to develop metaconceptual awareness, for adjusting self-assessments to students' preconditions (e.g., prior knowledge), and for designing teaching approaches in evolution and science education.